{"id":380059,"date":"2010-03-02T12:36:15","date_gmt":"2010-03-02T17:36:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/green.yahoo.com\/blog\/the_conscious_consumer\/125\/seven-foods-chefs-avoid-right-now.html"},"modified":"2010-03-02T12:36:15","modified_gmt":"2010-03-02T17:36:15","slug":"seven-foods-chefs-avoid-right-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/380059","title":{"rendered":"Seven foods chefs avoid right now"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"image\" style=\"float:right;padding-left:8px;\">\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"image name\" height=\"300\" src=\"http:\/\/a323.yahoofs.com\/ymg\/the_conscious_consumer\/the_conscious_consumer-727701109-1267480890.jpg?ym60cwCDdaR1Jp3Q\" width=\"200\"\/><br \/>\n<br \/><em>(Photo: David Myers, <br \/>chef\/owner, Sona)<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>The tomatoes, cantaloupes, and asparagus you see on grocery<br \/>\nstore shelves right now may look good, but chances are they don&#8217;t taste all<br \/>\nthat great. That&#8217;s because they&#8217;re not is season right now and probably had to<br \/>\nbe shipped from far away or grown in a hothouse. \u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Choosing fruits and vegetables that are at the peak of<br \/>\nfreshness instead brings many benefits. They taste better, are more nutritious, are<br \/>\nbetter for the planet, and are often less expensive than produce that&#8217;s<br \/>\ntravelled thousands of miles to reach your table. <\/p>\n<p>We asked chefs across the country to pick one fruit or<br \/>\nveggie they just won&#8217;t eat right now and why. Here are their answers: <\/p>\n<ul class=\"unIndentedList\">\n<li>\n<strong>Tomatoes.<\/strong><br \/>\n&#8220;Tomatoes should be picked off the<br \/>\nvine where they have grown at the natural pace in the summer &#8212; outside in the<br \/>\nsun. Those are the only ones worth eating. I&#8217;m convinced that people who think<br \/>\nthey don&#8217;t like tomatoes have eaten them at the wrong time of year.&#8221; Kevin<br \/>\nGillespie, executive chef, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.woodfiregrill.com\/index.php\">Woodfire<br \/>\nGrill<\/a>, Atlanta. <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul class=\"unIndentedList\">\n<li>\n<strong>Asparagus.<\/strong><br \/>\n&#8220;The<br \/>\npeak of its season is in spring, but people are able to grow it during the<br \/>\nwinter further south in places like Mexico because of the weather. By the time<br \/>\nthis asparagus gets to us in Seattle during the winter, it&#8217;s probably three<br \/>\nweeks old and hardly at its best,&#8221; Mark Fuller, chef\/owner, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.springhillnorthwest.com\/\">Spring Hill<\/a>, Seattle. <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul class=\"unIndentedList\">\n<li>\n<strong>Corn.<\/strong><br \/>\n&#8220;I grew up picking corn in the summer and know the flavor of perfectly ripe<br \/>\ncorn. You just can&#8217;t beat it,&#8221; David Myers, chef\/owner, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sonarestaurant.com\/\">Sona<\/a>, Los Angeles. <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul class=\"unIndentedList\">\n<li>\n<strong>Nightshades.<\/strong><br \/>\n&#8220;We stay<br \/>\naway from about all fresh <a href=\"http:\/\/search.yahoo.com\/search?p=nightshade+plants&#038;ei=UTF-8&#038;fr=moz35\">nightshades<\/a>, meaning tomatoes, eggplant, peppers.<br \/>\nThey&#8217;re not local, they&#8217;re shipped across the globe, you can drop &#8217;em out a third<br \/>\nfloor window and they remain intact, plus they taste lousy,&#8221; Eric Tucker, executive chef, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.millenniumrestaurant.com\/\">Millennium<br \/>\nRestaurant<\/a>, San Francisco<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul class=\"unIndentedList\">\n<li>\n<strong>Peaches.<\/strong><br \/>\n&#8220;Some people think of peaches<br \/>\nthe way that Gertrude Stein talked about a rose &#8212; but a peach is not a peach is<br \/>\nnot a peach, especially if you consider when and where you&#8217;re eating it. In<br \/>\nAugust, there&#8217;s no more beautiful or more delicious expression of the season.<br \/>\nBut in March, it&#8217;s a disaster.&#8221; Dan Barber, executive chef and<br \/>\nco-owner, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bluehillfarm.com\/home\">Blue Hill<\/a>, New York City. <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul class=\"unIndentedList\">\n<li>\n<strong>Melons.<\/strong><br \/>\n&#8220;Down here in the south, there&#8217;s no way you&#8217;re going to find a good quality<br \/>\nmelon right now. The taste, smell,<br \/>\nand texture are all bad in the wintertime. There&#8217;s also the mental association<br \/>\nto summer. You think of 90-degree days when you think of melons,&#8221; James Boyce, chef\/owner, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cottonrowrestaurant.com\/\">Cotton Row<\/a>,<br \/>\nHuntsville, Alabama. <\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul class=\"unIndentedList\">\n<li>\n<strong>Berries.<\/strong><br \/>\n&#8220;They&#8217;re really expensive. They taste like cardboard. Most of them are coming<br \/>\nfrom South America, and I&#8217;m afraid of some of the chemicals used in the growing<br \/>\nprocess,&#8221; Rob Endelman, founder, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cookwithclass.net\/about.html\">Cook With Class<\/a>, New York<br \/>\nCity.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>What are chefs most excited to start cooking with in the<br \/>\nspring? English peas, asparagus, artichokes, morels, and fava beans. <\/p>\n<p>Depending<br \/>\nupon where you live, you&#8217;ll see these vegetables pop up at farmers&#8217; markets anytime from late<br \/>\nMarch through April. And late spring is also when we&#8217;ll start to see ripe<br \/>\nstrawberries and rhubarb. Anyone who&#8217;s eaten local strawberries knows they are definitely worth the wait!\u00a0 <\/p>\n<p>Here&#8217;s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.realsimple.com\/food-recipes\/shopping-storing\/seasonal-fruit-vegetable-tool-00000000008233\/\">a<br \/>\nguide to peak times<\/a> for popular produce. Or find out <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nrdc.org\/health\/foodmiles\/\">what&#8217;s in season where you live<\/a><br \/>\nright now. Search <a href=\"http:\/\/search.yahoo.com\/search?p=local+farmers+market&#038;ei=UTF-8&#038;fr=moz35\">for<br \/>\nlocal farmers<\/a> markets or visit <a href=\"http:\/\/www.localharvest.org\/\">LocalHarvest<\/a>.\n<\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<p><em>Environmental journalist Lori Bongiorno shares green-living tips<br \/>\nand product reviews with Yahoo! Green&#8217;s users. Send Lori a <a href=\"http:\/\/help.yahoo.com\/l\/us\/yahoo\/green\/forms\/consciousconsumerblog.html\">question<\/p>\n<p> or suggestion<\/a> for potential use in a future column. Her book,<\/em><br \/>\nGreen Greener Greenest: A Practical Guide to Making Eco-smart Choices a<br \/>\nPart of Your Life <em>is available on <a href=\"http:\/\/shopping.yahoo.com\/p:Green%2C%20Greener%2C%20Greenest%3A%20A%20Practical%20Guide%20to%20Making%20Eco-Smart%20Choices%20a%20Part%20of%20Your%20Life:3005209514?clink=dmps\/lori_bongiorno\/ctx=mid:1,pid:3005209514,pdid:1,pos:1,spc:14489115,date:20081009,srch:kw,x:\">Yahoo!<\/p>\n<p> Shopping<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Green-Greener-Greenest-Practical-Eco-Smart\/dp\/0399534032\/ref=pd_bbs_1?ie=UTF8&#038;s=books&#038;qid=1228865081&#038;sr=8-1\">Amazon.com<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<p><strong>Check out Yahoo! Green on <a href=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/YahooGreen\">Twitter<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/yahoogreen\"> Facebook<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>(Photo: David Myers, chef\/owner, Sona) The tomatoes, cantaloupes, and asparagus you see on grocery store shelves right now may look good, but chances are they don&#8217;t taste all that great. That&#8217;s because they&#8217;re not is season right now and probably had to be shipped from far away or grown in a hothouse. \u00a0 Choosing fruits [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3953,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-380059","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/380059","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3953"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=380059"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/380059\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=380059"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=380059"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=380059"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}