Fifty-seven years since the Beatles sang of a “Strawberry Fields Forever” dreamscape, it’s actually not that much of a challenge to find fresh strawberries all year round. However, there is a big difference between biting into luscious, sweet, fragrant whole ones that come from a local farm at peak season and chiseling off anything remotely appetizing from the sour, pale bits of the ones you find at the grocery store in the other months. 

We’re in the height of strawberry season where I live in the Northeastern United States. I’m lucky to have three days a week to shop at local Brooklyn greenmarkets with stands that sell freshly picked berries—twice a week at Borough Hall and Carroll Gardens on Sundays. The fruit is usually so ripe that the juice starts to leak out of the little green cardboard carton the moment it’s set in my tote bag. They are so ripe that they all but spontaneously jamify (that’s a word, and I’m sticking to it). I find immense joy in having a berry juice-stained tote bag.  

Yes, I have become one of those Brooklyn women with a tote bag at the farmer’s market. I have also been seen in clogs from time to time. They got me.