Special

Getting In Tune With Fruits and Vegetables In Season

by Tam Thompson

It’s pop quiz time for all you foodies: do you remember the time when you could only get fruits and vegetables when they were in season? How about the days when you had to wait until high summer for peaches, late summer for watermelon and early spring for fresh, young salad greens? Well, as we all know, those days are over. In today’s age of immediacy and convenience, we simply don’t have to wait like we used to. In fact, if we crave peaches in January, it’s not a problem. Large grocery store chains are more than happy to ship these fruits and just about anything else we could imagine from all corners of the world, giving us almost unlimited options year-round. And it’s so great to exercise our freedom of choice, isn’t it?

Well, not necessarily.

For one thing, if you’re at all environmentally conscious, the average piece of food in most grocery stores travels approximately 1,300 miles before it hits the shelves. Tomatoes are typically trucked in from California, limes are routinely motored in from Mexico, and most citrus fruits take a long flight from warm and sunny Florida. Just think of how much the price of gas has gone up in the last year, then realize that the price of food has risen 27 percent as well, and then connect the dots.

What’s more, our central Texas area contains lush farmland that grows hundreds of different vegetables, not to mention extensive ranchland that nourishes cattle, chickens, turkeys and deer. These locally grown and raised foods taste good, they don’t waste nearly as much gas to truck in, and when we buy them, we are supporting local farmers and ranchers.

And if those aren’t convincing enough reasons, then think about this: consuming locally grown and raised food that’s ripe and in season for our climate keeps the subtle rhythms of our biochemistry in tune as well. The school of culinary thought known as macrobiotics teaches this very principle and emphasizes the importance of picking foods that nourish the mind, body and spirit to help make us healthier and fitter.

According to the La Leche League, a nationwide breast-feeding organization, “Eating seasonally benefits the individual, the family, the larger community and the environment. For those who are not gardeners, farmers’ markets and other local vendors provide a bountiful array of seasonal fruits and vegetables of which everyone can take advantage. When produce is trucked across the country for out-of-season distribution (tomatoes in winter, for example), its nutritive value declines.”

Dawn Steinborn, owner of The Natural Epicurean Academy of Culinary Arts, headquartered inside the same cozy, vine-lined compound that houses Austin’s macrobiotic treasure, Casa de Luz, also recognizes the value of eating local. In the cooking classes she teaches, Steinborn talks excitedly about how various foods affect our health and emotions, while also showing people how to make these natural foods taste even better.

“Eating the right foods at the right times of the year is very important,” Steinborn says. “What you eat in the summertime — cucumbers, melons, corn, even tofu — should keep you cool. Warming foods, like oatmeal and cinnamon, should be eaten in the winter.”

And she lives by her words. “I don’t have air-conditioning in my house,” Steinborn admits. “I don’t need it, even in Austin, because the foods I eat cool me. And in the wintertime, I only turn up the thermostat to about 64 degrees because I eat the right foods to keep me warm,” she says.

So how does all of this work? Steinborn starts by explaining, “We have self-regulating mechanisms in our body to warm or cool us, like shivering when we’re cold to help keep the blood flowing. If we get cold enough, our bodies will shunt blood to the core; in other words, we’ll sacrifice fingers and toes to stay alive,” she says.

So for the most part, the body knows what to do. The problem arises when the brain makes poor choices for our bodies, such as eating too much sugar. It is common knowledge that too much sugar can be bad, and in many cases can cause mood swings. But why?

“Fruit is generally good to eat in the summer, but not too much of it,” Steinborn says. Limit it to about four or five servings a week, because too much fruit can be acid-forming.”

So of course, the next logical question is: Is an acid-forming food bad?

“It can be,” she replies. “Our bodies are always producing acids of all kinds: lactic, hydrochloric, carbonic, uric…and if we’re eating enough alkaline-producing foods, it’s okay, because the alkaline foods will buffer the acids.”

“But if you eat too many acid-forming foods, such as sugars, fruits, even tomatoes, over a long period of time, you can build up acid in your system, which is stored in the blood,” Steinborn explains. “Stored acid is a great host for bacteria and candida.”

And that’s not all.

According to Steinborn, “You need alkaline-forming foods in your diet, and more of them in the summer when you’re more prone to eat acid-producing foods like melon and tomatoes. Some of the alkaline-forming minerals are sodium, potassium, calcium and magnesium. If you’re not getting enough calcium, your body will take it from where it’s stored in the body — namely bones and teeth.

That is one reason why athletes exercising outdoors in the summer must continually supplement with electrolytes — because they’re gulping GU energy gels and Gatorade to keep up their blood sugar, while sweating out precious minerals.

Steinborn continues, “When your body takes calcium away from teeth and bones for years at a time, that can lead to osteoporosis.” Furthermore, eating too many acid-forming foods for too long can lead to the development of certain acid conditions. These in turn can cause fatigue, muscle aches, arthritis, bursitis and tendonitis.

“The whole thing about eating seasonally,” Steinborn emphasizes, “is that you’re letting nature take care of what you need, and take care of balancing your body. Nature will show you what you need by producing the right fruits and veggies at the right times. There’s no way, in my lifetime, I could do all the math to figure out the complex chemical reactions in my body to determine just what to eat, how much and when. But if I listen, nature will tell me,” she says.

So now that summer is heating up and temperatures are pushing three digits, what kinds of foods should we turn to?

“Tomatoes are one of the few things you can harvest in our climate in August,” Steinborn explains. “But you have to watch out with tomatoes and other nightshades, such as potatoes, eggplant, tomatillos, and even tobacco.”

“Nightshades — tomatoes included — are very acidic,” she reiterates. “And that’s okay if you haven’t been eating them all year long; your body can tolerate high-acid foods for a few months. But if you eat them year-round, you accumulate the acid, so when the tomatoes are ripe you pour fresh acid on top of a saturation of acid. This can make you feel very fatigued,” she says.

Apparently the dog days of August aren’t just about heat, they’re also about what you eat.

Another caution Steinborn has about eating freshly-harvested tomatoes applies to people with joint or bone problems. “They should probably avoid nightshades altogether, since the acid in them can cause inflammation,” she warns.

So take your cue from what the good Earth provides you, and seek out seasonal foods that are grown right here in the Austin area. Before long, you’ll love the connection you’ve built between yourself, your health and your home.