While strawberries have always been a popular pick-your-own fruit, today they have also become a hit with home gardeners and those with container gardens. If you planted strawberries; what are the nutritional benefits, how do you care for them, and how can you use them?
Nutritional facts on a 1 cup serving of strawberries:
- Contain about 50 calories, making it a low-calorie food
- Include almost 4 grams of fiber
- Provide a good source of vitamin C
- Also is a source of calcium, potassium, vitamin A, folate, iron, and phosphorus
- Provide antioxidants in your diet which may prevent cancer and heart disease
Care of the berries:
- If you are picking berries, the best time is in the morning, after the dew has dried.
- Keep picked berries out of direct sunlight for the best shelf life.
- Berries won’t continue to ripen, so pick fully red berries and keep the leaf caps on them.
- Refrigerate picked berries as soon as possible, washing only when ready to use.
- To freeze berries – wash, remove leaf caps, drain on paper towel or in colander, place on cookie sheet, and freeze whole. Place in container once frozen, for whole berries. Or freeze with sugar for sweetened berries – about ½ cup sugar per pint of berries.
Ideas for serving strawberries include: sliced on a Romaine lettuce or spinach salad, in quick bread or muffins (think sweet zucchini bread), smashed on yogurt or ice cream, sliced on a sandwich or your cereal, or blended in a smoothie.
Berry Smoothie Recipe
1 cup strawberries, fresh or frozen
1 sliced banana or 1 cup other fruit such as peaches, grapes, pear, blue berries, etc
1 ½ cups skim milk
1 container, 6 oz., lite fruit flavored yogurt
1 cup ice
Blend all ingredients in blender. Serves 2 to 3. Contains 150 – 170 calories, 7 grams of protein, 30 grams of carbohydrate, and 1 to 2 grams of fat.
Sources:
University of Illinois Extension, http://urbanext.illinois.edu/strawberries/
Penn State Extension: http://extension.psu.edu/plants/gardening/fphg/strawberries/harvest-and-post-harvest-care
Writer: Lisa Barlage, Extension Educator, Family and Consumer Sciences, Ohio State University Extension, Ross County.
Reviewers:
Michelle Treber, Extension Educator, Family and Consumer Sciences, Ohio State University Extension, Pickaway County.
Bridgette Kidd, Program Specialist, Healthy People, Ohio State University Extension, Family and Consumer Sciences.
