Monday, June 21, 2010

Strawberry Pickin’ and Jam Makin’

On Saturday we went strawberry picking at Barthel Farm.   During our 3 years in Wisconsin we have never been strawberry picking.  I have never wanted to pick my own fruit (and pay for it!) after spending my childhood Summer Saturdays picking apples, apricots, peaches, cherries, plums and apples in our back yard.  I remember hurrying to fill up a bucket of fruit so I could go play with my friends.  This year I decided to put my painful fruit-picking past behind me and finally go strawberry picking. We only have 5 more weeks left in Wisconsin and I don’t want to leave anything out. 

To make a long story kind of short, I am so glad we went.  It was such a fun Saturday morning, family activity.  The strawberries were huge and delicious.  We ended up picking 13 pounds of strawberries (partly on accident).  They give you a large crate to put your berries in and you think you should fill it, and fill it we did.   After picking such a large quantity of strawberries Karen and I made tons of jam.  I’ve always made freezer jam but because we have to move the jam to Utah we tried canning it this time.  I LOVED canning it.  I don’t think I'm ever going to make freezer jam again.  It just takes up room in the freezer and looks ugly in those Ziploc containers. 

After canning 29 jars of jam I still had a lot of strawberries left.  So we ate a ton and froze some.

DSC02362

DSC02371

DSC02366

DSC02378

2 comments:

Megan said...

The fruit picking farms out there were so much fun. I miss it!

Mel said...

i'm new on the MBASA group and thought i'd check out your blog. my brother lived in wisconsin for a while and loved it as well. guess we'll be getting to know you all more over the next 2 years. good luck with the move.