The “buy local” movement is growing. Many home gardeners are growing their own food so they can feel confident that they are eating wholesome food that is grown organically or naturally. Many are discovering foods that are a world apart in taste from what they have been buying at the local produce or grocery. They are discovering gourmet strawberries among others.
Gourmet strawberries include open pollinated strawberries that have been grown for hundreds of years. They also include heirloom varieties that have fallen from favor with the large corporate farms that provide strawberries to the grocery chains.
Recently, I read a call for research projects from the national strawberry association. Among the preferred projects was one that requested research to develop larger fruited varieties. This is indicative of the direction of research projects with strawberries. Here in America the large corporations that produce the bulk of the strawberries we eat, believe that big is better. Home gardeners are finding that big is more of the same tasteless strawberries. The only way you will get to experience what strawberries should taste like is to grow your own.
I invite you to explore the world of gourmet strawberries. I like to call them “strawberries with taste”.