I've not eaten strawberries for years. When I was really young I remember them being nice, but post ~1990 they've always been bitter or tasteless.

So I bought some a couple of weeks ago just to test my taste buds, and they were fabulous! They were £1 for 300g from Asda and they were grown in that tropical paradise of Scotland. They were ripe, sweet, juicy and tasted like I remember strawberries should taste.

So I bought some more. Same Asda, also £1 for 300g. This time they were:

Variety: Elsanta
Farmer: Marion
Region: Kent

They were horrible! Bitter, no flavour or scent and a texture like cotton wool.

Any tips on choosing edible strawberries? Where am I going wrong? Is there a particularly sweet and juicy variety to look for? Should I avoid English, Kent, or maybe just women farmers?!

Your best advice will be eaten. Thank you!

It's the variety. Elsanta aren't very good IMO, but the others are better.

I generally prefer strawberries from the south of England (admittedly I haven't tried Scottish ones), but in my experience continental/Spanish strawberries (also generally Elsanta) are disgusting.

I'm not a strawberry connoisseur and tend to buy punnets from wherever I happen to be shopping. Most of them tend to be tasteless and very watery (somehow this is interpreted as juicy, though when the "juice" is tasteless, can you still call it "juice")? Anyway, tend not to buy strawberries as a result.

Next time I go shopping I will try and keep an eye out for the aforementioned varieties.

I went to a local pick-your-own with my wife about a week ago, they were very tasty indeed. You pick up only the best rather than what someone else has chosen to fill their quota with.

Very tasty!

I have some strawberry plants but the biggest problem is getting to them before the wildlife.

I've not been a fan of strawberries since a poisoning-induced vomiting incident when I was about 4.

I don't suppose that was funny, although I laughed because I wasn't expecting that particular reply! Was it contaminated, or an allergy?

I was thinking about the strawberries I enjoyed as a kid, and I think they were probably freshly picked from a sunny Cornish garden at the peak of ripeness. Ripeness is everything when it comes to fruit, and I mean ripe when picked not ripened artificially.

At £1 a punnet I think I'll continue my experiments and keep note of the variety and region. The last lot I ended up microwaving with a ripe banana to make a rather tasty mush. There are worse puddings.

mmmm you should copyright that!

Not that I'm biased or anything but a lot of good soft fruit (strawberries, raspberries that sort of thing) seems to come from Scotland.
It must be the adversity of the growing conditions or something Either that or it's only the more tasty varieties (normally slower growing) of fruit that grow well in the slightly cooler climate.

The mother in law brings us a couple of punnets up from a farm shop in Lichfield, and they are fantastic, but I can't remember what type they are... I'll ask her sometime.

Elsanta, or Elsatan* as I prefer to call them are not nice at all, (in my opinion) unless you like watery tasteless strawberries, in which case they're idea

* I do also refer to them as Satanta, but that's because I'm wierd.

I was out with my cousin and sister who were both a couple of years older than me when my cousin found some peas, which we ate. When we got home we had strawberries and cream and the parents asked what we had been doing. The subject of peas came up and as they weren't in season the parents asked further questions, determining that we had found peas growing on a tree, which doesn't happen. We had been eating Laburnum which is a tad posionous.

We all headed of to hospital and were given an inducing drug in orange juice and a bucket to throw up into. Obviously not knowing much about life and death my biggest concern was that my sister and cousin had nice colourful plastic buckets whereas mine was steel. As I was much younger I also had much more medical attention and had to stay in overnight in a childrens hospital in Birmingham.

Since then the smell of strawberries has always been a little off putting.

We had a laburnum in our front garden, so I was taught from a very early age that it was toxic.

I read or saw somewhere that supermarkets use a European variety of strawberry instead of the traditional English (even when grown here) as it's more robust and doesn't get damaged during transit. Unfortunately, it doesn't taste as good. For that reason, the best strawberries are home-grown or pick your own.

sarcasm? im allergic to strawberries

Yes, that was sarcasm.

As it happens, my dad is very allergic to strawberries. That's probably another reason I've not eaten them often.