MANCHESTER — The Red Arrow Diner is celebrating the brief season for Rainier cherries with a special dessert, Cherry Shortcake.

In celebration of National Rainier Cherry Day — it's today, in case you forgot — Northwest Cherries has commissioned one iconic restaurant in each state to create a unique menu offering featuring Rainier cherries, and for the second year, that restaurant is the Red Arrow, at 61 Lowell St.

Northwest Cherries started in Washington State but now also includes growers in Oregon, Idaho, Utah and Montana, 2,500 growers in all.

The association says cherries are ripened on the trees, generally harvested, packed and on the shelf of your grocery store within two days.

Although there are 12 varieties grown, the season is relatively short: from the first week of June until the end of August.

So the association picked a mid-season day to celebrate cherries, especially the Rainier Cherry, which the association describes having a “crisp bite and pale yellow flesh bursting with exceptional sweetness.”

That's a description to get a chef's creative juices flowing, and so the association selects a restaurant in each state to create a special dish using the Rainier Cherry for serving on and around Rainier Cherry Day.

The Red Arrow Diner doesn't like to mess with success, so this year it is offering an encore dessert offering — its Cherry Shortcake

The association provides each restaurant with 40 pounds of the cherries, but last year, said Red Arrow General Manager Brian Medynski: “We went through a lot more.”

So this year, Medynski ordered big. “I'm not messing around,” he said. So the Red Arrow will have plenty of servings of its Rainier Cherry Shortcake.

Medynski was willing to share the recipe, along with some advice.

To start, he said, take one quart of cherries and stem them, cut them in half and remove the pit. Medynski estimated it would take three pounds of cherries to net one quart ready to cook.

Next, he said, put the quart of cherries, one cup of sugar and one cup of water, along with three tablespoons of cornstarch and one teaspoon of cherry extract in a pan on the stove.

“Mix the all together and bring it to a nice little boil,” said Medynski. When it has thickened, let it cool.

While the cherry mixture is cooling, so as not to burn a tongue or roof of a mouth, the rest of the ingredients can be readied.

“An important thing is the foundation of the shortcake,” he said. That would be the Red Arrow's own Dinah Fingers. “We take great pride in our Dinah Fingers,” said Medynski, which he describes as homemade Twinkies.

“Cut them in half, end to end,” he said. You want to be able to see the cream.”

After the split Dinah Fingers are positioned on the serving plate, put one ladle — about two ounces — of the cherry sauce on the Dinah Fingers and pile on the whipped cream. “You can't have too much whipped cream,” said Medynski.

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Red Arrow's Rainier Cherry Shortcake

1 quart Rainier cherries (after stemming, halving and pitting)
1 cup sugar
1 cup water
3 tablespoons cornstarch
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cherry extract

Mix above and bring to a boil, stirring until thickened. Remove from heat and let cool.
Split Dinah Finger lengthwise, ladle 2 ounces of sauce over base and cover with whipped cream.
Calorie count not available.