Eating seasonally - silver linings

Week 12 in (partial) lockdown. Some restrictions are easing. We’re taking it one day at a time, with occasional trips to the local supermarket. Beyond that, we’re keeping up with friends and family via Zoom and WhatsApp, playing Scrabble (I’m losing so far) and going through our backlog of DVDs!

Back in March, I realised I would have to cook in a different way for the duration. Shopping proved the biggest challenge. Where once I would come up with an idea for the evening’s dinner resulting in a trip to the shops for the relevant fresh ingredients, now I had to think ahead – and a long way ahead at that, planning for 2-3 weeks’ worth of food.

The first big shop was a disaster. Contrary to most of my principles on how to stock a kitchen, I panicked – forgetting many of the basics. I ran out of butter, eggs and flour two weeks in. I ran seriously low on staple carbs: rice, noodles, pasta. I also completely underestimated how much fruit and veg we would go through cooking 24/7.

I did better with the second shop – partly because the Resident Husband insisted I bought large packets of frozen veg, which I was a bit sniffy about, but it was the right call in the end.

On the third shop, something changed. I noticed some of the fruit and veg I had bought before were either low on stock or out of stock, while other new fruit and veg had arrived. It was like going into your favourite clothes shop expecting to buy some fab outfit you saw earlier on, only to find it’s gone, and a shed load of new stock has come in, heralding a new season.

There are few unseen benefits to a pandemic, but reawakening my appreciation of cooking with the seasons, that was one of them. Unlike locavores, whose diet consists only or principally locally grown food, I’m pretty happy to buy imported fresh foods - in particular through winter, and the dreaded ‘hunger gap’ in March. However, that small moment in the supermarket - eyeing up all the new produce coming in - I realised I hadn’t been paying as much attention to the changing seasons as I thought I had. Action was definitely required!

The first thing I did was order a bunch of seeds and plugs, which we planned to plant in some of those large Really Useful Boxes. We are now nurturing a wide range of fruit and veg - strawberries, zucchinis, broad beans, peas and tomatoes - the broad beans flowering stage posted earlier this month. After that, I went through all of my recipes to pick out the best dishes for May and June, which was much fun, but also helpful thinking about how to use them in ‘leftovers’ ahead of their end-date. And - in the spirit of sharing - I posted some ideas for others, on seasonal June foods, sharing my thoughts on which fruits, veg, herbs and nuts would be great to use that month. Given I have a low base of followers (naturally, given I have only been on Instagram for a couple of months) I was surprised by how well it went! Which tells me that there is a real appetite out there for aligning with Nature’s cycles.

I can’t wait to see how our new plants take, and hope we’re rewarded with a decent crop that will take us through those sunny, hot lazy days in July and August. We’re taking lots of photos along the way, so look out for my posts in the July Season collection for the before and after shots!

Stay well in the meantime, everyone!

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