Food of the week: fruit in season
 

This is a strange "food of the week".. but I know you gals are going to come up with some awesome ideas!

What's in season where you live?
Do you eat it raw?
cook with it?
Do you care about the natural sugar in fruit?
How much do you pay for it, in season?
Have any recipes with your favourite in season fruit?
Do you grow it yourself?

Tell me all about your favourite fruit in season!

I'm in South Florida so I am very lucky to have fresh produce available at very reasonable prices from produce stands year-round.

Apples are on sale this week (99 cents/lb). I love Gala the most raw, but for something yummy for every kind is to peel and slice the apple and put into a bowl w/a packet of splenda and some cinnamon and microwave it for 2 minutes. Turns into the inside of an apple pie. Sometimes I sprinkle graham crackers on it for a "crust" too.

Strawberries are at their peak season right now too ($2/lb). Love them in smoothies and by themselves. If anyone has any healthy preparations for strawberries, I would love to hear it.

Cantaloupe is in season now too. ($2 ea)

Sometimes pineapple ($1.99-$2.99 ea). Love to grill pineapple, love it in smoothies, by itself, anthing.

Hi Dana.....
 

I am really into berries right now--strawberries, blueberries and blackberries. I put them in my oatmeal and yogurt. I really like just about all fruit. I am careful with bananas because they seem to increase my sugar cravings but anything else is fine. One thing that really helps if I am needing a "treat" is a cooked apple. I take an apple (usually Cortland or Empire) and slice it thin (I leave the skin on.) Next I arrange it on a plate in a single layer, sprinkle it with cinnamin and microwave it for 2 minutes or so. You can put a bit of walnuts or Fiber One one it and it is delicious. One of my daughters is hooked on this and asks for it all the time.

I am into frozen raspberries and light cool whip. I actually crave for it. The raspberries are a little tart and the cool whip gives it the little bit of sweetness you need.

I love any kind of fruit, but I try to limit them to no more than 2 a day - there is a lot of natural sugar in them. (Not a bad thing, but I am trying to still just do 2 a day) Any of them sliced into a 1/2 cup of plain nonfat yogurt is WONDERFUL. Or, I put them in my steel cut oats in the morning.

I also will cut up an apple (peel included) or peach, nectarine etc. with a little bit of cinnamon and microwave it for a minute or two. I don't add any sweetners to it, they're plenty sweet enough all by themselves for me!

Smoothies are great too - just put the fruit in the freezer, and it makes a nice frozen smoothie without having to add ice cubes or ice cream to it!

I'm not sure what is in season here (so sorry if this is considered hijacking the thread), but I eat 1 cup of frozen WILD blueberries every morning. The wild have more antioxidants than the other blueberries. I am thought to be weird, but I put the berries on a plate and eat them in-between bites of hot oatmeal. I do NOT like them mixed with my oatmeal, but they are good in-between bites. LOL!! I do like fruit, in general, but these blueberries add an extra "umph" to my morning and makes the oats seem to last a little longer. :smug:

Ok RitzyFritz,
Where in the world do you get wild blueberries? I love them.

BTW - You southern people are so lucky! Nothing is in season here right now. Soon, but not now. We have beautiful flowers on the trees, but will have to wait for another couple of months for the cherries. Yum! Then, we'll be the lucky ones because I live where there are cherries, then apricots and plums, then peaches, then melons, and then apples!!

I actually buy them at our Wal-Mart Super Center. They are in the frozen section. It is a 3-lb bag for just under $10. It is the Dole brand. They are VERY good!

Costco also carries frozen wild blueberries. The brand is Wyman's? I think and it is 3 lbs for about $8 or so.

What's in season where you live?
Nothing is in season this far north. But since apples stay all winter long, that's the closest I can come.
Do you eat it raw?
yes, with natural peanut butter.
cook with it?
They are nice baked occasionally. Every once in a blue moon I try to make an apple pie that comes out pretty mediocre. I made homemade applesauce once.
Do you care about the natural sugar in fruit?
Yes. Especially since some fruits are very high in sugar.
How much do you pay for it, in season?
About $1 per pound in the fall. hmmm I just noticed my keyboard has no cents sign. I was going to say 99 cents per pound :D
Have any recipes with your favourite in season fruit?
Not unless somebody wants a recipe for a mediocre apple pie made with a pre-made crust.
Do you grow it yourself?
No, but I pick my own in the fall.

I like to put strawberries in my salad - --

Today, for lunch, I had a salad with 3 different kinds of lettuce, some grape tomatoes, strawberries sliced (about two), part of a kiwi, a little bit of avacado, some grilled chicken, red, yellow, orange and green bell peppers. I found this dressing at Bloom, it's an organic vinagrette, it is kind of tangy sweet, I don't remember who made it, the bottle is white.

Anyway - it was perfect - YUMMY!

Citrus is what's available around here right now, although it's pretty expensive. Bananas are always available, but I seldom eat them because the high sugar content seems to cause cravings.

I froze pounds of blueberries last July, and I eat blueberries almost every day. Not really an apple eater, although I found Liberty apples last fall, and ate one every day during their season. When I was in Hawaii in January, we ate pineapple every day. I will eat other frozen berries, too, especially raspberries in a smoothie--yum!

We don't get much local produce until later in the spring, and the summer. This time of year, I eat a lot of fresh apples, oranges, bananas, grapefruit and pears, and frozen berries. By the summer I will be buying mostly local - potatoes, corn, berries, peaches, cherries....I really can't wait!! We have a lot of farms locally - many organic - and so the summer prices are very reasonable.

I spend about $30 a week on fresh produce for the whole family this time of year - in the summer, I'll spend about the same price but get a lot more for the money. I don't grow anything myself (well, not fruit anyway - I have herb plants, though!) - maybe someday!

I eat most fruit raw - sometimes cooked in the case of a baked apple or rum grilled pineapple. The sugars in fruit aren't a big concern to me - I love fruit, and eat it every day, but don't binge on it or anything. I'll take those natural sugars over processed treats any day!

My favorite trick is stirring the beans from a fresh vanilla pod into a mixed fruit salad - SO delicious and fragrant. This works with any fruit, but is especially great with the tropical stuff - mango, pineapple, papaya, a few strawberries, along with some curls of fresh coconut. It's my favorite.

Consider yourself very blessed! I looked to see what was available to us, and there is not ONE in our state! :( At least I can get organics at the grocery store, however! :)

I'm trying to eat more fruits.

If you want some really good recipes, go to fiveaday.gov

We are still pretty cold and snowy but soon rhubarb will be ready. I know it's technically a veggie but just love it. My strawberries will arrive by the end of June along with currants followed by raspberries and the black caps at the edge of the meadow. Until then, it's citrus and frozen berries.

At 51° N, 1km high, Calgary's growing season is pretty short. What grows here isn't in season 'till July or August, except for indoor-grown, i.e. mushrooms, sprouts, various herbs.... Our global distribution access is pretty good, though, as we're a market of 1 million plus, and there are several million more north of us.

Hard to pick any favourites! Generally I prefer it all raw, or as lightly steamed (veggies) as possible. Salads with spices & vinegars (no oils), crudités with homemade crushed garlic-hummus dip, stir-fries, light veg. curries, and roasted cauliflower (instead of spuds) or spaghetti squash (with homemade tomato sauce) are all faves. I love all fruits too, but bananas, grapes, most tropicals, and too-generous portions of ANY other fruit cause my blood sugar to crash, so I try to go easy on them, or forego entirely. Not easy!

Prices reflect the fact that most fresh local produce is either hydroponic or long warehoused. The bulk of produce comes from 100's of miles away, and much of it from other continents as well. Still, we get a huge selection all year long!

Hmmm, not sure what would actually be considered "in season" but I do buy whatever looks good at the supermarket that day.

I guess you could say strawberries are in, as they are available now in all the local grocery stores. Not sure what size that plastic container is, maybe two pounds? It's running $5-6 for the container, and I need to go buy another one tomorrow...it will be the 3rd container in about a week. EEEK!

Bananas are always available, but we seem to be having a run on them in our house lately! DH tends to go through cycles with them, he eats them for a week or two, then doesn't for a couple weeks. However, I've bought a bunch of bananas every other day for the past two weeks! I keep buying them by the bunch thinking they will last me a few days, and low and behold the next day they're all gone. I'm not complaining, though, cause that tells me the kiddos are hitting the healthy snacks instead of the junk!

As for how to eat the stuff, bananas I like just by themselves. The kids are eating them plain and putting them on cereal. Strawberries are pretty much straight out of the carton. I will admit I like to dip them in splenda or sweet n low for a little extra sweetness, and I do occassionally add them to a salad. I've been eating them almost daily with lunch as a little dessert. Clementines are great on their own or tossed into a salad.