How to live now

One punnet of strawberries – 17 fantastic ways to use them, from cake to ketchup

There is more to strawberry recipes than just cream and sugar. Try pairing them with tomatoes, avocados, basil or harissa – if you dare

If you are not going to get out there and pick strawberries, the least you can do is eat them. Britain, farmers tell us, is facing a huge strawberry glut, thanks to the cancellation of major events such as Wimbledon (where 33 tonnes of strawberries were eaten last year), along with thousands of weddings and summer parties. As civic duties go, eating loads of strawberries isn’t that taxing, but they won’t sit around waiting for you to come up with new ways to serve them. Here are 17 delicious ideas to help you manage your personal stockpile.

Maceration is step number one in a lot of the recipes below. At its simplest, macerating consists of hulling and halving a quantity of strawberries, tossing them in a bowl with a couple of tablespoons of sugar, then leaving them to sit in the fridge for half an hour or longer, but not long enough for them to turn into mush (meaning not overnight). Additions to the basic formula may include juice (orange or lemon), balsamic vinegar or alcohol.

Cakes and tarts

A basic strawberry tart, however, requires no maceration. You just make – or otherwise obtain – a shortcrust pastry case, fill it with whipped cream or pastry cream (I have had some success with this fail-safe Youtube tutorial by Thomas Joseph) and sink sliced strawberries into the top in an orderly spiral. You can get very fussy about sizing fruit for a neat look or, alternatively, not bother.

Felicity Cloake’s strawberry tart is slightly more sophisticated, in that you have to be the sort of person who has rosewater to hand, but it is no more difficult to produce. It also contains a handy recipe-within-a-recipe, for an incredibly useful no-roll shortcrust pastry: you just press the mixture into the tin with the base of a cup.

Yotam Ottolenghi’s strawberry and basil tart has an intriguing combination of strawberries, pistachios and basil-infused pastry cream. It also calls, thankfully, for store-bought puff pastry. Life may not be too short to make your own puff pastry, but the British summer definitely is.

Strawberry shortcake is the traditional American way to keep on top of a strawberry glut, but Cloake’s reclaimed British version is excellent. As you will see, strawberry shortcakes are not cakes at all, but individual assemblages of macerated strawberry, whipped cream and large biscuit. However, it is not uncommon in America to make one large one and slice it like a cake. The ingredients are the same, although the amounts might differ since you will probably want three layers for height. This version has the right proportions.

In terms of actual cake, a strawberry and olive oil breakfast cake fits the bill, while Cassie Best’s strawberry and almond cheesecake sponge could be more accurately described as a sponge with “cheesecake blobs” in it.

Salads

If you are like me, it might take you a while to get your head round the idea of using strawberries in salads, especially salads that sound as if they would be just as good without them. But let us not forget why we are here: to level Britain’s massive strawberry mountain before it collapses and buries us all.

Here is what I would suggest: before you commit to a whole salad, try a few bites of the relevant flavour combinations first, to see if they work for you. Some will be delightful from the outset; others may be tastes longer in the acquiring. I haven’t yet made Ottolenghi’s strawberry and tomato salad, but I did put a tomato and a strawberry in my mouth at the same time, and I can testify that they have a surprising affinity. Now I just need to convince my family.

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall recommends a strawberry and avocado salad, dressed with parmesan and a simple honey and lemon dressing. Mark Bittman’s strawberry and rocket is another rather startling combination to experiment with, as is Erin Clarke’s spinach and strawberry salad.

Frozen desserts

I am always drawn to ice-cream recipes that don’t require an ice-cream maker, because I don’t own one and I don’t want one. This straightforward freezer recipe from Tom Hunt, chef at Poco in Bristol, has just four ingredients: strawberries, sugar, double cream and mascarpone. Mine didn’t turn out quite as rippled as his, but it disappeared very quickly.

Jeremy Lee’s strawberry granita is simplicity itself, and should really be kept that way. As he says, cream is not required, “and the addition of a sprig of mint is absolutely forbidden.”

Compotes, sauces and jams

A surplus of ripe strawberries can quickly turn into an embarrassment of overripe strawberries: bruised, soft, leaking. Compotes and preserves are the perfect way to rescue them. Strawberry jam is the most obvious route, and, as always, Felicity Cloake supplies the winnowed-down, optimal version. The major issue with strawberries is their lack of pectin, which causes jam to set. You need to add some, either in the from of other, pectin-rich fruit (lemons, say), or by using jam sugar, which already includes pectin.

Strawberry compote is even simpler and keeps in the fridge for about two weeks. If you are looking for something more adventurous, try Ottolenghi’s frankly counter-intuitive strawberry and harissa ketchup, which he recommends as an accompaniment to grilled meats. After the thing with the tomato and the strawberry, I am willing to take his word for it.

Drinks

Strawberries are, for many people, just smoothies waiting to happen, either alone or in combination with numberless other fruits. You can begin with the basic format (strawberry, banana, orange juice) and experiment by adding elements –cranberries, chia seeds, oatmeal – until you realise you have gone too far. Then pull back a little.

For something a bit stronger, Tom Hunt’s strawberry daiquiri is a respectable way to use up any final stray strawberries, or any leftover vodka. Hunt recommends macerating the berries in grappa beforehand, but if you don’t have grappa, a little more vodka makes a decent substitute. If you don’t have a proper blender, you can use a hand blender in a tall jug, although you might have to break up the ice a little first. If you haven’t got a jug, just wash out a large vase. You can see I really wanted to make this work. And it did, in the end.