How to Eat Seasonally All Fall Long

This is the time of year when I step outside to tend my garden and have to run back in to grab a sweatshirt or sweater. Having lived (and gardened) in so many places, it's been really interesting to watch the changing of the seasons in different parts of the world and to build an understanding of how the seasons affect what I can grow.

In order to savor fall to the fullest, I want to fill my diet for the next couple of months with the best foods the season has to offer. That means eating as many foods grown locally as possible while they're in season (and at their most nutritious).

Knowing what's in season, however, can get a little complicated. What's seasonal for me in Chicago is different from what's seasonal to my friends in Houston. For instance, locally grown cherry tomatoes are available from farmers as late as early November in Houston, but they finish up here by mid-September.

I say locally grown because people in Boston can obviously still eat cherry tomatoes in the winter. It's just that those tomatoes have been shipped across the country from places like Southern California, where they can be grown year round.

I teach you how to identify your growing seasons in my first book, Kitchen Garden Revival. Knowing your season will help you understand what's local to you when.

I'm going to dive into this discussion about fall eating today by talking about cool season plants, so just know that if you're somewhere a bit warmer still, my fall suggestions will be more like your winter suggestions.

(If you'd rather listen, I've got a podcast episode called Eat This All Fall Long. Listen on Spotify.)

The Best Seasonal Fall Foods Come from 9 Different Plant Families

In Kitchen Garden Revival, I teach you about the different plant families and describe their characteristics. Plant families predict growth habits and length of time until you get to harvest and enjoy, which means they can help us know what's growing when. If one plant is available during the growing season, you can generally expect most of the other plants inside the same family will be available, as well.

To eat seasonally in the fall, we're going to focus on two types of plants: plants that have been growing for a long time throughout the summer and are finally ready to harvest, and plants that are planted closer to the time we're going to eat them. I call the latter short and small plants, and for cool season, that category includes lettuce, radishes, and other greens.

Let's look at some plant families together and which seasonal autumn foods they have to offer.

The Apiaceae Family Includes the Fall Staple: Carrots

This group, also known as the carrot family, includes carrots, plus cilantro, dill, parsley, and fennel. In general, these plants take about 50 to 60 days to harvest, which means carrots achieve the perfect fall flavor around October.

Keep an eye out for plants in this family at the farmers' market or the grocery store so that you can enjoy them now, when they're at the peek of their flavor. There's nothing better than the sweet, rich flavor of roasted carrots in a fall dish, is there? (Great, I'm already hungry, and we're only at the first family.)

Grow These Fall Favorites at Home

Plants in this family typically have a deep tap root, and they all love cooler weather but thrive when they have more sunshine. If you tried growing cilantro and dill in the middle of the summer and had a total bust of a harvest, the fall is a great time to try those again.

The Asteraceae Family Covers Your Fall Salad Greens

This group is also known as the lettuce family, and they love when the temperatures start to drop. You guys know about my obsession with salad gardening, and the fall is the reason why. Fall salad is so delicious. It fills your body with nutrients to buff up your immune system right as we're heading into a time when we're more susceptible to colds and flu.

Inside the Aster family, we have the spring mix that you might buy in a big plastic box at the grocery store, romaine lettuce, all those beautiful red lettuces, the frilly lettuces, iceberg lettuce, endive, and radicchio.

Grow These Fall Favorites at Home

Grow lettuce plants during your cool seasons. Thanks to the milder winters in Houston, I could plant a lettuce garden in October and have fresh greens for the next six months when I lived there.

If you're growing a full head of lettuce, you'll need 60 to 75 days, but if you're just harvesting loose leaves, you can begin cutting as soon as 30 to 45 days after planting. I love harvesting in that way because you get to cut and come again and again and again.  

The Amaranthaceae Family Includes Autumn Favorites Like Spinach and Beets

We've got Swiss chard, spinach, and beets in this family, and I like to say the little red color that runs through their veins has super powers. This family has the perfect fall greens and root crops to fill up on all fall long.

Grow These Fall Favorites at Home

While my Swiss chard has been growing here all summer (even in 90-degree weather), it prefers cooler weather, as do spinach and beets.

With the exception of spinach, plants in this family take a bit longer to grow from seed. For beets, there's a learning curve as you figure out how much space to give them so they have plenty of room to grow underground. But there are few things more delicious than a freshly harvested beet roasted with some salt and olive oil.

The Amaryllidaceae Family Has Many Health Benefits and Pairs Well with Fall Root Crops

This family includes onions, garlic, and chives, and adds great flavor to all of the other things we're harvesting this fall, on top of being good for you. Most people consider garlic and onion roasted with root vegetables the quintessential flavor of fall.

Grow These Fall Favorites at Home

This family will stay in your garden for a long time. Garlic, for instance, can be planted in the fall, grown throughout the spring and summer, and then harvested the next year in July or August for use in the fall.

Chives are one of the last greens to give up in my winter garden. I've been able to harvest and enjoy chives from my garden even through the first few cold snaps. Once we get a hard snow or frost, they're done, but the fall is a great time to be harvesting them in bulk and enjoying them on everything.

The Brassica Family Highlights the Benefits of Eating Seasonally

Brassicas include kale, brussels sprouts, broccoli, cauliflower, romanesco, arugula, and radishes. Few foods have more nutritional value when enjoyed fresh and in season than these guys.

Grow These Fall Favorites at Home

Similar to onions and garlic, some plants in this family are going to spend all summer long (90 days or so) in your garden and then be ready to harvest in the fall; those include broccoli, cauliflower, and brussels sprouts.

If you're not expecting snow soon, you could still plant brassicas in September to harvest before winter. Many plants in this family have savoy leaves (which just means bumpy) to protect them from frost and cold.

I keep the kale plants from my warm season garden and sow new ones from seed for even more fall leaves. I love to use kale leaves in sautéed dishes, casseroles, bean soups, and of course, salads.

Radishes and arugula are short-season plants, so if you're looking to plant something now that will give you a harvest in 30 to 45 days, these are two great options. If you plant radishes and arugula by late September, you can enjoy them before we get to the end of October, most likely without having to use covers or other frost protection.

The Cucurbit Family Gives Us Our Fall Decor and Pies

The Cucurbit family, also called the squash family, has become emblematic of fall. While cucumbers are pretty much already finished by the cool season, you still have so many other family members wrapping up their long growing periods in the garden, including butternut squash, pumpkins, gourds—all those guys that have been hanging out on their vines for the last 90 to 120 days.

As you can tell, Cucurbits are long and lengthy plants. Eating things that have been growing all summer long makes me think of Thanksgiving or harvest festivals, because if you have a squash or pumpkin that lasted through the harsh days of summer and all the other challenges facing Cucurbits (read: squirrels), then it really is a cause for celebration. Picking one that's edible and all in one piece means it's time for a big ol' harvest party.

Grow These Fall Favorites at Home

Butternut squash, pumpkins, gourds will hang out on their vines several months before they're ready to harvest. I recommend growing herbs, leafy greens, and smaller fruits before you try your gardening hand at these larger fruits. These guys will also take up a considerable portion of your garden, so I like to thank local farmers who turn over large veggie patches to these delicious crops by buying from them.

The Convovulaceae Family Gives Us the Fall Favorite: Sweet Potatoes

I don't talk about the sweet potato family often, but sweet potatoes are a fantastic thing to eat all fall long. When I used to visit my parents in Mississippi in the fall, my mom would have a huge box of sweet potatoes she'd been growing all summer for us to eat, and in my grad school days, I used to eat sweet potatoes daily to have something inexpensive, nutritious, and easy to cook.

If you're a smoothie drinker, try adding sweet potatoes for sweetness instead of something like bananas, which have been shipped from somewhere closer to the equator. Sweet potatoes are a super fun way to make your smoothies more local (and they also have a lower sugar content).

Sweet potatoes are a budget-friendly way to eat a more plant-based diet, and they last for a really long time after harvest.

Grow This Fall Favorite at Home

You'll need a long hot season and a dedicated growing space where these plants can really spread out to grow your own sweet potatoes.

The Graminaeae Family Gives Us Corn

The grass family features prominently in the stories about the first Thanksgiving. I'm talking about corn. Like winter squash and gourds, corn is a long and lengthy plant. It grows for 90 to 120 days during the summer so that we can store it and enjoy it throughout the fall season.

Corn is a super easy starch that you can add to your plate for the fall, so make it the base of salads or dishes that you want to cook. Corn stores pretty well, so even in areas where corn was harvested back in July or August, there's a good chance it's still local to you in September and October. 

The Solanaceae Family Provides Us with Potatoes—Perfect for a Chilly Fall Day

The Solanaceae family, aka the nightshade family, includes potatoes, more long and lengthy plants that are now ready to be enjoyed. Think yukon golds, red potatoes, Irish potatoes, russet potatoes—whatever kind of potato you want to grow, besides sweet potatoes, which have their own family. Potatoes store well in cool, dark places so that we can enjoy them all season long.

One of the easiest fall weeknight meals I do for my family is a baked potato bar. I know there's nothing original there, but it's still delicious and simple.

These Families Will Help You Eat Seasonally This Fall

While this list is in no way exhaustive of all the yummy things you can pull from your garden in the fall or find at the farmers' market, it's just a good reminder of what's possible. There are also all the herbs in the Lamiaceae, or mint, family (oregano, rosemary, thyme, sage), which you can be harvesting to use fresh now or dry for garden-fresh flavor throughout the fall and winter.

Visit Your Farmers' Market to Eat More Seasonally

The best place to discover the local and seasonal possibilities in your area is your farmers' market. Even if you aren't planning on buying anything, just head over to a market to see what people are harvesting and to ask questions about local availability. You can even buy seeds for your next planting.

The Benefits of Eating Seasonally

Believe it or not, when you choose to buy locally and eat seasonally, you're making a difference. I know it may feel insignificant to buy sweet potatoes from your local farmers instead of buying them from your grocery store (where they were shipped in from who knows where), but it really does matter.  

Even if you don't think it makes a difference in the world at large (though, let me tell you, it does), think of that farmer who you're supporting with your purchase, just by taking a few minutes to buy the sweet potato straight from him. Your money goes directly to support his small business, rather than getting spread out amongst big businesses and grocery store chains.

Not to mention all the other little benefits, like less plastic, less fuel, less pollution, and less waste. I think oftentimes we're looking for those big ways we can change the world, when there are so many small opportunities that can add up to really big things if we just try.  

If you're wanting to feel like you can make a difference in the world today, just make an effort to eat more seasonal this fall. Even one fall-inspired meal a week can change the world for the better and fill you up on the good stuff.