WIMBLEDON reaches its inevitable rain-lashed conclusion this weekend, so it would seem fitting, if not perhaps a little sarcastic, to provide a recipe based on that quintessential accompaniment to tennis-watching, the British strawberry.

Despite the horrendous weather, our very own strawberries are finally with us for their most fleeting of seasons.

There is very little to compare with the perfumed intensity of a locally-grown strawberry, especially if it’s a plump fruit, picked from the stem, still warm from the sun, and eaten, perhaps with a slightly guilty tinge, in the middle of the garden.

They are also incredibly good for you, just five strawberries giving you the same dose of vitamin C as a whole orange!

I won’t go on about air-miles and the importance of seasonality again, as I’m sure you’re getting bored, but it really is very important to try to buy British fruit in season, and then wait for it to come around again.

Put it this way, if I see any of you buying Mexican strawberries in December, there will be cross words. And similarly, if you see me even contemplating a punnet in the supermarket after the summer, you have my permission to push me into the freezer cabinet and cry ‘hypocrite!’ So, from now until the end of August, let’s make the most of our native varieties.

Look out for Elsanta, Jubilee, Ava and English Rose for the very best flavour these fruit have to offer, and if you ever see them, I implore you to try the amazing Mara Des Bois variety, a French hybrid that combines the lusciousness of a medium-sized fruit with the concentrated intensity of the wild strawberry. They are amazing.

Now to our recipe; I thought I’d keep it fairly classic, as strawberries require only a few subtle accompaniments to show their best attributes.

One thing strawbs do like is cake and biscuit-y things. The gentle, cereal flavours sit nicely with the sweet fruit, and it’s this winning combination that makes the classic strawberry shortcake, of which this is a slightly more elaborate variation.

I decided to ditch the traditional soft, cake-y base and make some nice crunchy shortbread, loaded with toasty almond flavours, sandwiched with a white chocolate-infused Chantilly cream, and combine this with a ‘salad’ of fresh strawberries simply dressed in a little sugar, citrus, crème de cassis and, for a silky mouthfeel, a few drops of olive oil.

To finish, a few fresh herbs; strawberries, bizarrely, adore many of the regular garden herbs like thyme and rosemary, but are especially good alongside the hot-weather herbs we always have so much trouble growing here in the wet windy UK.

Basil and strawbs love each other, the aniseed-y intensity of the herb acting as a seductive foil to the luscious fruit, and lemon verbena, one of my all-time favourite leaves, adds a subtly perfumed citrussy flavour that hits the fruit right where it counts.

I’m using lime juice with the strawberries here, as I find its tanginess works and has an alluring affinity with berries. Lemon juice is fine, but lime and strawberry is one of my very favourite combinations, and works great here.

You can make up the salad a few hours in advance, and it’s good either chilled or at room temperature. Any spare is wonderful poured over some good quality vanilla ice-cream, like our own local Yummy Yorkshire.

The biscuits can be made days in advance, and you just need to make up the cream at the magic hour, and assemble the plate.

A crunchy, sweet tart treat, then, and one that sums up a British summer so very nicely. Aprons on!

For the shortcake:

225g butter

100g unrefined golden caster sugar

120g ground almonds

2 tbsps sliced, toasted almonds

280g plain flour

Maldon salt

For the white chocolate and vanilla cream:

275ml whipping cream

110g white chocolate

The seeds of 1 vanilla pod

For the strawberry salad:

1 punnet fresh British strawberries

The juice & zest of 2 limes

A splash of olive oil

A few tsp unrefined golden caster sugar

A few drops of crème de cassis / raspberry liqueur

Extras:

Fresh thyme and lemon verbena, wild flowers

Method:

Make the biscuits first. Cream the butter with the sugar until very pale and fluffy. Add the ground almonds, flour and a good pinch of salt.

Mix together quickly to form a smooth dough, then chill for 20 minutes.

Roll out to about ½cm thickness, and cut squares about 6cm by 6cm. Press a few toasted almonds into each biscuit, place on a baking tray and chill for 35 minutes.

Heat the oven to 180ºC / Gas 4. Bake the biscuits for 15-25 minutes, or until a nice deep golden colour.

Allow to cool a little on the tray, then transfer to a wire rack and let them go completely cold before storing until required.

To make the strawberry salad, Top the strawberries, and slice in two (or four if they’re huge).

Place in a bowl, and mix in a little sugar, the lime juice and zest, a few drops of cassis, a small splash of olive oil and mix together quickly. Test for sweetness, and chill until needed.

To make the white chocolate cream, melt the chocolate in a bowl over barely simmering water, and when melted remove from the heat and add the vanilla seeds.

Whip the cream to a medium peak, and whisk a quarter of it into the melted chocolate. Fold the two mixtures together.

To assemble the dessert, sandwich three biscuits together with the white chocolate cream, and arrange on a plate with a spoonful of the strawberry salad.

Garnish with small leaves of verbena and thyme, and any other herbs or flowers you fancy.