Recipe Wednesday! Wild Strawberry Fruit Leather and Fool! (the dessert, not the insult)

These bright little GEMS are just starting to ripen in our area. We LOVE eating them fresh, if we can beat our free-ranging poultry to them first!

An old-time way to preserve wild strawberries is by making STRAWBERRY LEATHER. This method was used in Europe and by the Indians. The colonists soon were preserving berries this way, too. The berries were dried into thin cakes the size of pancakes. Then they were eaten that way or made into sauces, pies, and puddings.
Wild strawberries have been used for many purposes over the years - strawberry wines, strawberries and cream, strawberry jams and jellies, strawberry shortcake, etc. Strawberries are high in vitamin C. The leaves, nutritious, too, have been used for strawberry tea, a drink rich in this vitamin.
Strawberry juice was used in years past as a wash for the complexion. The roots and leaves have been utilized as an astringent.
Wild strawberries are very fragile berries. They get mushy very quickly. So these berries should be handled carefully when picked and transported. They also should be used, either eaten or preserved as soon as possible.

WILD STRAWBERRY FRUIT LEATHER

Ingredients:

2 pounds hulled strawberries
1 cup sugar

Directions:

In a pan, simmer 2 pounds hulled strawberries with 1 cup sugar over low heat. Stir and mash fruit as it cooks and gets as thick as possible.

Then spread the mixture on a flat dish and place in the sun, a food dryer, or low 200 degree oven. When dried, sprinkle with powdered sugar and cut into squares. Store in covered container to keep out moisture.

(-adapted from www.oldfashionedliving.com)

EASY WILD STRAWBERRY FOOL

Ingredients:

1/2 lb wild strawberries
1 tsp sugar
1/2 pint whipping cream
A few berries and a little grated chocolate for garnish

Directions:

Wash the strawberries, de-husk them and slice them to about 1/8". Add them to a pot with the tsp. of sugar and gently bring up to heat. (No water is required, as the natural juices of the strawberries will be sufficient.)
The strawberries should be stirred regularly with a wooden spoon as they begin to break down, and after around five minutes, should have pureed sufficiently. Note that some solid pieces remaining add a little bit of bite and character to the finished dish. Set the puree, covered, aside to cool. This will take at least half an hour.
When the strawberry puree has cooled, the cream should be poured in to a large bowl and whisked until soft peaks begin to form. At this stage, the strawberry puree mixture should be folded in to the cream, not stirred in, or a lot of the trapped air will be lost from the cream. This will spoil the final effect of the dish.
The strawberry cream should then carefully be spooned into four serving glasses. A little chocolate should be grated over each, then top each serving with a fresh strawberry. Serve immediately or refrigerate until required.

“Doubtless God could have made a better berry (than the strawberry), but doubtless God never did.”
~William Allen Butler