Spring Vegetables and Fruit

Is there any season more anticipated than spring? Any fruit more yearned for than a ripe strawberry? You may crave tender lettuce instead. Spring vegetables and fruit let us shrug off the heaviness and cold of winter. Read on for spring recipes and tips for celebrating spring with the freshest, most affordable fruit and vegetables.

What’s in Season: Early Spring Vegetables and Fruit

I look forward to crunching into fresh, raw sugar-snap peas, the candy of the vegetable world. Put your wok to work with snow peas, scallions, and Asian greens such as tatsoi and mizuna. Make salad with the mesclun, arugula, and bok choi. Cook a mess o’ greens or whirl up a smoothie with kale, chard, collards, beet greens, and mustard greens. Roast beets, turnips, sweet potatoes, and winter squash. Celery adds crunch to chickpea salad and aroma to stews. Super-food parsley works as a garnish, in green sauces, and tabouleh salad.

What’s in Season: Mid Spring Vegetables and Fruit

Strawberries at last! My Taster loves strawberry shortcake. We get extra berries to freeze strawberry sauce for the winter. It’s also peak salad month, with big lettuce heads that look like rococo flowers and taste sweet before the heat turns them bitter. If it’s been awhile since the last freeze, I look for the sweeter greens like chard, spinach, and baby kale instead of possibly bitter collards and mustard.

What’s in Season: Late Spring Vegetables and Fruit

Strawberries continue as our favorites seasonal fruit. Late spring vegetables include super-healthy cruciferous vegetables broccoli and cauliflower, along with radishes and lettuce. Look for larger heads of nutrient-rich romaine lettuce. Welcome baby summer squash as a sign that summer is right around the corner.

Spring Recipes

• Strawberry Shortcake — Classic Biscuit Style
• Orange Broccoli Bowl with Ginger and Cashews
• Collards in Peanut-Lime Sauce