One of the simple joys of life is picking fresh strawberries in Germany and eating to your heart’s content.
Picking Strawberries From A Roadside Patch In Germany
Strawberry season in Germany runs from early May to early July. Across Germany, you can find fresh German strawberries in grocery stores but 35% of the country’s harvest is sold directly to consumers via road stalls or farm shops.
One of our first activities after getting settled in Baden-Württemberg was to find strawberries. It was now early July, quite late in the season, but thankfully we caught the last week of harvesting.
It rains throughout the summer in Germany and the fields were ankle-deep in mud. You absolutely need to wear rubber boots or galoshes to protect yourself and your car from getting very dirty.
I can’t quite describe it, but there is something really special about German strawberries. They are not pumped full of hormones to make them plum-sized (as we often find them in California) but are generally quite small. And unbelievable sweet.
As my wife explained it, you get to “sample” strawberries as you go in exchange for the much higher price per kilogram you pay for these berries versus at the grocery store. Oh, how we sampled them! Some are covered in dirt. Some have some bugs you have to brush off…but you just eat them. No one got sick.
This was particularly special for my wife, who grew up picking strawberries and now got to share that joy with our children.
Word of warning: only buy what you can eat over the next day. Without preservatives and other additives, these strawberries go bad very fast once picked.
CONCLUSION
In the past, strawberries were only available in Germany during that two-month window. With global freight, strawberries are now available throughout the year, but there is nothing like picking your own strawberries and enjoying them while you work.
This is part of my summer in Germany trip report.
In southern Netherlands you can find Het Aardbeienland, which takes this a step further – a strawberry themed park, which naturally includes strawberry picking. Great fun for all strawberry lovers.
Your two children have enjoyed to pick and eat them.
Great idea for an outdoor activity.
Memories you’ll never forget. Takes me back to my childhood in Bayern. My mom yelling out “Vergiss nicht, deine Gummistiefel!”
Don’t think that not feeling sick is the same as not getting sick. You can pick up parasites from the soil by eating unwashed strawberries or other fruit. You can get toxoplasmosis, which can cause very serious eye diseases. It won’t happen in a day or a week but it could be months or years. Just don’t cheat and pay for all the strawberries that you take then wash them at home or in the hotel.
Probiotics are taken in their purest form… very healthy.
Looks like the small, sweet strawberries that you’ll find at pick your own farms across New England.
A trick to keeping fresh strawberries for a couple of days is to refrigerate them, or to cut them up and add a little bit of sugar and then refrigerate. Or just make strawberry jam to enjoy all year round 🙂