Recommended strawberry varieties?

[suethegardener]

We would like to plant strawberries on our allotment soon.

Could we please have advice on the best varieties (for sweetness/vigour/disease resistance, but taste most of all)? It would be really good to know what people have found to be good in practice.

[Flummery]

Marshalls' Marshmello is a great flavour. I expect everyone has a favourite though. It's like when people ask for the best tasking tom or new potato. You get deluged - and no 2 answers are the same!

[Tam]

Royal Sovereign is my favourite and, fortunately, is now easier to get than it was a few years ago. It isn't a huge cropper like some of the tasteless modern varieties.

[FB.]

.
Pegasus.

Sweetest strawberry I've ever tasted - nobody needs sugar!.
Very vigorous.
Lots of fruit.
Lots of runners
Good disease resistance.

Texture is quite soft, like an alpine strawberry. Takes a bit of getting used to the texture as it's not like normal strawberry texture.
Often, the seeds of Pegasus are somewhat sunken into the skin, rather than spiky protrusions as seen on most strawberry varieties.

[NOG]

Its got to be one of the Cambridge types,

Cambridge favourite or Cambridge Vigour or Cambridge Prizewinner...

16 Strawberry Breeding and Industry in Great Britain

[Redpepper]

I gotta say Jubilee . Sweetness and 'strawberryness' is superb.

[Welsh Wizard]

I second Cambridge Favourite. I am growing 6 different varieties at the moment, and this variety is the one that I like the best. Seems to crop well no matter what, and the strawbs are the right shape and taste for me. Mara des Boises have a great flavour but an odd longer shaped fruit that is less aesthetically pleasing on the plate. Aromel is good but yields less in my garden and seems to be more fussy as to crown depth when planting in the soil . Honeyoye is very vigourous, fruits well and is great for getting runners for propagating (in my hands). Elsanta tastes ok, Sonata dies off more often in my garden, Sarian has viable seeds available from Suttons, and gives nice berries...

They are all good really, just get growing. If you are not in a hurry then you can save a lot of money by propagating from runners from a few bought in plants. After a year you can easily double or triple the number of crowns by rooting some of the many runners the crowns throw off.. You even grow from seed. Otherwise buy a bulk load of crowns off ebay, you will never regret having a glut of strawbs....

[rana]

I suspect the taste of strawberrys varies with soil and growing conditions. I grow a number of varieties including Cambridge Favourite but the sweetness and flavour are not as good as Hapil and Elsanta.

[suethegardener]

Many thanks - this will give us a good start!