109. Strawberries - Christina Sinclair: Salty Sam's Fun Blog for Children

March 17th, 2017

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Salty Sam’s Fun Blog for Children

Number 109

Strawberries

Hello Everyone

Hands up anyone who likes strawberries!

Well, l suppose a few people don’t like them, but my nephews Bill and Bob love them and decided last summer that they would try and grow their own.

They bought some plants already growing in a strawberry tower from the Rocky Bay Plant Nursery because if you plant little strawberry plants in the garden, you have to wait a long time before you get fruit.

Strawberry plants grow in most types of soil but it must be well-drained.

You can get wild strawberries, they are tiny and sweet, but the garden variety, which was first grown in Northern France, and is now grown all over the world, produces a bigger crop.

Strawberries became bigger when the wild variety was crossed with an American variety.

Strawberries will rot, if they lay on damp ground. That is why when they are grown in fields, farmers put down a layer of straw to create a barrier between the strawberries and the earth. The best straw is barley straw but sometimes farmers use black polythene which doesn’t look as romantic but still works. This is done just as the berries are swelling and beginning to ripen.

Have you ever stood in the middle of a strawberry field on a hot summer’s day and smelled all the strawberries cooking in the heat? lt smells wonderful!

Well, Bill and Bob didn’t have enough room in their garden for a whole strawberry field so they had to plump for a strawberry tower instead.

ln a strawberry tower, the berries hang down the sides and catch the sunshine in order to ripen.

Bill and Bob positioned a cage over it so that the birds and squirrels didn’t help themselves to the strawberries while they were at school!

Strawberries are very nutritious and so are very good for you – unless of course you are one of those unfortunate people who are allergic to them.

However, help may be at hand. A new white strawberry has been produced that is far less likely to cause a bad reaction in people affected by the red ones. They are also less likely to be taken by birds before you can get to them yourself.

You can also now get black strawberries.

Strawberries can be used in many different ways: milkshakes, yoghurts, jams and lots of different dessert recipes. l’m sure you have your favourites.

Do you love cream on your strawberries? lt is thought that Cardinal Wolsey was the first to create this delicious combo for the guests at Hampton Court.

A strange thing that you might not know is that strawberries are actually related to roses! Both do well in British gardens.

So Bill and Bob did get quite a good crop of strawberries from their tower, but unfortunately none of them actually got to the dinner table because every time they saw one ripen they just ate it in the garden!

To solve this problem, their mum went to the farm shop and bought a very large box of strawberries so that everyone could have some for dessert!

Bye bye everyone – don’t forget to subscribe to my blog!

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Thank you!

And see you again next Fun Friday!

Love and kisses

Salty Sam

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www.christina-sinclair.com

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Bill and Bob’s Joke of the Week

Bob: Doctor, doctor, l keep thinking l’m a strawberry!

Bill: Yes, l can see you’re in a bit of a jam!

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Salty Sam © Christina Sinclair 2015

Unauthorized use and/or duplication of material from this blog without express and written permission from this blog’s author and owner is strictly prohibited.

Links may be used to www.christina-sinclair.com

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Picture Gallery

Strawberry flowers are white

A strawberry tower

Straw protects the berries from the damp ground

White strawberries

Lots of people love strawberries!

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desk THE SALTY SAM NEWS DESK

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And so this week, Bill and Bob thought they would make you another word puzzle for my blog. It is a gap-fill puzzle and this time all the things are red. Then they went off to the Rocky Bay Nursery to buy some more seeds for sowing in the garden this spring.

Just fill in the missing letters to find out what they are.

s_r_w_e_r_
t_m_t_
L_n_o_ b_s
p_p_y
p_l_a_ b_x
L_n_a_h_r_ r_s_

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TO ADVERTISE ON THIS BLOG

PLEASE CONTACT:

christina.sinclair.ads@aol.co.uk

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Recipe Spot

This is an easy recipe for an upside-down strawberry tiramisu which will serve 4 people.

You will need:

8 amaretto biscuits

2 teaspoons of camp coffee (or a teaspoon of instant coffee dissolved in a table spoon of water)

2 tablespoons of caster or icing sugar

250g mascarpone cheese

300ml thick double cream

1 small punnet of strawberries

Arrange slices of strawberries in the bottom of four dessert dishes
Mix the coffee, sugar, cheese and cream gently together in a bowl divide mixture and place into the dishes
Crush the biscuits in a bowl with the end of a rolling pin and sprinkle on top of the desserts

* lf you don’t like amaretto biscuits you can decorate with strawberries instead.

* You can adjust the amount of sugar and coffee used to suit your own taste.

* You, as head chef, are allowed to eat the left-over strawberries whilst working in the kitchen!

(Don’t forget to wash your hands before you start cooking anything.)

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weekend

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lt’s the Weekend!

HOW TO MAKE A PUNNET OF STRAWBERRlES PlN CUSHlON

It is traditional to have strawberry pincushions, but this project has a modern twist; a whole punnet of strawberries.

Make sure you make plenty of strawberries and pack them in tightly so that your pins don’t fall between them. You will need a sheet of green felt and two of red.

This pin cushion looks good enough to eat – but don’t!

Cut 2 circles of red felt 4½cm/1¾ inches in diameter

Cut 2 circles of red felt 5½cm/2¼ inches in diameter

Cut these circles into half.

Thread a line of running stitches down the straight end, pull it up and stuff the berry with a little stuffing before you gather the top of the strawberry completely.

Cut some green strawberry tops and sew them on to the top of your strawberry taking a line of straight stitching half way down the centre of the leaf in order to make it curl.

The tops are like pointed-petal flowers with five petals – make them in paper before you cut them in felt to make sure they look right.

*Stuff the strawberries as hard as you can because pin cushions need to be tough.

Cut some plastic canvas sheets and sew together using white yarn along the edges.

The punnet in the photograph has a base which is 21 holes by 12 holes.

The sides are 21 by 6 holes and the ends are 12 by 6 holes.

Make as many strawberries as you need to cover the base.

Arrange the strawberries so that the top of the arrangement is as flat as you can get it and don’t leave any gaps for the pins to fall into. Having different sized berries should make this easier.