Strawberries have no flavor anymore. Agree or disagree?

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For years I've been searching in vain for strawberries which taste like they used to. Has all the sweetness been bred out of them? Of course, they're more beautiful than ever, but they're just not sweet. I bought some organic ones at the local farmer's market yesterday. They looked nice and small, but they weren't really sweet. People who've never tasted sweet strawberries think they're great, but doesn't anyone else remember that strawberries can actually be sweet? Years ago when I lived in China, we had strawberries for about 2-3 weeks a year. They were ugly and half green, but the flavor was amazing. Same goes for strawberries in Europe years ago, but I think even there they've bred the sweetness out of them. Bring back sweet strawberries!

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Driscolls, the huge fruit company, packages their tasteless strawberries in scented plastic. White interior means no taste at all to me. I get great strawberries in January-March in Florida. There is an organic farm inland from me that has great ones. Alva, Florida is the location.

I can't remember getting good tasting strawberries for years in Michigan. I did grow my own Fraises de Bois and they were instensely sweet and delicious but the rabbits and birds did play merry hell with the plants.

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Just buy from local growers and you will find the good stuff.

The local berries start showing up in Oregon in June, well worth waiting for. Will be seeing some blueberries and rasberries first, some of the best available.

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Don't know where you are located. Here in Southern New England, there are no strawberries worth eating until about the first of July.

Off season fruit that travels a great distance may look pretty, but is lacking in taste.

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I would have certainly agreed, until this year...my husband heard that the CA crop was both ridiculously abundant AND delicious, and--although suspicious of these giant honkers appearing in the stores--I tried some, and he was right! 

Now, that said, the only ones that REALLY have true strawberry flavor, though, come straight from my (sadly too small) backyard strawberry patch. :-)

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I agree completely, unless they are locally grown. The ones in the supermarkets now are a waste of money and besides, they go bad in a day.

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Key is to buy SMALL strawberries that look ugly.

More often than not producers have been trying to find the holy grail of "beauty queen" strawberries -- so much the better for dipping in chocolate and charging a premium, but so much the worse on the palate.

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just went to a local pick your own farm in south Fl, picked 7lbs to make jam at 99c/lb but they really don't taste of much at all. I sampled ripe, very ripe, large and small and they are all the same - tasteless. Fortunately they are going to be jam. Disappointing. 

Fresh with some confectioners sugar helps a little to brighten the taste or some sweetened heavy cream.

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I live in North Carolina and these strawberries are local, pesticide-free and in season. While they are way better than the white-centered Driscoll's, they're still not nearly as good as they used to be. I really think people have forgotten what strawberries are supposed to taste like. They're supposed to actually be sweet. No sugar needed. My experience has been much like smartie's.

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Well, of course if you get them in season they will be best, aside from growing them yourself. I do have a little trick though.... try rinsing them in hot tap water. It mimics the sun and will boost their sweetness!

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I think the answer is on two fronts.

First, don't buy strawberries when they're out of season wherever you are. If you do, you'll be eating stuff that will have travelled great distances, probably picked well before it was properly ripe and, almost certainly, it'll be a variety grown more for travelling well and long life than taste.

And for second, see first. Most supermarkets sell a very very limited range of varieties, even when homegrown. Where I am, it's rare to find something that isnt Elsanta which is probably the most boring berry you'll ever want to find - but it keeps well on the shelf and looks nice and red. Perfect if you're a supermarket; not perfect if you're a customer. 

Farmers markets, farm shops and pick-your-own farms can be a good source but not necessarily. At the market or shop, ask to taste one.

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I know what you mean! I go to the farmers market and when I ask how the strawberries taste, I'm told, "they're super sweet!" I don't want super sweet. I can mix water and sugar in a glass. I want a strawberry flavored strawberry. The kind I remember from my childhood. Sweet is just that, I want a sweet and flavorful strawberry.

The closest I have come are the small Seascape strawberries out of the west coast. I was told they are becoming increasingly rare due to their short shelf life. It's unfortunate, people complain because their strawberries don't last an entire week in the fridge. 

It's a trade off - if you want a ripe, juicy, richly flavored strawberry, it will likely not last for more than a few days. The genetically modified, watery, size of your fist, flavorless, things at the big box stores (and increasingly at the farmers market) will last for weeks...but I don't want them.

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Suse,

i agree that strawberries have no flavor anymore. My mother used to rave about the wild ones that she picked as a child and teenager in Northern Michigan. Hybridization to create a strawberry that will travel and last has killed the true strawberry for most of us. They're still out there, here and there, but we must search for them. Thati's why LilMsFoodie's remark about a place in Alva, Florida (upthread) intrigued me so much.

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I disagree. It might be where you get them. I live in Southern California and they taste awesome here. But, I don't eat them so much that I take them for granted.

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I live in the Houston area, and every year we go to King's Orchard to pick our own strawberries. They have been in business for over 20 years, and they said this was the best strawberry crop they have ever had. Four of us picked 36 pounds in about an hour. And they were amazing! Juicy and sweet. The trick with strawberries is to not pick them until they are perfectly red and ripe. Unfortunately the ones in the stored have been picked too green so that they transport better.

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the mass-distributed ones by large companies like Driscoll's are worthless - completely devoid of flavor, and often water-logged or spongy.

go with smaller, local farms if you're fortunate enough to have access - we're blessed here in San Diego to have several - but even then it can be a crap shoot. i was hugely disappointed with the first offerings from a farm just north of here a few weeks ago, but the pint of organic strawberries i picked up yesterday from another local source was really wonderful - like the sweet, flavorful berries i remember from childhood.

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I am not sure it's just strawberries. I have yet to have a good peach bought from a supermarket - they are dry and floury with zero flavor. The last time I had good peaches were from a roadside stand in N Ga about 7 years ago.
How about tomatoes - they too are very tasteless from the supermarket. 
I think it's all about packing and shipping for the end destination and less about flavor and textures.
I try hard to buy produce from farmer markets and roadside stands as much as I can for reasons of price, support to local farmers, better quality, taste and so on.

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I wouldn't know, I buy supermarket strawberries and the berries taste pretty good. I've been to local farmers markets, and its a shame that the prices tend to be so much higher than at a supermarket. I mean seriously the big companies can pay to ship the strawberries half way around the world and still beat the local farmer's price. 

Babyducks " Key is to buy SMALL strawberries that look ugly.

More often than not producers have been trying to find the holy grail of "beauty queen" strawberries -- so much the better for dipping in chocolate and charging a premium, but so much the worse on the palate.
"
I agree Babyducks, I believe American food is sold on the idea of image rather than taste or nutrition.

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For the definitive story on strawberries or fruit in general, one would be wise to seek out the advice of David Karp, aka The Fruit Detective. Here's a few timely articles of his that recently appeared in the LA Times "Food" section. We in LA are so lucky to have such a trusted and knowledgeable expert: 



http://www.latimes.com/features/food/la-fo-marketwatch-20100416,0,4470304.story

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/dailydish/2010/04/strawberry-school-is-now-in-session.html

http://www.latimes.com/features/food/la-fo-marketwatch0409-20100410,0,1322192.story

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Strawberry farmer from Oxnard, CA told me this spring the strawberries they had were picked earlier because of the heavy rains.

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I'm from Ventura, Ca, which is at the center of some of the best strawberry growing country in the world. I also write a farmers market column & go to all the farmers markets in Ventura County, so I regularly get to taste all of the wonderful varieties of strawberries we grow around here. The taste of the strawberry comes from a variety of factors. For example, we had a wet rainy winter, so the winter berries, which are generally less flavorful than the summer berries, developed what is called "white shoulder," where the tops by the stems are white. They still sell these berries, but any grower will tell you they're not very good.
Sadly though, the best, most flavorful berry varieties are too fragile to stand shipping. Most of the time you have to eat the fresh berries the day you buy them. You can actually watch them rot on the kitchen counter over an 8-hour period in the summer. Sweetness also varies by variety, and most of the farmers will let you taste the berry to see if it's the kind you prefer.
But for the rest of the country, you guys tend to get the giant, durable varieties that ship well, and you're right, they aren't as good. I'm by no means a strawberry expert, but I'm told that they are trying to create big, flavorful berries. I'd suggest checking out your local farmers when they're in season and using the grocery store varieties for jams.

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The local farm we shop at in season north of Boston grows their own strawberries (early and late variety), raspberries, blackberries, blueberries, peaches (yellow), peaches (white), and apples. They must be choosing the right variety of each of these fruits because each is sweet and succulent. For us it's a wonderful experience eating In Season fruits and vegetables. There's always something tasty to look forward to. I wouldn't touch a supermarket strawberry for all the world. That's where they come from...all over the world.

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I am munching on a clam shell of "Certified Organic Natural Choice California Strawberries" for breakfast. I cannot remember EVER having strawberries this delicious. Incredibly sweet. VERY "strawberry tasting." But I don't expect the strawberries I buy next time, even if from the same grower, to be exactly like these. It's sort of like betting in the Derby. You picks your horse and you takes your chances. This time I'm a winner.

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Completely agree with the frustration. Strawberries from the market are def. hit or miss in NJ; cantaloupe even worse. At least I can smell the sweetness of a strawberry and the NJ farms beat every market in season but I have returned more lousy cantaloupes than I care to admit. Musk melon is now my preferred melon....nothing more disappointing than tasteless, musty cantaloupe.

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my tasteless strawberries were put to good use tonight - in the blender with some sugar and tequila - delicious.

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When I buy strawberries in the store they are always huge and tasteless. Near my home is a local farm where you can pick the berries yourself. Recently got a box from there and were amazed at how sweet they were. Not the prettiest but they were sugar sweet. Also a deep dark red compared to the ones from the supermarket.

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When I was young, I grew up on an island in Washington State that was one of the strawberry capitals of the world. The Marshall strawberry was reputed to be the finest, or at least one of the finest every strawberries. Deep dark red, all the way through, and with an incomparable taste. Marshalls are now one of the most endangered food plants in the world. They were hit by a virus that evidently has no cure and even if they weren't diseased, they are so fragile, they don't ship well. For a while, the only cultivars in the world were in a lab in Oregon. Here's a more recent article. http://www.pnwlocalnews.com/kitsap/bir/news/19686829.html

California strawberry growers have bred the flavor out of berries in exchange for shipping quality and long life. While they are a bit better than they were a few years ago, they are nothing like I remember when I was a kid. Washington local berries are better than California berries that are shipped. I assume that some grower somewhere in California has a good variety, but he/she probably sells it locally. I wonder how many Americans have ever had a really good fresh strawberry.

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Am fortunate enough to live in Bermuda and local strawberries are in full swing right now. They are sooooo much better than the Driscoll's tasteless foam that gets shipped here throughout the year. Am rather lucky that am it's already in season, have been craving them forever! Sweet and intense flavour. Have been dumping sliced berries into my Greek yogurt, what a great afternoon treat!

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If you're talking about those Driscoll monsters, their strawberries are one notch above waxed fruit. On the other hand, the strawberries growing wild on my 8 acres are unbelievable.

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Strawberries are a curious beast. Until about 15 years ago, it was virtually impossible to have them out of season. The problem with them is that they don't actually like a lot of heat, and shut down production when it's too warm. They're also light sensitive, which means that depending on the length of daylight, they will stop production :)

There have been some advances made in recent years. Those horrible tasting strawberries that look really good and travel well were a commercial breakthrough; too bad about the taste and texture. There are now day-neutral varieties that produce continuously throughout the season, rather than in weird spurts.

Strawberry plants are weak. They are very susceptible to a host of diseases, and no matter what you're almost guaranteed that after about three years they'll give up the ghost. Now most varieties will make daughter plants from what are called runners; this is how you can sustain a strawberry patch indefinitely.

Your best bet is to grow your own. A serious strawberry lover will have around 1000 plants.

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Gariguette strawberries always have an early season in France, which is now !
The batch we had last night was so sweet and so fragrant. You can smell it from a couple of rooms away.
My love story with gariguette does not date from yesterday. A few years ago driving in southwestern France in June, I was absolutely blindsided by the smell of gariguette. The car screeched to a halt, and protected by two little girls, I climbed out to … steal strawberries.
Later I confessed to my landlady and asked her if she knew the farmer I had stolen from, as I was ready to buy from him actually. She sweetly replied that it was her BIL and that I could go back to help myself as much as I wanted, because the seasonal harvesters had just come and gone, and what was left in the fields was proverbially up for grabs. 
Vive la France or what.

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Now I can actually distinguish between strawberries from Watsonville, Ca. and those grown in Florida ... the former are wonderfully sweet and flavorful, the latter are not especially sweet and lack the flavors that make this fruit unique ....

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In So. CA, I get them right from the farm, fully ripe and sweeeeet! I'm spoiled, when I'm away I never buy them, especially in a store, they're tastless and not ripe. I will buy them or pick them, only when they're in season when traveling elsewhere.

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I lived in South New Jersey most of my 60 years. For the past eight years I live in Tampa Fl. My dad had a farm and raised some strawberries along with tomatoes and peppers. I think we ate more strawberries that we actually picked for market because they were sweet as sugar. Ever since I moved to Florida I cannot understand why people around here think these berries are delicious. Maybe it is because they have never taste what a strawberry suppose to taste like. They look good but have no taste at all. You have to put a pound of sugar on them to sweeten them up. Florida tomatoes and corn are tasteless too. Must be the sandy soil here but I guess they have to make a living some how. Maybe sticking with horses and cows!

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Our strawberry season is very short here in Canada so in the off seasons we get imported strawberries from California that are rather tasteless. Now obviously I don't know what fresh California strawberries taste like just picked. I'm sure they are very tasty but because I live so far away they must travel for quite a while before reaching us. As strawberries lose their flavor very quickly the price drops continuously until delivered. Meaning lower quality product. We have a new type of strawberry here called day neutral that bear fruit in 6 week cycles from June to September and they are delicious. We have many farms just outside of the city that have pick your own. I also think the nectarines and peaches right now are tasteless. In August we have fabulous peaches and nectarines but once the season is over the grocery stores are full of under ripe rock hard fruit. If peaches and nectarines are picked before ready they do not ripen anymore. We get Driscoll's here too. I thought there were just tasteless because of the reason above...now I know different. Thanks

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Years back, I used to travel to Italy each year, in May, for business. At that time of year, they always had small strawberries that were nice and sweet. American strawberries seem to have been bred to please the eye more than the palate.

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Omg there's a thread about this. I'm home. *tear*

Even after a lifetime of huge, hard, tasteless supermarket strawberries I still find myself having to consciously decide not to buy them sometimes. They LOOK so good. My eyes tell me they will be juicy and strawberry-y and delicious. And they never are.

I grew up on Vancouver Island in BC and my mother had a strawberry patch in the backyard. It never consistently produced many - but they were by far the best I have ever eaten. They tasted of strawberries. They were small and bright red and very prone to getting mushy quickly, so you had to eat em while you could - my siblings and I would descend like locusts the second they showed signs of being ripe and my mom never did manage to harvest enough to make jam. But I have never found good strawbs at the grocery store. Not in BC, not here in Montreal. I'd pay a premium for them if they existed (here).

Someone commented above about the peaches and nectarines in Canada - again, a childhood memory, we had a single, stunted peach tree in our yard that produced about 6-8 of the most delicious, juicy peaches you ever tasted every season. My ruthless parents chopped it down for being inefficient and I mourned those peaches for years. I eventually found a brand, from California, that used to show up in Thrifty's every season (they were definitely seasonally available, Thrifty's used to make a big song and dance about their arrival with signs and ads etc.), that compared to those backyard peaches. The name involved the word "Frog" anf the word "Farm" - I want to say Frog Farm but that sounds incorrect. Those peaches were a juicy revelation. And if they were for sale in BC, they're probably available in other non-California areas, too. Does anyone know the brand I'm talking about? They were deep orange, like farm-egg yolks, not those pale-fleshed, only-tastes-of-sugar peaches you see a lot.

Btw, a question from someone who knows nothing of fruit cultivation and breeding. Since they can engineer huge tasteless strawbs that look great and ship well, could they also, if the will existed, engineer ugly-but-delicious strawbs that shipped well? I mean, COULD they do it, even though they probably, in reality, wouldnt?

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Oh, but the pick-your-own strawberries on the North Fork of LI in June! Small, juicy, and red through and through. Still warm from the sun. One in the mouth, one in the pail. They are the BEST!

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I think the supermarket strawberries are unusually good this year.

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Agree. But, go to Spain. Strawberries live. Best is to rent an apartment so you can enjoy market food (amazing fresh fruit, slabs of very fresh swordfish, baby artichokes sold by the kilo) which are better than restaurant food (fried grease). Failing that, just buy some fruit and sneak it into your hotel room. Best strawberries I have tasted in decades.

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i think strawberries today are sweeter than they were even ten years ago. i am also happy with the consistent quality.

ps, related "tip" -- even when the strawberries are on sale, it is still cheaper to buy odwalla's "strawberry c-monster" than "make it" yourself. that is one "test" i have done.

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I would have said that strawberries have no flavor anymore except that I picked some amazing ones today on a farm outside of Boston. They were dead ripe, some were more than ripe, and they were warm from the sun and so sweet and full of strawberry flavor! I have picked there before and they were good, but this time they were incredible! So my faith in food has been restored.

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Well I just came back from Seoul a week ago. I had the strawberries that were grown in Korea. They were so sweet and really juicy, and they were pretty big as well. Too bad I went when it was the final days of the season.

However I bought some Ontario stawberries yesterday and those were small and bland. Maybe because of climate change...

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Disagree. Just had a punnet of Scottish strawberry's from Sainsbury's. Small, sweet and full of flavour.

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I'm fortunate to get berries from my farmers markets. Strawberries and blackberries were gushing with flavor!

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If you are talking about the horrid Driscoll's, then yes, they have no flavor. They look like strawberries and smell like them but are flavorless. Locally grown from old varieties are loaded with flavor. They may be smaller and not the big plump things we are used to finding in the supermarkets, not as beautiful when dipped, but the flavor is incomparable.

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Oh, yes.....Bring back normal "human" strawberries, stop feeding us those carrot-like monster mutans... Just today I got Discrolls, to make a 5-minute jam for dessert, and I had to... chop those monsters with a knife, with such an effort, as if they were carrots or potatoes, really... And added sugar produced no juice at all - i had to add water, and the bastards just floated, like cotton balls... These are Not berries, they are dry, firm and porous vegetable mutants, with no taste... Peaches - same thing, apricots - same thing.... The fruit does not even smell like itself....I want a piece of fruit that will sprinkle juice all over you when you bite it, and I want intense, sweet-and-tangy flavors... I used to grow my own fruit and sell it, I know the best and the worst of it, and what is sold in US to general public is really a perfect-looking.. hm.. FAKE?

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Driscoll = strawberries so worthless I wouldn't take them if they were free.

The problem isn't the taste or texture, there is a bigger issue. The acidity of these things now approaches that of a lemon. Literally. I actually contemplated borrowing a pH meter to check it. Nobody has mentioned the acidity yet. Who goes into Vons/Safeway everyday and even bothers to buy these things? I guess there's a lot more professional food photographers out there than I would have guessed.

There is a solution however for those of us who only shop at Safeway, etc. In the organic section at Safeway/Vons, there is the 'Eat Sweet' brand of strawberry. They're always lighter colored than Driscoll. I'm not even saying they necessarily have more flavor or even that they're sweeter. The important thing is, they aren't sour like lemons. So you can at least actually eat them!

I went to strawberry festival in Oxnard, CA five years ago and my brother got a flat of Driscoll strawberries. Guess what. They brought out the good stuff. They must have set aside a special crop (and heirloom breed) just for the strawberry festival. (PR) They tasted better than any candy I ever had in my life. It was a revelation. I then spent the next five years trying to get strawberries like that in a major grocery store without success. A lot of times old timers will talk about how good tomatoes used to be. Maybe there's something I'm missing out on there, too.

I think Driscoll's is now messing up blackberries, too. I believe blackberries are hardier fruit and probably taste good even when growing like weeds at the side of the highway. And unlike strawberries, I traditionally haven't had a problem with sour blackberries from the grocery store. But last couple Driscoll blackberries I got were super sour. Please, please Driscoll, don't jack up blackberries too. I recently saw TWO DIFFERENT shows on the food network where there was a chef cooking competition and they were using Driscoll blackberries. In both cases the judges complained about the sourness of the dessert dish, as if the cooks in the competition had done something wrong. Nobody made the connection it was the Driscoll berries.

My mom just received a $90+ fruit arrangement from Edible Arrangements. She opened it up and bit into a strawberry. It literally sounded like she bit into an apple. I didn't even bother trying any of the arrangement.

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They are back!!!!! Chandler strawberries, old time strawberry flavor, Harry's Berries

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Too many posts to read all of them at this point, but just a few thoughts.
French strawberries, bought in Paris at a produce vendor across from our apartment? Absolutely the best strawberries I've EVER had.
Ontario strawberries from the U-pick? Really, really good.
Strawberries from the Farmer's Market? Really really good IF locally grown. Really really BAD if they are resells from grocery store resellers.
Grocery store strawberries? I don't remember when I've ever had a good one. Ever. Always bright red and oddly "crunchy" or ripe, red and mushy/moldy. Blech.
Strawberries from my wild strawberry patch that is growing out of control (unplanted by me, unplanned by me, just appeared so I've let them go)? AMAZING, but really, really REALLY small.
:)

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This brief piece ran on NPR yesterday: "Bigger, Blander, Blegh: Why Are Strawberries Worse?"
http://www.npr.org/2012/05/17/152944880/bigger-means-better-not-with-strawberries

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If they don't smell like strawberries from several feet away, I don't buy them. Doesn't matter where, market or grocery.

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Wishes farms is the place you are looking for. I just tried some here in Ohio, the other day. Real strawberries! I was so glad. Check them out. Google them. They are truly the bomb. They also have blueberries , strawberries and veggies too. I love them.

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Funny you should mention that...I recently picked up a two-pound box from Stop and Shop...HUGE berries...but practically tasteless. I mean, you can TELL they're strawberries by the taste, but if you mix them with anything, they'd be lost...yougurt, cottage cheese...any cheese for that matter...and very dry...hardly ANY juice whatsoever.

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Agree. I've also noticed that fast food restaurants do have very sweet strawberries. Where are they getting theirs? Are they finding a way to sweeten them? Chick-fil-a has a salad that always has super sweet strawberries.

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I purchased 3 strawberry plants about 3 years ago from folks who grow their own plants. I have them planted in a very small area in my backyard. For a couple of weeks, I have wonderful, delicious strawberries that I pick from my very own back yard. Try growing your own and leaving the supermarket ones alone.

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3 years or so ago, I purchased 3 strawberry plants at my local growers. Every year since, I have a couple weeks of delicious strawberries right in my own backyard. Some are big berries, some are smaller and all taste awesome. These plants self propagate so the original 3 are now at least 30 plus plants. I just popped 2 small ones in my mouth as I am typing...Yummy! Try it. Doesn't take a lot of space to grow your own. The plot of ground they are growing on is less than 5' x 3'.

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100% agree. Especially the so-called giant ones. All core. I think they have all been genetically tampered with and that's why they have no flavor. Same with apples. They have been tampered with so that they will last for a year in storage before they go to market. Now they taste like water.

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If you ever get a chance to try wild strawberries, they are awesome. I've only had the French fraise du bois which are small yet packed with deliciousness

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Disagree.

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The only good strawberries I have had in about thirty years were in Spain.

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Disagree. We have a lot of strawberries here, from different grocery chains, and no, none of them taste like the perfect little bite of a homegrown alpine strawberry, but in southern AZ, one has to settle, not being in the Alps. I like a nice strong strawberry flavor, if it isn't authentic I'm sorry, but it's better than no strawberries.

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Fully agree that strawberries from major grocers are terrible (especially Driscolls), but now that it's strawberry season, we once again had some very tasteful native berries yesterday (RI) that were likely picked within a day- purchased at the farm.

In recent years, we've had some exceptional berries in several states including GA, CT, RI & ME, but always as local / native, freshly picked berries. 

Yes, strawberries that are bred for shipping are not worth while, but if you are fortunate to live near a farm, it is possible to get very flavorful berries, but be prepared to pay 2-3 times the price of CA berries.

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Just bought two one pound containers of Driscoll Strawberries. They were on sale for 2 for $5.00. They looked beautiful,, dark red with no white at all but sadly they were as expected, watery and very little strawberry favor or sweetness. I still enjoy them.

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I agree with you completely, Suse.

I did have one revelation. My girlfriend and I traveled by car along the Rhine River recently. (We have now repeated this strawberry experience several times over several years.) About ten miles north of Rudesheim we came across a series of fruit stands with the most flavorful, sweet strawberries which we had ever had. They actually tasted of intense strawberry flavor!

My understanding is that these strawberries were not unique to this area. You can get good German strawberries in many places. Their characteristics were that they were entirely red (no white parts at the shoulders), much smaller than the strawberries we get in the U.S., much more intensely strawberry-flavored, and significantly sweeter. 

They were also more expensive, but certainly well worth the added price.

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Thought I was eating the first 'Diet Strawberry!'

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drive up, down or across from wherever you live to Camarillo Ca and pick up a giant box of fresh strawberries from a stand. you'll not soon be disappointed.

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I agree 100%. The strawberries you buy in the grocery store are rather disappointing, somewhat bitter, and quite tasteless. I know how great strawberries can taste when you pick them straight from the field. In Denmark where I was raised, strawberry season was only for about 1 month every summer. Those strawberries would taste absolutely amazing. Nowadays you can get strawberries year round, but they must have either genetically engineered them or treated them in some way, because they simply don't taste like in the good old days...

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I agree that the Driscoll's are tasteless. I live in the NW Pacific now, but I have
problems finding really good strawberries also. I was in Paris two weeks ago, and
had the most delicious strawberries I've had in years. They were quite small,
maybe 3/4" long, but plump and wonderfully sweet. I had them in a lovely cafe
with breakfast every morning, but I also saw them for sale by the pint at the corner
Saturday market (a wonderful experience unlike any street market I've been to
in the US). I wish I knew the variety as I'd like to see if I can grow them next year.

I am growing ever-bearing strawberries right now, but they aren't as sweet as I'd
like. I hope to find a sweeter variety. I think we've hybridized the heck out of the
strawberries in this country, in large part because I believe everything made for
Americans needs to be BIG! Now don't get me wrong, I used to live close to Plant City, FL; and as I remember they have really large strawberries that actually taste good too.

When we were in Paris, they served us a lot more bread than they did the locals.
The "Americain" breakfast was larger than the locally-preferred breakfast listed on the menu. My son and I felt it was because they think we eat a lot more than Europeans. That may be true. I was impressed that the Parisians just ate a long
sliced baquette with butter and jam for breakfast, and yet everyone was thin. They
don't seem to be all worried about carbs over there. It was refreshing.

On the other hand, we saw more educated, white collar, well-off types smoking than we'd ever see here, so maybe that's part of the way they stay thin. Anyway, that's off the subject, but I'd sure like to know what type of strawberry they served.

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I agree. In Florida the Strawberries have never tasted good. I am from Northern Illinois and they always tasted really good. Also, Strawberries from California were always good, but the last few years I can't find them in the stores in Florida that often anymore. And recently, all the Strawberries in all the stores are over ripe and going bad already.

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I agree 100%. I'm 65 and I remember fixing strawberries for our shortcake. They were small, very red and very sweet and juicy. They have gone the way of the bats, the monarch butterflies, the abundance of salamanders, frog, toads, and everything else that were so much a part of our childhood. Sure, the strawberries now LOOK nice but you cut into them and they are often actually hollow inside and they yield NO juice. I've learned to chop them up finely, add a ton of sugar and a bit of water to make the juice. I don't know what the farmers are doing...but they're not doing it right.

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What really gets me is that the strawberries can have a nice fragrance but still be tasteless. Bring back the real thing is right (even if I'm asking some 5 years later-since this OP began)!

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At lunch, I visit my local supermarket and buy a salad and a package of strawberries. I take them from the store, to my office where I wash some and eat them with my lunch. They are sweet and crisp, the best you can get. I refrigerate the leftover berries, and eat them within the work week. Even the DAY AFTER, only being in the icebox for 24 hours, the berries become horribly sour. All the sweetness has been taken from them, and only a few taste even remotely good. Basically, what I am saying is that the berries that I buy and eat that day are kept at a temperature around 60 degrees F. The berries I eat the next day are kept at 38 degrees F. If you want the berries to keep their sweet taste, keep them at a cool temperature betwee 50 and 60 degrees, not a cold temperature. When eating them from the fridge, let them warm up slightly to a cool room temperature before eating them, and I guarantee they taste just a bit better. Refrigeration ruins the taste and integrity of the fruit, and if you live in a state that sees warm seasons, growing them is a great option. I only have six young strawberry plants, but they are pumping out berries pretty quickly now that it is getting to mid May. They are the BEST berries you will ever eat, and MUCH cheaper!

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I believe it's because the farmers are not rotating their land and resting it. when this happens the minerals are not in the soil and when the minerals are not in the soil then you have tasteless fruit and bitter vegetables

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I've bought Driscoll's randomly over a year. Every single time - No Flavor. They Look red and ripe, the texture is good, but they have No flavor at all. Someone commented that they have growers all over world - great - but they also manage to have Strawberries with No taste from their growers all over the world. Avoid Driscolls or - your learn.

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I agree they have much less flavor than years past...

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I am from Florida currently living in Thailand. Most of the stores here import Driscoll strawberries. The same company that supplies Walmart. They are just as horrible tasting here as in America except 3 to 5 times more expensive. They should outlaw scented containers. I had a few good strawberries from a neighboring Asian country. That was the first time in 7 to 10 years that I was able to buy strawberries and had them taste good. And less than half were sweet, the rest were also sour. It has also been over 10 years since I had a good peach. Mellons are getting bad also. Even apples are now engineered to be smaller and have less taste. This is time try to adjust the public to the outrageous price increases in apples.

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I've found some really good ones but no brand seems to always be good, sometimes they're great, sometimes they're inedible.

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I bought a 2# box of beautiful looking Driscoll's this week. A few berries were good but most were watery& insipid.

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