What is seasonal food?
If you grow your own vegetables the packet will tell you when you can expect to harvest the crop and this is when it is in season. If you see vegetables for sale outside of this time then they are not in season and may well have been imported or grown under heat in a greenhouse.
Why eat seasonal food?
Food that is in season has many advantages over imported food or that grown under cover:
- It will have the best and freshest taste.
- It will have a higher nutritional value.
- It is good for the environment as it will have low food low miles and less energy will have been used than glass-grown plants to produce it.
- As a result it will be cheaper.
- Finally, as a consumer, you will get seasonal variety and the excitement of the first taste of a just in-season food is hard to beat. A strawberry in winter may look appetising but it has minimal taste compared to a summer one.
What is is Season in July?
(Please note I have based this list on UK and Northern France)Veg
- Peas and mangetout
- Aubergines
- Spring onions
- Radishes
- Beetroot
- Summer cabbage
- Potatoes - new and maincrop
- Broccoli
- Salad leaves and lettuces
- Carrots
- Tomatoes
- Runner beans
- Chard
- Spinach
- Courgettes
- Pak choi
Herbs
- Fresh herbs are all in season now - if you grow your own you can dry them for later use. Keep picking them to stop them going to flower too.
Fruit
- Cherries
- Gooseberries
- Strawberries
- Blueberries
- Raspberries
- Hybrid berries such as jostaberries, loganberries and tayberries
- Currants - red, white and black
Foraging
- Wild garlic (in northern regions of UK)
- Samphire
- Watercress
- Nettles
- Gorse flowers
- Sea beet
- Wild thyme
- Wild strawberries
- Pennywort
- Greater and Ribwort plantain
There is so much you can cook with July seasonal foods and here are 2 of my favourites - one healthy and one maybe not so good for the waistline. I give you Grated Beetroot Salad and Summer Fruit Pavlova.
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| Grated beetroot salad |
Do you have any favourite recipes using these July ingredients?
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