I make my own as a rule. Don't care for the spongecakes at all. If I had to I'd use poundcake if I didn't want to bake.

Baking powder biscuits made by me.

Hubby is the strawberry person in the family (can't stand them myself) and he likes his served on homemade gluten-free pound cake. On gluten-free drop biscuits he likes:

Strawberry Chia Seed Jam

1 c. strawberries - fresh or frozen [will also work with freeze-dried strawberries]

1 T. chia seeds

1 T. water

stevia to taste

Mash berries with a fork. Mix in chia seeds, water and stevia. Cover mixture and let set 30-60 minutes. If you don't like the texture, you can grind chia seeds in a spice/coffee mill first for a smoother texture (you may need extra water).

I love the hot milk cake recipe that Pixiestix posted on here some time ago. Goes great with any fruit, or as is.

We keep it simple. We just make up a yellow cake mix from a box. I've never really been a fan of pound cake or sponge cake.

To me it isn't strawberry season till early June when local berries are ready. Berries coming from Florida or California are never fully ripe, are hard, sour and you can hear the knife slicing through them. I will wait till June to make the shortcake probably using Bisquick. My own from scratch recipe is too labor intensive these days.

I live in Houston and the local growing season for strawberries is probably later. The stores are already carrying strawberries that have a scent. That's how I decide whether to buy or not. If you sniff the container and you can smell the strawberry scent then they may have a strawberry taste. It's not as good as fresh picked, but I don't have that option here anyway. We've had strawberries so many times that we are almost burnt out on them already for this year. Same for blueberries, but those are more expensive so I don't buy them as often.

Our local berries won't be ripe until into June, but we are buying California berries just about year around and other than January when they had no taste or were sour, they've been fine. I'm not usually making desserts with them, I rinse, slice, put them on the table with yogurt, call it our 'salad', many nights. Same with the blueberries. My states main crop will be available in July/Aug. I try not to buy many of the fruits and vegetables imported, but make an exception with blueberries and buy those from Chile year round - we will almost always have berries in this house.

We like strawberries all by themselves, but for a special dessert, I'll make angel food cakes in a shortcake baking tin.

When the stores have nice looking, decently priced berries out of season, I buy extra and separate them. We eat the ones that are ripe, fresh, then I use the less-than-ripe ones for strawberry preserves--slightly under-ripe fruit is good for jelly-making.

I prefer homemade biscuits over sponge cake. Never did like that. Don't like store strawberries, no flavor. Also use to wait till mine were coming in, until some critter ate all the plants. Nothing like ripe fresh picked strawberries.

phyllis, I agree about the hot milk cake. Here's the recipe

Hot Milk Cake
from pixistix

4 eggs
2 cups sugar
2 1/4 cups flour
2 1/4 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/4 cups milk
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter

Beat eggs and sugar well. Combine flour with bk. powder and add to egg
mixture along with vanilla. Heat milk and butter together until butter melts;
gradually add to batter, beating until well blended.

Pour batter into a greased 9x13 pan or a bundt pan. Bake at 350 for 30 to 35
minutes. Old fashioned, simple, melts in your mouth

****I bake mine in a square pyrex dish, and bake it about 45 minutes. Works for me.

Strawberries on top of cream cheese pound cake is how everyone at work eats it. I am not a strawberry fan but the pound cake by itself is very good! :)

Mamagoose and Glenda, thank you for those recipes. I will try them. I like the recipe on the Bisquik box because that is what my mom used to make for us. I do love strawberries, even the frozen ones. They have that good, sweet juice when they thaw. Or I slice up fresh and add sugar and put them in the refrigerator. That juice is good too. I don't think we will have good strawberries in the stores for a while yet, but I look forward to them.

We either have them just sliced with sugar, or with cake or the favorite way is served with chunks of pie crust and some milk over them in a bowl. Of course there is the strawberry pie too! Never with the shortcake that is biscuit like. We may have a glazed strawberry pie for Easter meal too.

Sue

My family loves angel food cake with their strawberries...and of course, topped with whipped cream.

We tend to eat the strawberries plain. If they are not sweet enough, I will fix myself Strawberries Romanoff, which I first had at the Rainbow Room. It is easy and I love them this way. Serve rinsed strawberries with the stems and leaves still attached. Heap the strawberries on a plate, and then add a little pile of light brown sugar and a little pile of sour cream. Pick up the strawberry by the stem and leaves, dip in sour cream and then in the brown sugar. Voila.

I forgot to add, I like strawberries a lot of ways, but not dipped in chocolate :)

Sue

I prefer angel food cake, but DH's mother always baked pie crust (cut into slices), to put into the crushed strawberries. That's his preference.

We love to dip the strawberries in Nutella.

Shielajoyce, We also usually eat them plain. I never knew there was a name for with brown sugar and sour cream, but that's what my mother did with sour varieties of strawberries when we were little, and that's what I served as a treat last week, even though the berries were a sweet variety, just a little early (so not too sweet for the sugar).

I like my strawberries straight up. Oh, they're also pretty good dipped in quality dark chocolate.

Anyhow, our local ones won't be ready for a couple more months -- lucky you!!!

Adellabedella, I live near Houston too...close to Alvin and Froberg's farm has pick your own strawberries and they have been picking them for a month already. If I am in a hurry I use angelfood cake. Kroger sells a good one. I prefer baking powder biscuits that I make myself.

Strawberries are one of our county's top crop. There are two berry stands within walking distance and they pick them fresh daily. So good!

I don't like shortcake with my berries....just plain or made into freezer jam.

Thanks Marilyn. Alvin is too far for me. I should probably do a search. There have to be more places. I just haven't seen any... Too much sprawl. May be time to go exploring.

We use white cake mix for a cake.

I love strawberries raw. Wash them off, de-stem, and dine away. Yummy snack! Cottage cheese or cream goes well with fresh strawberries. Ice cream works, too.

The Plant City FL strawberries have hit the market here, going for .59 cents per pound. I bought one case, 8 pounds and 6 of those are now low sugar preserves. The are truly the best ones to hit IL, as they are full of flavor without that nasty white center you get from the CA or MX berries. The other 2 pounds will be sliced and used for dessert...a trifle or a tort I think. For Easter I may make a strawberry buttercream cake roll.

This looked like a fun recipe and you could use other fresh fruit instead of strawberries: From "EatingWell" http://www.eatingwell.com/recipes/muffin_tin_strawberry_shortcakes.html

My favorite way to use strawberries is in strawberry rhubarb pie.

Changed my mind and gonna make Trisha Yearwood's skillet shortbread. My son loves it and it will be wonderful with the strawberries. I might though leave off the almonds.

Skilllet shortbread

Ingredients
bunNonstick
cooking spray
1
1/2 cups plus 2 tablespoons sugar
3/4
cup (1 1/2 sticks) butter, melted
2
large eggs
1
1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2
teaspoon salt
1
teaspoon almond extract
1/2
cup sliced almonds with skins





Preheat
the oven to 350 degrees F. Line a 10-inch cast-iron skillet with aluminum foil
and spray the foil with cooking spray.

In
a large mixing bowl, stir 1 1/2 cups of the sugar into the melted butter. Beat
in the eggs one at a time. Sift the flour and salt onto the batter. Add the
flavoring and stir well. Pour the batter into the skillet. Top with sliced
almonds and the remaining 2 tablespoons sugar. Bake until slightly brown on top,
about 35 minutes. Cool the shortbread in the skillet. When cool, use the foil to
lift the shortbread from the skillet; remove the foil before serving

We use store-bought angel food or pound cake. When I make a cake from scratch, it's going to be chocolate!

What I started doing as it was my birthday month when our strawberries came out and so I bought an angel food cake and what I would do is prepare the strawberries ahead of time and then take some angel food cake and put it in small bite size pieces and strawberries that had sat over night to bring the juice over the angel food cake and then whipped cream and wow awesome it is.