Fruit and vegetable picking at ParkSide Farm, Enfield, Middx

I have never been fruit-picking as a child. So decided it was time to do it, and take my children. We went to Parkside Farm, an award winning PYO farm in 2011. Plenty of space to park, and you have to spend a minimum of £2 on exit. On arrival you select your punnet/box / bag carriers for fruit/veg, and you can take a cart if you wish to help carry your items (a good idea if you plan to get a few things as it's a bit of a traipse around a few fields). I went with a friend and between us, 3 children from ages 2-4 years. We went predominantly to pick strawberries, but also ended up picking raspberries, courgettes and sweetcorn.
Not sure what I'd expected but I was surprised at how professionally it was laid out. Strawberries occupy one field, in raised boxes, in long lines. New growth is cordoned off and you are directed to fruit ready to pick now. My initial panic of 'someone might get there before me' proved unfounded. there is so much fruit ywe managed to get some huge, deliciously ripe and fresh strawberries within the first row. you are permitted to 'taste' one but the expectation is you will do the right thing, and put your produce in the punnet and pay for it before eating. Fair enough.
We moved onto the rasberries, and these were huge, fat, falling off the bush variety, a beautiful deep pink/purple colour. Delicious. Really quite addictive picking them and we got far too much.
Then onto a further field to pick vegetables, sweetcorn and courgettes. Fascinating to do, and really enjoyable to know you'd picked straight from the field to kitchen. I loved it.
The children spent 3 hours intent on picking, exploring and delighting in the fruit. My 2 year old got the hang of choosing the reddest, biggest strawberries within minutes and delighted in the process of reaching up and plucking them off their stems. I had to give up trying to stop her eating them as we went round, some things are just not possible. My son loved finding and picking the courgettes. so much so, i had to threaten i'd make him eat one raw, if he picked any more. 'mummy , there's a courgette (pick), and another one (pluck), I've got 3 look (grab!)', and so it went. A great day out for the family. Relaxing, fun, foody and if i wanted to be a bit smug, teaching them how and where our food comes from, all in one  go. This is a  great activity to do with your children. They will walk miles without realising it, something about seeing them running between the rows, diving through the caned veg, with wellies on and red rasberry juice round their mouths felt very rewarding. I spent £12 for a huge 1kg carry box of strawberries, a 1/2 kg punnet of rasberries, 4 courgettes and 7 corn on the cob. I would have paid twice that in the shop, with not a fraction of the fun. All went down a treat at the bbq with friends we had today. Worth every penny. Just wish I'd done it years ago. It will be a staple for the family each summer going forward.
www.parksidefarmpyo.co.uk/ 

grandma and grandpa's

Ok, this is a cheats activity (i put my hand up to this now), but we handed our kids over to the grandparents for 3 days, just picked them up today. It has done us all the world of good to have a change of scene and routine. I'm definitely up for doing this again, just need to keep fingers crossed that the grandparents are also game.