Strawberry Time

It's time for strawberries picking!

We have been busy every week since the beginning of June choosing the reddest, freshest, and juiciest strawberries from one of our raised bed around the formal pond.

The garden strawberry is a very easy plant to grow even if you don't have a large space, a pot on your balcony can be a suitable home for it. Direct sunlight exposition and daily watering are the best ways to grow this plant and get its sweet and pretty scarlet fruits.

Actually strawberries are not just red! We have white berry plants with just tiny red dot seeds on the surface of each fruit. This special quality of strawberry has smaller fruit than a common strawberry and it is know as "Pineberry" because of its pineapple-like flavour.

If you feel inspired by this tasty fruit why you don't try one of the recipes of  Pebble Soup' s blog?

Rhubarb-Strawberry Meringue Pot

Ingredients

450g rhubarb cut into 4cm/1½in chunks

Golden caster sugar

About 10 strawberries halved & tailed

2 eggs separated

Method

1. Put the rhubarb in a saucepan sprinkle over 50g/2oz of the sugar and stir together. Cook for 20 minutes until tender.

2. Allow to cool slightly. Stir in the strawberries then the egg yolks. Divide the rhubarb mixture between four 175ml/6fl oz ramekins. Put on a baking sheet and cook in the oven for 10 minutes until lightly thickened.

3. While the rhubarb is cooking, whisk the egg whites until stiff. Sprinkle over half of the remaining sugar and whisk again. Gently fold in the rest of the sugar. Pile the meringue on top of the rhubarb to cover it completely and swirl the top. Return to the oven for 10 minutes until the meringue is puffy and golden. Serve immediately.