June Harvest

Now that summer is officially here, the best way to ensure you are buying local foods it to visit our local farmer's markets. While visiting markets, these are the fruits and vegetables you want to be looking out for during the month of June.

Vegetables:

• Aparagus, Bokchoy, Beans (Green/Wax), Brocolli, Cabbage, Cauliflower, Field Cucumber, Kale, Lettuce, Mushrooms, Onions (Cooking/Green), Peas (Green/Snow), Peppers, Radicchio, Radishes, Rutabaga, Spinach, Sprouts, Sweet Potatoes, Tomatoes, Turnips

Fruits: 

• Apples, Cherries, Rhubarb, Strawberries

The closer we get to July, you will find a greater variation in fresh fruits and vegetables. Things get more colourful and a lot more delicious! Time to start cooking.

Looking for a farmer's market in the area? Click on Ontario Farmer's Markets

Summer Eating

"And so with the sunshine and the great bursts of leaves growing on trees, just as things grow in fast movies, I had that familiar conviction that life was beginning over again with the summer" - F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby

Summer is a time of growth and activity.  It is a time to take action and follow through with the positive changes we started setting up in the Spring. We make big changes to our lifestyle in the summer by spending more time outside, becoming more physically active, we may even become more social. With all of the lifestyles shifts we make, our eating patterns must also shift to provide us with the right amount of fuel and energy to get through the longer and busier days of summer.

Summer brings an abundance of fruits, vegetables, and herbs. Our options are limitless and we are able to choose from many highly nutritious and delicious foods. This is a time where we are able to have a greater variation in our diets and test out new recipes. The summer heat requires us to eat a lighter, fresher diet high in water content, sticking to mainly raw meals and salads. During this time of year, heavy proteins and cooked fats are best reduced to allow for easy digestion and to use the lighter foods we eat for fuel.

If summer is a time where you really feel the motivation to make changes in your eating habits, try to follow this guideline I found in Elson M. Haas's book "Staying Healthy With Nutrition". I have found it extremely useful and simple to follow. It is a guideline that should be used throughout the year, but summer is an especially good time to make these changes due to the variation of seasonal foods that
are available to us.

Suggested Dietary Changes

Decrease	Increase
Calories, saturated fats, red meats, dairy foods, refined sugars, refined flour, salt, processed foods, soda pop	Fresh vegetables, fresh fruits, sprouts, drinking water, complex carbohydrates, fiber, whole grains, legumes, vegetable oils

 

Get Juiced!

While I sit in the sun this morning, I reminisce about a trip I took with my lady friends over the May long weekend. The weather couldn't have been any more perfect. Even in the middle of May, we could already feel the summer warmth. The sun was out in full force, you could feel the humidity in the air, it was the kind of weather we'd been dreaming about all winter. It was a reminder of what was to come.

Since the weather that week reminded me of the summer months, I decided to make some home made juice for us.  I had made a fresh juice with a bright green colour to it and included a plethora of ingredients. Apples, carrots, mango, lemon, celery, kale, and spinach. You would never imagine these flavours pairing well together, but the sweet hint of mango combined with a slight earthy flavour of kale and spinach, with an aftertaste of celery was delicious and satisfying. The girls raved about how yummy it was. There was nothing we could compare the flavour of the juice to, but one thing was for sure the girls wanted more of it.

Because they still ask me to re-create my juice and to continue to make different recipes, I have dedicated a page to juicing. This page will include information about juicing, the benefits of juicing, and juicing recipes.

If you haven't tried making home made juice before, now is a great time to start. With summer right around the corner, you can't beat drinking a glass of homemade juice on a hot day. The refreshing flavours of fresh fruits and vegetables quenches your thirst like nothing else. Just add a few ice cubes and voila!

http://thegardenofeating.blogspot.ca/p/juicing.html

Leon Seasonality Chart

 

    A great and easy way to determine which foods are in season. 

For a print off chart visit http://cuesa.org/sites/default/files/cuesa_seasonality_veg_chart.pdf

Why Should I Eat A Seasonal Diet?

As seasons change so do our diets. With the hot air and spells of humidity that summer brings, we tend to gravitate towards light, fresh, raw foods that will hydrate us and keep us cool. In the winter time, we look for those hearty, filling meals that will give us comfort and warmth. It's not just a coincidence that we crave these different types of foods depending on the season. Eating seasonally keeps us in tune with the Earth and the cycles of Nature. Seasonal eating provides us with the right type of fuel to protect us from the climate as our environment provides the best foods to support our health and keep us in balance. Eating seasonally is an essential step in attaining and maintaining overall health and gets us re-acquainted with our own body cycles.

What is seasonal eating? 

Simply put, seasonal eating refers to eating a diet rich in foods that are at their peak at any given time of the year. This is usually the time where these foods are the freshest, most flavourful, and highly nutritious being full of vitamins and minerals that our body calls for. For example, in the summer time our gardens are full of juicy fruits and vegetables such as cucumber, melons, berries, corn, tomatoes, and zucchini. In the winter time, we will commonly find root vegetables and foods that take more time to prepare, such as carrots, squash, potatoes, beets, and turnips in our gardens. Seasonal eating has been practiced since ancient civilizations as people ate what nature produced according to the seasons.

Is seasonal eating sustainable? 

Yes. Seasonal eating is the most sustainable way of eating because it encourages us to buy locally. By purchasing local foods or by growing foods that are fit for our climate in our gardens, we are eliminating environmental damage that is caused by shipping foods from thousands of miles away. By purchasing and eating seasonal foods, we are also supporting our local farmers! It is an economical diet that can give us some of the cleanest foods because fewer chemicals are needed to store or ship them and helps us to avoid processed and modified foods. Majority of us living in the city don't have a garden, so always think to yourself, if I were to grow this fruit, vegetable, herb, or grain in my backyard would it survive the climate throughout the season? If yes, then try to stick to buying and eating these foods.

Should I eat local and seasonal foods all of the time? 

Since I am a big believer of living in moderation and finding a good balance in everything, eating seasonal foods ALL of the time may not be realistic for many of us. Although I encourage eating local and seasonal foods, I do not think that we need to completely cut out foods that are shipped from abroad. I admit, I love the way ripe mango tastes when you eat it off of the pit and bananas with peanut butter are one of my favourite snacks. I like having variation in my diet and try to make things interesting by adding ingredients to my recipes that may not be local. The key is to cut down on these foods, not cut them out completely and to predominantly use local seasonal foods. You will find that I will not only use ingredients in my recipes that are local, but the ingredients will be seasonal and may be found during this time of year in other regions.