Seasonal Eating in Texas!

Today we're talking seasonal eating.  Well, more specifically, seasonal fruit eating here in the great state of Texas.  I bet you are wondering why I decided on this subject.  Yesterday I made mini cheesecakes (pictured below) and topped one with caramel apples and the other with strawberries that were saturated in rum and orange juice.  They were both amazing tasting but a fellow foodie commented that while he attended culinary school, he was thoroughly trained to never mix seasons!  Of course, being that I have never been trained I had no clue about this "forbidden" rule, and I was very thankful he shared this information.  So now I'm sharing this information with you.

I did a little research and I'm going to give you a reasonable list of fruits and what months they are in season.  I found the information here on Ask.com and here.

• Apples, July through November
• Blackberrries, May through July
• Cantaloupes, May through December 
• Cherries, June and July
• Figs, June and July, second crop in fall
• Grapefruit, October through April
• Grapes, August through October
• Honeydew, May through January
• Oranges, October through June
• Peaches, June through Sept
• Pears, August through November 
• Plums & pluots, May (red and yellow) and July through September
• Pomegranates, October through December
• Strawberries, June through August
• Watermelon, May through November

This is just a preliminary list, so I encourage you to visit the two links mentioned above for a more detailed list.  Other things you want to keep in mind is when you purchase fresh fruit it is at its cheapest when its in season.  Of course we all know you can buy frozen fruit year around, and that is perfectly okay, but if you are expecting to wow a culinary expert you might want to keep this in mind.  Or you could become a culinary rebel (of sorts) and break all those rules...just because you can!  Just imagine the first person to bring sweet & salty together, or the creator of savory cupcakes...they broke the rules and became successful.

Here are a few more of my fruitful delights just for your viewing pleasure: