Local and In Season

With the wide variety of imported food available to us in Canada, most people seem to have forgotten what "in season" means.  Or they just don't understand the importance anymore.  For instance, for months now I've seen a guy set up shop on a corner at a main intersection, selling "peaches and cream" corn and "fresh ripe" tomatoes.  People are always there buying his stuff.  WTF?  It's the beginning of July.  My tomatoes are just now starting to ripen, and yesterday I bought a half dozen corn off of a woman at the farmer's market who told me the season is starting early, because of the heat.  So where has the corner guy been getting his stuff?  Certainly not around here.

This morning, I hit one of the more upscale grocery stores, looking for a good variety of fresh fruit.  I've been asked to bring a fruit platter to a BBQ this evening.  Imagine my disappointment when aisle after aisle in the extensive produce section, I saw the label "product of USA".  I finally stopped an employee and asked where I could find the local Ontario berries?  He said "we don't carry them anymore".  Ummmm, what?  The poor guy, I know it was not his fault, but did he ever get an earful.  Seriously?  I was just out picking strawberries 2 weeks ago, and yesterday I purchased fresh blueberries and raspberries at the market.  And yet the grocery stores don't stock them "anymore"?  That's insane!

So I created quite the exotic fruit platter, complete with the remainder of my Ontario berries.

279.  Fresh Fruit Platter (Jamie's Food Revolution, page 320)

Jamie uses a different variety of fruit in his sample recipe than I did, but I am sure he would agree that you have to go with what's available, and fresh.  So I sliced and chopped pineapple, mango, cantaloupe, banana, and persimmon.  I squeezed a bit of lemon juice over the fruits that I felt might darken.  I sectioned a few clementines, washed some cherries, and picked through the berries.  To serve, I bought a container of fat-free peach flavoured Greek yogurt.

If there are left overs, you can combine them for a quick fruit salad or whiz them up into a smoothie!

If the guests at the BBQ are expecting one of those generic, pre-filled plastic fruit platters from the grocery store (priced this morning at $29.99, yikes!) they should get a big surprise.  I calculated that I spent about $10 on all this fruit, and the rest is staying here for me to enjoy all week.