Since when are strawberries an ‘everyday essential’ in the depths of winter?

The traditional Scottish peasant diet was very limited but apparently healthy.
Fish, oats, eggs, occasional meat, kale, potatoes and berries. Wild raspberry Blaeberries, strawberry, apples, cherries, damsons, nuts....honey too
Actually I keep adding things so it wasn't so limited! 😉

Why do we never see damsons now?
Such a lovely fruit.

I think we have to grow damson trees. I never see them in the shops. Callistemon

My aunt had damson trees on her farm and she and Mum would pick them - damson tarts, damson jam, lovely.
The only thing was they're more difficult to stone than plums and some of the stones were in the jam!

welbeck

i have never thought of or been aware of fruits having seasons, except by reading about it in here and similar.
if i want a raspberry or whatever, i will pay to have one.
don't care where it comes from.
perhaps i am less aware of this as i never cared for strawberries.

Fruit is always in season somewhere in the world, but consider the transport costs to get them here. If you look at the source you can see if they are locally grown, and therefore in season. However, bananas are the main exception - and we provide a good source of income for the tropical growers.

It was 1962, when Japan airlines gifted my father a small crate of satsumas as a special item
In 1970, I walked into a greengrocer, who had them on a special display in December as a novelty item

We had many different varieties of British apples and pears through this time of the year, and we bottled other fruits, such as plums

Nigel Slater's 'Toast' book is one I read and re-read. Takes me back to my childhood days in the 50s/60s when food choices were limited, and we knew no different then.

Now we are overwhelmed by supermarkets with aisles and aisles of everything - entire aisle of yogurts, entire aisle of cheeses, entire aisles of sauces, entire aisles of ready meals, for example.

Sometimes I really crave the simplicity of the days when we had so little choice, and a strawberry in summer was a real treat.

FranP, I well remember small citrus such as tangerines (then) being a ‘ Christmas only’ item - we always had one in our stockings, and some in a bowl on the table (but you had to ask!) but hardly ever at other times. I dare say they were available for longer in the shops but in my family it would have been down to cost.

I can remember the joy if you got the special one in the paper wrapper!

Beautiful wrappers too. We used to collect them.

welbeck

i have never thought of or been aware of fruits having seasons, except by reading about it in here and similar. if i want a raspberry or whatever, i will pay to have one. don't care where it comes from. perhaps i am less aware of this as i never cared for strawberries.

You must be very young indeed if you're unaware of seasonal fruits and vegetables!!

FranP

welbeck

i have never thought of or been aware of fruits having seasons, except by reading about it in here and similar.
if i want a raspberry or whatever, i will pay to have one.
don't care where it comes from.
perhaps i am less aware of this as i never cared for strawberries.

Fruit is always in season somewhere in the world, but consider the transport costs to get them here. If you look at the source you can see if they are locally grown, and therefore in season. However, bananas are the main exception - and we provide a good source of income for the tropical growers.

It was 1962, when Japan airlines gifted my father a small crate of satsumas as a special item
In 1970, I walked into a greengrocer, who had them on a special display in December as a novelty item

We had many different varieties of British apples and pears through this time of the year, and we bottled other fruits, such as plums

My brothers could remember when bananas and oranges arrived back at the green grocer's shop after the war. They were very excited! There was a long queue outside.

DH's Aunt used to send him food parcels from Australia containing tinned fruit, a real treat during wartime.

Talking of ‘in season’, I remember my father driving us to a fruit farm in the season, where plums (for bottling) were 2d a pound! That was very cheap even then, or my folks wouldn’t have bought a lot of them.

For the likes of Welbeck, and anyone else who liked that "if i want a raspberry or whatever, i will pay to have one, don't care where it comes from." -- maybe you missed the recent widespread floods, a result of the bonkers weather caused by Global Warming? And it's YOU that is a primary cause, wanting out of season foods flown in to suit your whims?

Poppyred

My two little granddaughters have strawberries on their porridge every morning. Also in their packed lunches. So, I suppose they are?

This time of year they are tasteless, white in the middle and hard. Bananas are nutritious and are the same all year. You can't beat English strawberries in season, especially from your own garden.

DrWatson

For the likes of Welbeck, and anyone else who liked that "if i want a raspberry or whatever, i will pay to have one, don't care where it comes from." -- maybe you missed the recent widespread floods, a result of the bonkers weather caused by Global Warming? And it's YOU that is a primary cause, wanting out of season foods flown in to suit your whims?

That applies to anyone who uses any product, whether it’s out of season fruit, tea, coffee, almond milk, flour, rice, oil, medications, clothing etc.
Anything that is produced elsewhere and has to be transported here to suit you whims, contributes to global warming.
Speck and beam.

Surely the difference between the transporting of bananas and strawberries is that bananas can be picked while green and sent by ship whereas strawberries, as well as peas, beans and flowers from Kenya, don't last and so have to come by air, which as we know is much more of a threat to the climate.

I wouldn't eat soft fruit in the winter as it's such a pleasure to eat it in the summer, and also I don't buy brussels sprouts from Morocco in the summer, as we enjoy eating them in the winter so much.

True, Wheniwasyourage, and less pollution is better than more pollution, but all transport causes pollution and uses finite resources. It’s a bit like Greta Thunberg going all over the world to tell people about global warming.

No, strawberries aren't everyday essentials. They aren't in season. Fruit in season could be classed as everyday.

i am not particularly young; from what people say, i know i am older than several on here.
nor do i think my whims are destroying the world.
like most people, if i like and can afford something that is in the shops, i will buy it.
it's a simple as that.
maybe certain things were not in the shops at certain times when i was young, but i didn't notice.
maybe i wasn't doing the buying then.
i also think this is largely a class issue.

I am fed up with reading that everything in life is a 'class' issue.

What on earth has what you eat got to do with 'class', (whatever that may be)

Tinned fruit cocktail. Yuk.

CoolCoco

Tinned fruit cocktail. Yuk.

With a tin of Carnation milk

DrWatson

For the likes of Welbeck, and anyone else who liked that "if i want a raspberry or whatever, i will pay to have one, don't care where it comes from." -- maybe you missed the recent widespread floods, a result of the bonkers weather caused by Global Warming? And it's YOU that is a primary cause, wanting out of season foods flown in to suit your whims?

Which seasonal fruits, on sale now, in January, are grown in the UK? They are all being shipped in from somewhere.

Last week I saw some huge strawberries for sale in the supermarket. Three quarters of each was fruit was bright green and a quarter red, they looked very hard, and, I would imagine, were tasteless. I only buy strawberries in season ie British because oddly, I like strawberries to taste like strawberries.

Lucy Ann and Coco.
To me the worse thing about tinned fruit and evaporated milk was being made to eat bread and butter with them. The same went for any dessert such as trifle. I vowed as a child that I would never make any children of mine have to go through that.