Strawberry Shortcake

A couple of weeks ago, my little man and I went strawberry picking. This was the first time we'd ever been, and we loved it! It is work, kind of hard on the legs and back, but we ended up with 20 pounds of strawberries for about 1/2 of what we would have paid for them from the super market.

Isaac worked very hard, filling up his little green bucket 5 times. The last time he filled it, he said he only chose the biggest ones he could find. He said that they were all for eating, not for jam. :-) He didn't complain at all while we were picking. That's a pretty big deal for him. We had gotten up at 5:30 that morning, and he's my child who's difficult to wake up at 8 when we have to. I know he was tired that morning, but he kept on picking. We had a great time together, picking and making memories at the strawberry patch.

Still not complaining, but visibly tired. It was now 8:45 in the morning, and we'd already picked 20 pounds of strawberries.
We froze about 1/2 of them for later use.
Besides that, we made freezer jam, and enjoyed many of them within the next days after picking.

One of our favorite ways to enjoy fresh strawberries is with shortcake. Here's a fantastic recipe for fresh homemade shortcake:

• 2 cups flour                                         
• 3/4 cup milk
• 1 Tbspn baking powder
• 1/2 tspn salt
• 3 Tbspn sugar
• 6 Tbspn butter
• 1 quart strawberries
• 1/3 cup sugar
• whipping cream

1. Prepare strawberries-wash, cut, and combine with sugar. Set aside at room temp for an hour.
2. Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Butter and flour 9 inch cake pan (this size works well for this size of recipe. If you're doubling it, use a larger pan.)
3. Mix flour, sugar, baking powder and salt.
4. Stir in milk slowly, mixing only until dough is moist.
5. Form dough "biscuits", they will be lumpy. Place in pan.
6. Bake 10-15 minutes, until golden brown.

I know it may seem like quite a few steps, but it's really not difficult. And the time spent making it is totally worth it for the yumminess afterwards! It's SO much better than those sponge cakes from the grocery store. Hope you enjoy it!