5 Reasons You Should Be Eating Seasonal Fruits and Veggies

eating seasonal

Wondering if that CSA box or farmer’s market trip is worth it?

Eating plenty of fruits and vegetables is well-known as a healthy choice. These dietary choices can protect you against heart disease, obesity, diabetes, and many other complications. But does it matter whether or not they’re in season?

As the weather changes in your area, so does the list of what you can get in terms of seasonal produce. Although it’s possible to buy things that aren’t in season, you won’t be doing yourself any favors. Eating seasonal food is a great reason to try new things, experiment with recipes, and start taking better care of your health. Here are the top reasons why eating seasonal produce is a great choice for everyone.

1. It Tastes Better

We all want our food to taste as good as it possibly can. When you try seasonal eating, you’ll get food that’s sweeter, fresher, and perfectly ripe.

Seasonal produce is able to properly ripen on the vine before it gets picked. It’s harvested at the perfect time, so it has the best flavor and maximum nutrition.

Have you ever had the perfect, juicy, sweet orange during winter or a crisp, delicious pineapple in the summer? These foods taste best because they’re in season.

When crops need to be transported farther because they’re not locally in season, they get harvested and refrigerated early to reduce the chances of spoiling during transit. Chilling takes away some of the flavors, and when the fruit reaches its destination, it usually needs to get heated again.

Sometimes, they’ll even be artificially ripened in a hothouse if they were picked early. This changes the texture and flavor in significant ways. Ever had a tomato with no flavor; a floury, grainy apple; or wilted greens from the store? That’s because they’re out of season. But it’s easy to avoid – just buy seasonally and you’ll enjoy your food much more.

2. It’s Less Expensive

All but a select few of us have to work with a food budget when we go to the store. But having a budget doesn’t mean you can’t eat well. In fact, sometimes the best choices are also the most cost-effective.

If your produce is in season in your area, then you can buy locally-sourced. There’s no cost for transporting or storing the food en route. This reduces the total production costs, which can reduce the amount you’ll have to pay in turn.

When you buy out-of-season produce, it tends to come from far-away places that have different climates. The produce might need to get stored for a long time, so stores can time when products hit the shelves to offer a wider variety. However, all of these things drive prices up. Saving money and eating better-tasting food? Sounds like a win-win to us.

3. It’s More Nutritious

Nutrition may or may not be the first thing on your mind when you choose what to eat. But if you knew you could easily get more nutritional value out of your foods, why wouldn’t you choose it?

When you buy in-season produce, it’s fresher. You’re eating it closer to the time when it was harvested, so the nutrients in it haven’t dissipated yet. Certain antioxidants such as carotenes, folate, and vitamin C quickly deteriorate during storage.

You’ll know the in-season produce because it appears crisper, and brighter in color, not old, dull, and dried-up. The color can make food more appealing, but it’s also another sign of high nutritional value. Out-of-season food may have been irradiated or gassed to kill germs, or stored in wax. Although these methods make it safe to eat, they take away a lot of the nutrients that make food good for you.

4. It’s Less Contaminated

Needless to say, some of these preservation processes don’t seem too healthy. One more benefit of eating seasonal is that it lets you avoid contamination from produce that’s been shipped overseas.

When produce comes from other countries, you won’t know for sure what their regulations are for things like pesticides, fungicides, and herbicides. A lot of countries around the world have lax laws for what fruits and vegetables can be sprayed with. Just because your country has banned some harmful chemicals doesn’t mean other countries have.

Other countries also might not conduct soil contamination tests to make sure the soil isn’t contaminating the food. Some places where food is grown have high heavy metal contents and other dangerous things in the soil.

When you buy in-season produce that’s grown locally, you’ll know exactly how it’s treated. You can even buy bulk in-season produce and then freeze or otherwise store it yourself using methods that you know are safe and healthy.

5. Gives Your Body What it Needs

For most of the centuries that humans have been growing food for, buying out of season produce wasn’t an option. Modern technology lets us have access to food grown anywhere at all times of the year. But most of our food is actually designed to give us what we need at the time when it’s in season.

For example, citrus fruits are in season during winter. They provide us with the vitamin C we need to ward off illness during those months. Seasonal summer foods like stone fruits contain beta-carotene and carotenoids, which our body uses to ward off damage from the sun.

Many seasonally popular recipes focus on what’s in season – think of summer salads and winter stews. Cooking becomes much easier when you’re eating seasonally, and you’ll get the nutrients that you really need at the time.

Ready to Try Eating Seasonal?

Eating seasonal has more benefits than we could list here, but these are a few of our favorites. Give it a try – it’s easier than you might think.

Once you’ve made the move to eating seasonally, it’s easy to take it a step further and try eating organic. Check out our guide to shopping organic here.