Summertime Blues and Reds and Purples

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Next, while berries are an essential addition to your diet, make sure to steer clear of pesticide laden conventionally grown berries. Raspberries and strawberries are on the Environmental Working Group's list of the 12 most contaminated foods, so buy organic berries whenever possible.

And when you can't find organic berries, reduce the pesticide residue by rinsing them under cold running water for a few minutes before eating them.

Anthocyanin pigments are easily degraded by heat, metals and alkaline substances. This can have aesthetic consequences—or nutritional consequences. First the aesthetics: cooked berries don't have the vibrant eye appeal of fresh berries and when berries come in contact with metals such as aluminum foil, their color can change, so be sure to store prepared berries, both raw and cooked in glass dishes, covered with plastic wrap instead of foil. Alkaline ingredients such as baking soda can turn deep purple pigments to a lighter blue, you may have seen this happen in a batch of blueberry muffins. Acid, such as lemon juice, can help protect the beauty of berry's pigments.

More importantly, cooking berries can have an effect on their antioxidant activity. Studies show that cooked berries don't have quite as strong an antioxidant punch as raw berries—so eat your berries raw whenever possible.

Happily, the antioxidant activity of frozen berries seems to stay the same. That means that you can buy extra at the market and save them for winter. Janie Hibler, offers the following suggestions for freezing berries: solid berries, like blueberries, are washed, patted dry and simply tossed into a plastic bag and frozen. Softer berries like black berries and strawberries should be washed, patted dry and placed on a cookie sheet in the freezer so that they can freeze individually. Once frozen the berries can be transferred to a plastic bag.

Berries are just one more example of the beauty of our ecosystem. They are lovely to look at, delicious to eat and take care of our bodies like no other food can.

The following recipes were reprinted with permission from The Berry Bible (Morrow, 2004) written by Janie Hibler. Ms. Hibler is a contributing writer to Gourmet, Food & Wine, and Bon Appetitmagazines. She is the past president of the International Association of Culinary Professionals and the author of five books, including the bestselling Dungeness Crabs and Blackberry Cobblers, and Wild About Game, winner of the 1999 James Beard Award for Best Book: Single Subject. She divides her time between her home in Portland, Oregon, and her cabin in the Cascade Mountains. More information about Ms. Hibler can be found on her website at www.janiehibler.com/.

The Berry Bible is a great resource for berry lovers; the book includes an encyclopedic section on each type of berry with information on its common and scientific name, habitat, and history as well as growing, picking, buying and storage hints.