Photo by The Joneses The Strawberry Festival is all that and more! It's held each year in Plant City. Fla. SLIDE SHOW: More strawberries than you can handle — — — View Larger Map
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There are large strawberry fields everywhere and this time of the year workers are very busy picking strawberries. If you buy strawberries in the store right now they are probably from Plant City. I have read that 18 million flats of strawberries are produced each year in Hillsborough County.

The Florida Strawberry Festival is held at the fairgrounds in Plant City every year about this time and runs for two weeks. It is a fair very much like The Great Frederick Fair held in the fall. The festival has the usual carnival rides, various competitions, entertainment and, of course, (much different from Frederick) strawberries, strawberries, strawberries!

You can buy strawberry shortcakes, strawberry milkshakes or strawberries by the basket or flat in just about any of the buildings. At one place you can even make your own strawberry shortcake — pay one price and then go around putting as much shortcake, strawberries and whipped cream as your plate can hold.

The boys (Ralph, Richard and Nick) were not interested in going to the Festival, so the girls (Robin, Jordyn and I) went and had a great time just walking around and looking at the many exhibits. It was a beautiful sunny day, just like so many of the days are here.

Jordyn used to have a black rabbit that she entered in this fair a few years ago and got a ribbon for it. Therefore, she was interested in going through the building with the rabbits.

We also went through several of the other exhibit buildings. The big decision was what to eat — beside the strawberry shortcake, of course, that we had first, yum, yum. I have never been to a fair where there were so many food vendors and so many different types of food. I guess Floridians believe in food variety. For me the choice was fairly easy, I love smoked turkey legs (I also took one home for Ralph).

One of the competitions that really impressed me was "cake decorating." The competition included the most unusual decorated cakes I have ever seen. One looked like a police car, another like a hot dog, several looked like hats and one was a bee hive — take a look at the pictures!

I was also impressed with the entertainment, there were a lot ofthe older country stars: Chrystal Gayle, Glen Campbell, Billy Ray Cyrus, Charley Pride, and many more. Tom Jones also performed — I know he is past his best years, but I would have loved to see him. Unfortunately, we had to work on the evenings he and the stars we wanted to see performed. It is very difficult to get time off from work. We were told at training that we are expected to work whatever schedule we are assigned to. I guess that is necessary, especially in food service, to keep everything running smooth.

Since this is the time for strawberries, Ralph and I have eaten them as much as possible. We buy them by the flat (very reasonably priced) and have them in pies, with shortcakes or just plain. Of course, all of these with lots of whipped cream. My refrigerator is NEVER without several cans of whipped cream.

I have been baking many strawberry pies in the last few weeks. Our motor home has a convection oven that works great as a microwave (very hot) as well as a regular oven. Actually "baking" is a bit exaggerated – I bake the frozen pie shells, then heap on the strawberries, and add red glaze. This ‘recipe’ is from my friend Clara from Walkersville, only she actually prepares the piecrust herself.

We really do enjoy these strawberries pies, each slice topped with whipped cream, as dessert as well as serving it when we get together with friends.