Combine business with pleasure, take a breath of fresh air and sunbathing - if the weather is good - but also taste the pleasure of freshly picked fruits and vegetables at often unbeatable prices: the virtues of there is no shortage of pickings! Gathering fields, vegetable gardens and orchards, we invite the customer to help themselves on site in these operations. Picking, weighing, payment, it's as simple as that in these agricultural self-services, which are estimated to number between 60 and 70 in France in France, half of which belong to the Chapeau de Paille network which has 33, including 10 in Ile-de-France.
Right now, the stars of these pickings are small or fleshy, reddened in the spring sun, juicy, sweet and slightly tart… Strawberries, you just have to bend down to pick them up. Shovel. And for cheap. “Five euros per kilo of strawberries! If we take a little trouble, it's worth it, ”enthuses Adeline, met in Torfou (Essonne). A long-time follower, the mother comes next door "every week for years ... My vegetable garden is harvesting, in high season, I can spend the morning there. "
In Torfou, a 25 hectare family farm, it is rush hour at the strawberry station, the busiest of this morning on Ascension Thursday. Between the rows of deep green, clusters scattered with curved backs dig through the leaves in search of ripe fruit. "The strawberry is the first fruit of the year, it's delicious, it's the spring product that brings you back to picking," said Philippe Marguery, director of Chapeau de Paille, whose members attract around 2.5 million people per year, mostly active retirees and families.
Local agriculture and short circuits
Anne thus came with her daughter and enjoys the outing. "The children see how the vegetables and fruits grow and arrive on our plates, and then I also like the idea of local agriculture and favor short circuits," she explains. For city dwellers, it is also the way to go green. And after the two months that we have just lived, it feels really good. "
Two months and an epidemic still present. At the entrance, the instructions are given: no more than two people per household when the region was still classified in the red zone, distribution of hydroalcoholic gel at the entrance, wearing of a mask recommended, direction of traffic imposed, number of people limited in confined spaces, systematic disinfection of spades and wheelbarrows on loan…
"It's work and additional costs, but we also have a lot more people, almost twice as much on weekdays, we feel that people really need to get out," said Hélène Poupinel, whose father created the operating almost a quarter of a century ago.
"Strawberries, a great love story"
And gourmands, young and old, are out. Céline's mask cannot hide her broad smile which we can guess from her bright and happy eyes as she walks, a large tub overflowing with scarlet strawberries in each hand. "It's a great love story, my daughter loves it," she chuckles. I must have 3 kg, I may have taken too much… No problem, we will make pastry! "
"She's not that ripe, but it's okay, she's ripe anyway," loose mouth Theo, 4 years old. Hugo, 2 and a half, also has a craving for imp that their mother is struggling to contain. We work a bit in the rows ... "Do we REALLY have the right to eat it?" Asks Victor, 11, who tries to choose them very red.
Eating! "
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A priori no, it is registered at the entrance. But "it's part of the game, smiles Hélène Poupinel, like that people make sure of the quality of the fruit ... We just hope that they eat less than one out of two". Queens of spring, strawberries of various varieties are harvested here in tonnes and until mid-July. Soon, raspberries and tomatoes will invite themselves to the ball to become in turn the stars of the summer.
Plain, coulis or in a cake?
But, by the way, what are you going to do with your strawberries? In their simplest appliance or cooked, there are some guidelines to follow to sublimate them.
Nature. Sweet and tart, very juicy, we like them very ripe, so we pick them very red while keeping the tail so that they keep better. They are washed when consumed, keeping this appendix to prevent them from getting waterlogged. Finally, we hull them to taste plain, with a mint or basil leaf.
For an express coulis. To marry with a faisselle, a fromage blanc or a vanilla ice cream, take 500 g of ripe strawberries, between 100 and 150 grams of sugar, a tablespoon of lemon juice and a glass of water. Place strawberries, sugar and lemon juice in a bowl of a blender. Grind, add water and restart the machine. We can pass the result to the Chinese to remove the seeds or keep it raw, a simple matter of taste. To consume quickly.
In a fresh and very fruity cake . Whisk three eggs with 150 g of sugar. Add 160 g of flour, half a sachet of yeast. Mix, then stir in 150 g of soft, semi-salted butter. We will take 300 g of strawberries, half of which will be mixed and then mixed with a spoon. We will keep the rest - the smallest - to place them whole in the heart of the dough in the buttered and floured cake pan. Bake 40 minutes in the oven at 180 ° C.