It is that time of year again. I have said it before and I'll say it again. If you have never had an Oregon berry of any sort then you have no idea what that humble little fruit is capable of. Not to mention how many freaking varieties there are. Aside from your basic straw, rasp, and blue, we've got your marion, logan, tay, huckle, sylvan, olallie . . . the list goes on and on.
Now you have to understand that I grew up in Arkansas, where narry a berry ever crossed my lips. While it is an agricultural area and we had a large garden for many years, I guess the climate and such is not conducive to fruit as much as veggies and I just wasn't interested in the stuff from the produce department much less in a can. My mom and sister were always quite passionate about strawberries, but I could never figure out why they always added about 2 cups of sugar to a bowl of them to get them down. Even though I wasn't a fan, that still seemed like some sort of desecration to me.
Until 2 years ago, I thought all strawberries were quite firm and always white in the center. And then I moved here. Holy flippin cow.And the very best thing is that almost anywhere you live here in the Portland area, you can get to a "pick your own" farm in about 15 minutes. Unfortunately, the strawberry season is a short one, so both this year and last we were only able to make one trip. These pictures were taken the week before I went into labor when I still thought I had a month left in my pregnancy. In the 3 weeks it took me to recover, the strawberries disappeared.
After the strawberries are gone it's time for raspberries, blackberries and all of their relatives. This week was about marionberries, and no we're not talking about the former mayor of Washington D.C. It's a blackberry hybrid that I have been told you can only get in this area, but I'm not convinced that is true. This here bucket o' berries cost us all of 5 bucks.
Oh, did I mention that at U-pick farms, the prices run about $1.25 a pound. And are you catching the blackness of these blackberries? You are looking at a big bucket of YUM! We made a crisp that night and the rest are frozen for smoothies and ice cream toppings and so on. Ah yes, it's one of those things that make all that rain worth it.
