Aromatic, fragrant and a vibrant red color! A perfect topping for decorating cakes.
Origin
The Sciacca and Ribera Wild Strawberry, commonly known as wild strawberry, is a variety of the strawberries family and it deserve our attention because it is a Slow Food Presidium. A spontaneous herbaceous plant that grows in Ribera, a small village near Agrigento, Sicily. This strawberry is unique because it is very small, soft and extremely fragile. You can pick them from April till the end of May and its cultivation is done by a group of local farmers. It is picked at sunrise or after sunset to respect and maintain the aroma longer. To facilitate the process, farmers prefer to grow this wild strawberry next to lemons and oranges trees, because they protect this fruit from the hot weather and from the typical, strong Sicilian wind.
Cookit
The peculiar thing about this strawberry is its fragility, and because of this, it needs to be eaten immediately after you picked it (max. 48 hours). Is a fruit with a very strong aroma and perfume, very little and it has an intense red color. In the local cuisines it truly makes the difference. It is very used to make ice creams and slushes and the intense aroma enhances marmalades, syrups, jams and jellies. You can prepare many desserts with this fruit, like pies and cakes and it is very used in patisseries and ice cream shops, especially to prepare sorbets.
Did you know
This fruit has a very interesting history. Some Sicilian soldiers fighting in the First World War, were battling in the Alps in Friuli and Trentino and there, they learned and appreciated the value of small wild strawberries. When the war ended, they brought back to Sicily this fruit, creating a new local ecotype that used to be extended around the valley created by the Verdura river, and now it grows only in Sciacca and Ribera. This wild strawberry is full of minerals, potassium and iron, and it has a high content of C and B2 vitamins.
