Recipe: Tea bread makes the most of small berries
Sunny strawberry bread marries berries and lemon. (Photos: Debbie Arrington) |
This delightful tea bread combines two favorite flavors of spring: Strawberries and lemon. It also makes good use of small berries.
Small berries is what I have right now. My strawberries have had a bountiful May, producing pint after pint of flavorful berries. And they just keep going.
I grow Seascape, a disease-resistant ever-bearing variety that's bright red all the way through. It can take the heat and produces berries from April through November. Besides all those pluses, the flavor is intense and very berry.
The first round of fruit is always the largest and prettiest; those berries go into shortcake or on top of tarts. In late May, the plants are pumping out little jewels -- thimble-sized berries that are just the right size to bake into bread or other treats.
This recipe is an adaptation of Nicole Routhier's strawberry-lemon bread in her excellent "Fruit Cookbook" (Workman Publishing, 1996).
Tossing the strawberries with a little flour before baking keeps the fruit suspended in the batter instead of sinking to the bottom of the loaf.
Yes, it's a lot of butter, but the result is light and moist.
Still a few large Seascape berries, but mostly small ones now. |
Strawberry bread is great for brunch, a snack or dessert. |
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Garden Checklist for week of May 5
Survey your garden after the May 4 rainstorm. Heavy rain and gusty winds can break the neck of large flowers such as roses. Also:
* Keep an eye on new transplants or seedlings; they could take a pounding from the rain.
* Watch out for powdery mildew. Warmth following moist conditions can cause this fungal disease to “bloom,” too. If you see a leaf that looks like it’s dusted with powdered sugar, snip it off.
* After the storm, start setting out tomato transplants, but wait on the peppers and eggplants (they want warmer nights). Pinch off any flowers on new transplants to make them concentrate on establishing roots instead of setting premature fruit.
* Trim dead flowers but not leaves from spring-flowering bulbs such as daffodils and tulips. Those leaves gather energy to create next year's flowers. Also, give the bulbs a fertilizer boost after bloom.
* Pinch chrysanthemums back to 12 inches for fall flowers. Cut old stems to the ground.
* Mulch around plants to conserve moisture and control weeds.
* From seed, plant beans, beets, cantaloupes, carrots, corn, cucumbers, melons, pumpkins, radishes and squash.
* Plant onion sets.
* In the flower garden, plant seeds for asters, cosmos, celosia, marigolds, salvia, sunflowers and zinnias. Transplant petunias, zinnias, geraniums and other summer bloomers.
* Plant perennials and dahlia tubers for summer bloom.
* Don’t wait; plant summer bulbs, such as gladiolus and tuberous begonias.
* Harvest cabbage, lettuce, peas and green onions.