How to grow enough strawberries for daiquiris

Our kids eat all the strawberries we grow as soon as they’re ripe. A lot of them don’t even get the chance to ripen before they’re plucked by hungry little fingers.

The good news? You only need four strawberries for this delicious daiquiri recipe. Our kids had a sleepover at their nana’s this week, which gave me an opportunity to swipe a handful for frozen strawberry daiquiris.

Here’s our favourite recipe (serves 1, scale up for a crowd):

1 ½ ounces white rum

½ ounce Maraschino liqueur

2 ounces lime juice

1 ½ ounces simple syrup

4 pieces of strawberry

Ice

Pour all ingredients into a blender and blend until you’re happy with the consistency. Serve in martini glasses (or any glass really) and enjoy!

I’ve been giving our strawberries a lot of love this season and it’s been paying dividends. Our plants are on their second year in our raised garden beds. It’s been a warm, wet summer in Tai Tokerau Northland, and I learned the hard way last year how quickly mould spreads. I’ve been going out almost every day to pick the fruit as soon as it ripens and also to remove any dying leaves.

There are lots of great articles on how to grow strawberries, I found this guide from Tui helpful. This is what I’ve done this year:

• Tend the plants regularly, removing ripe fruit and dying leaves
• Covered the dirt with polythene to retain heat and moisture
• Spread pea straw on top of the polythene so that the fruit wasn’t sitting directly on the plastic
• Use a net tent to keep the birds off
• Water twice a day (automated for our whole garden)

Our plants started fruiting in early October and we’re still collecting about a punnet full every second day. Next year we’re going to try a new technique that will allow us to suspend the strawberries so that they get plenty of airflow and never touch the ground.

Important note: the above recipe works with frozen strawberries if you have not got your plants in this year!