A fresh strawberry tart, chocolates, and champagne set the mood for an evening of romance.
Strawberries are a delectable treat any time of year, but in February they are known as the fruit of love. Long before Valentine's Day was celebrated, the strawberry was associated with love and fertility due to its shape, red color, and abundance of seeds on the fruit surface. According to folklore, if two people cut a strawberry and each eats a half, they will fall in love. In an old French tradition, strawberry soup is served for breakfast to a newlywed couple the morning after the ceremony as an aphrodisiac. When strawberries are paired with another aphrodisiac, such as chocolate, one can hardly fail to romance their sweetheart.
Today, there are numerous strawberry cultivars grown worldwide that vary in flavor and appearance. When purchasing strawberries, choose those that are bright red in color. Avoid those with white or yellow flesh near the stem end as they do not continue to ripen and usually won't taste as sweet as a fully red-colored fruit. After purchasing strawberries, keep them refrigerated until use. While those purchased at grocers will usually last for 5 to 7 days, more mature strawberries purchased at roadside markets will likely have a shorter life even with refrigeration.
Strawberries with white or yellowish flesh will not continue to ripen.
Strawberries are available year-round due to global production outdoors, in greenhouses, and in high tunnels. Strawberries grown in Missouri are usually available beginning in May. Despite the name, June-bearing strawberries are recommended for planting outdoors and bear fruit for 2 to 4 weeks. Some of the older, reliable cultivars are Earliglow, Honeoye, and Jewel. Some of the newer June-bearing cultivars include D 'Light, Dickens, and Keepsake, but these are yet to be tested in Missouri. Although day-neutral strawberry cultivars potentially produce fruit in the summer or fall, flowering is adversely affected by high temperatures, especially in Missouri. As a result, little fruit may be harvested following hot weather.
Strawberries are planted outdoors in full sun. For large areas, they are planted after the danger of frost in a matted row system, about 30 inches apart in rows 3½ to 4 feet apart. Daughter plants are allowed to develop subsequently to fill the space within rows. During the year of planting, remove any flowers that develop, provide irrigation when needed, and keep the area weed-free. To protect plants from subsequent winter injury, cover them with straw mulch in late fall when temperatures have dropped to 20°F for about 3 days, which usually occurs near the end of November or in early December in Missouri.
The following spring, rake the straw covering the plants to the outer edges of the row. To avoid soft fruit, do not fertilize plants until after harvest. Keep the plants well water-watered (about 1 inch per week) during the summer. Pick strawberries every 2 to 3 days when the fruit is fully colored. Remove any overripe or diseased fruit from the planting to avoid additional fruit loss from spotted wing drosophila and other insects.
After harvest, it is important to renovate the planting to ensure future fruit production. Renovation involves mowing off old leaves, fertilizing and thinning plants, as well as tilling between the rows to maintain them in a 12-inch-wide strip. Thinning plants to enhance the drying of foliage aids in the prevention of foliar diseases such as gray mold, leaf spot, and scorch. Well-managed plantings generally remain productive for 4 years.
Detailed information on growing strawberries is available from University of Missouri Extension at: https://extension.missouri.edu/publications/g6135.