Have you been loving the local fruits and vegetables lately?  It’s been such a nice summer with lots of warm weather and local fruits and veggies a plenty!  And while we all inherently understand that eating in synch with the seasons helps our local farmers and the environment, have you tied the connection to how eating seasonally can help us function at our best too?

I’ve noticed that no matter where I’ve gone in the country at various times of the year, it seems like I can always find a strawberry.  It could be January in New England and I bet I can find one.  And here we are in the middle of 90 degree weather, and I can find a sweet potato at my local grocery store. 

The interesting thing about this is that I love strawberries and I love sweet potatoes, but I know that eating a sweet potato doesn’t really appeal to me right now.  And you better believe that sweet potatoes are one of my favorite vegetables, especially given my affinity towards dessert.  So why doesn’t it sound good today?  Because over the last year, I’ve been trying my hardest to eat what’s readily available at that particular time of year, and I think my body likes it!

Sweet potatoes are naturally available in the Fall, and it’s for good reason.  Nature has once again done its job by providing us with the right thing at the right time.  Sweet potatoes are building foods; they actually warm up our body and prepare us for the cold weather to come.  In the summer, eating a sweet potato will be adding heat to fire – one might find themselves to be a little cranky or irritable a few hours later.  By consuming them in the fall instead, we are setting our immune systems up for success in the winter.  Don’t get the wrong idea – if you were to eat sweet potatoes and Snickers throughout autumn, it doesn’t mean you won’t get sick!  But as you adopt a more seasonal eating plan, your immune system will be stronger in the season to come, and with each new season, you’ll be preventing disease as a result.

For example, the spring is a time for renewal, and after a long harsh winter, your body is ready to lighten up in preparation for summer.  In the winter, it’s likely that we’ve been eating heavier comfort-type foods.  It just so happens that greens are in season in the Spring and greens naturally detoxify and clean our digestive tracts and bodies.  Eighty percent of our immune systems lie in our gut, so by detoxifying our intestines, we are setting our immune systems up for success in the year to come.

Eating seasonally naturally gives more business to local farmers, so you are nourishing your community while you nourish yourself.  This also means that foods are not traveling from far away places (like California or Ecuador) to get to your plate – they may be right in your backyard or just a few miles away.  This dramatically reduces the carbon footprint of the food you choose, so our earth is much happier and healthier for it.  Plus, who doesn’t want the little guys to survive?

So let’s talk about summer.

Summer is the time for us to be outside – it’s warm out and we don’t need any insulation anymore!  It’s a time for us to exercise and sweat toxins out, furthering the detoxification process that we went through in the Spring.  It’s also the time of year that we should be spending outdoors in the sun and having fun!

According to both Ayurveda and traditional Chinese medicine, summer is the time to recharge our internal batteries by getting out.  Because it’s hot, we need to balance our bodies with cooling foods and water on the inside!  It’s the time of year that naturally nourishes the heart and small intestines, and it just so happens that the foods that are most abundant in the summer are naturally cooling to our bodies and are also very beneficial to those exact organs.

What to eat?

As you may have guessed, it’s a great time for strawberries right now!  And since strawberries are cooling by nature, you can imagine that eating a strawberry in the winter isn’t going to serve you as well as when you eat one in the summer.  The same goes with raspberries, blueberries, apricots, and melons.  All of these fruits are full of water and therefore naturally cooling to our bodies.

Veggies that will be most supportive in the summer include asparagus, cucumbers, dandelion greens, and endive.  Want a great way to incorporate these into a meal?  See below for my Cool Cucumber & Avocado Soup.  Other excellent choices for summertime eating are pumpkin and sunflower seeds, coconut, olive oil, garbanzo beans (hummus is a great choice in the summer!), rice, and tofu.  Check out the Center for Urban Education about Sustainable Agriculture (CUESA) and Sustainable Table for other great ideas on what to eat this summer!

How to eat?

How you prepare your foods also makes a difference.  In the winter, I cannot handle even the idea of eating a carrot raw, or anything else raw for that matter.  And yet, right now I can’t get enough raw fruits and veggies into my system!  Smoothies are my mantra these days but I’d have get back under the covers if I drank a smoothie in January.

Portion quantity differs by season as well – right now you may have noticed that your appetite is a bit lower – you don’t need as much to fill you up.  This is because you’re not using any energy to heat your body, nature is doing it for you by providing you with warmth all summer long!  Honor this – you will feel better.  Overeating puts a lot of unnecessary stress on the digestive system and ultimately can make you sick later on in the year.

The most important thing you can do for your body is to listen to it. If something doesn’t sound good, stop and ask yourself why.  Most people find that after some practice with seasonal eating, it starts to happen naturally.  And of course, once again, you can easily see that eating in a way that promotes your health not only supports you, but it supports the community and the planet. 

Cool Cucumber & Avocado Soup

1 cucumber, peeled

1 avocado

2 green onions

Juice of 1 lime

1 cup plain, organic yogurt (Greek or soy are my favorites)

1 cup water

Salt & pepper to taste

1. Roughly chop the cucumber, avocado, and green onions and toss in the blender
2. Add other ingredients and process until smooth.
3. Enjoy!

Kendra Strasburg, Holistic Health & Wellness Consultant, helps her busy clients everywhere to enrich their lives with healthier eating, living, loving, and moving. For more information, visit www.healthiswellth.com

Image from Flickr user *clarity* shared with a Creative Commons Attribution License.