Why Seasonal Eating?

< Full Episode

Transcript: Why Seasonal Eating?

Season 9, Episode 8  | October 15, 2024

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Welcome to Life Time Talks, the podcast aimed at helping you achieve your health, fitness, and life goals. I’m Jamie Martin, editor in chief of Experience Life, Life Time’s whole life health and wellness magazine.

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Jamie Martin

Welcome to Life Time Talks. I’m Jamie Martin.

David Freeman

And I’m David Freeman.

Jamie Martin

And in this mini episode, we are talking about seasonal eating. We are in the midst of fall and it’s a great time of year to kind of think about what’s available for us wherever we live and just talk about the approach in general, whether it’s fall, spring, summer, winter, because there are a lot of different things to consider and lots of different foods that are available at different times of year. So we’re excited to dive into this episode. have one of our regular guests is back. David, you want to introduce him?

David Freeman

Paul Kriegler is a registered dietitian, personal trainer. He serves as a director of nutritional product development for Life Time. Welcome back, Paul. How are you doing?

Paul Kriegler

Hey, good to be back, David.

Jamie Martin

We have been talking a lot with your colleagues, Sam and Anika, as they’ve been visiting the podcast lately about how many episodes each of you have. So at the end of this season, we’re going to go back and tally and just see who really is the top guest in terms of appearances, just so you know — this is your first one this season, I believe. So we’re excited to have you back.

Paul, let’s just start with this topic. We’re going to keep this short and sweet today, but talk about when you hear the phrase seasonal eating, what does that mean and what does it encompass?

Paul Kriegler

Seasonal eating, the simplest explanation is eat whatever is available and ripe and in-season in your local environment. There’s multiple reasons for doing that, but basically looking at your environment, what’s around you and how nature is providing certain things at certain times of the year. If you eat in tune with that, then you’re going to end up maximizing a lot of flavor, variety throughout the year and nutrient quantity and quality. So there’s a lot of reasons from a nutrition standpoint to eat seasonally or focus on seasonal produce and seasonal items. And there’s also lot of reason, you know, ecologically and environmentally to eat in season and locally.

David Freeman

Yeah, Paul, I mean, fall as a whole, we talk about it as a good time to kind of help embrace this practice of seasonal eating. It’s almost as if we look at fall to be a great time to reset and start to establish some of these healthy habits. So can you unpack that a little bit? You kind of talked about ecological and the why within that. So if you can unpack that a little bit more for us.

Paul Kriegler

Yeah. I mean, we’re in North America. So fall is the end of the longest growing season that we have. So autumn, you know, really starts around Labor Day unofficially, but the official season is towards the end of September. But fall is kind of a time where like the summer scattered calendar rhythm starts to settle in and people get back to routines and habits and schedules. And really that kind of impacts the whole family. So when kids go back to school, it’s a nice time for everyone to get back into a good, healthy rhythm, especially if they need a little reset or a little recalibration after a summer of fun.

And it’s, it’s especially important to ground into those healthy patterns, like health patterns with nutrition, exercise, sleep, stress management, family time before the fall and winter holidays come and attack your calendars. Cause there’s, there’s, they’re filled with temptations and we know that nutrition gets especially difficult at that time. So this fall season is a really valuable time to just kind of slow down, appreciate what nature is giving you from this long growing season over summer and settle into some healthier habits, at least for a few months.

Jamie Martin

Yeah, I mean, it’s the season of harvest in so many ways. I grew up on a farm when I think about fall and autumn, it’s really about like, kind of bringing everything that you’ve been growing and producing. It’s that final step. And then so it’s ready to be enjoyed in different ways. So I mean, that’s one thing I that’s one of my favorite times of year because it was always like the finishing of it, like all that work, and like the reward of it too. So Paul, let’s talk a little bit about what is actually in season in fall and some of the seasonal shifts that we just might start to naturally make because of what’s available. I mean, we kind of go from summer where we maybe it’s more leafy greens and that type of thing, but where do we shift to in fall?

Paul Kriegler

Yeah, typically you’re, you know, the shift happens towards heartier produce items. Things like broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, squash, pumpkins, even some leafy greens and sweet potatoes, they start to become, you know, harvestable or ripe or like the best they are for the entire year, right around this summer to fall transition. So, you know, you might be switching up from more fruit and fresh vegetables, like earlier season vegetables, like green beans and tomatoes and those sorts of things. So you’re naturally seeing different things come out of your garden if you’re gardening, or you’re naturally seeing transition of the types of things that look the best at a farmers’ market. You don’t really see that transition happen in many like large grocery stores, unless you go looking for it because they’ve kind of eliminated the seasonality and in a sort with the supply chain access they have with produce grown around the world. But if you are focusing on locally available produce from your own garden or your neighborhood garden or community garden or local farmers’ market, you’re going to see certain things get right, you know, get ripe and show really well and tastes really great.

You know, some other things are like peppers, certain tomatoes, apples, pears, cranberries, grapes, raspberries, and some melons can get really good in the fall. So there’s an abundance of things that nature’s giving us at this time.

Jamie Martin

Yeah, there’s a reason those apple orchards are popular places to visit.

David Freeman

And what I think of a fall, whenever that is brought up, I am thinking about us gathering around the table and families coming together and seeing a lot of those heartier dishes, the soups and you already know some of the holidays that might be celebrated, whether it is Thanksgiving and so on and so forth. So just why do we tend to crave this kind of food in the fall?

Paul Kriegler

You know, I think there’s a couple factors there. One, the food, you know, certain things are just really delicious this time of year. And those things tend to handle heartier cooking methods or slower cooking methods better. Parsnips, turnips, Brussels sprouts, the cauliflower, squash, they’re great for roasting. They’re great for stews, slow cooking. So I think the ripeness of certain items combined with the cooling down of temperatures, the tendency to spend more time indoors and just gathering a little closer lends itself to certain shifts in the way we’re preparing those foods. So like you said, soups, stews, roasts, casseroles, those are, they’re comforting. Not only are they delicious and warming, but they’re, you know, they’re nice to share and they’re comforting for people. So that’s my take on why we have this shift from, you know, maybe grilling out or having salads and that sort of thing to heartier dishes that are more warming. I like that you said that you said comforting and we’ve heard the saying comfort food.

David Freeman

So let’s talk a little bit about that and then I’m going to pass it right back to you, Jamie, but just when you think of comfort food, can you unpack that a little bit more and what relationship as far as comfort in the food, how that plays a role?

Paul Kriegler

Yeah, I mean, they’re super satisfying, they taste amazing. And just the warmth that comes from eating a really well-prepared, nutritious meal at the end of the day, it just helps you relax. It’s satisfying physically and probably emotionally and a little bit spiritually too. Like, especially if you’re growing the food or you know who grew the food. It’s just a really nice, rich reward.

Jamie Martin

And just to tag onto that, when I think of it, like often people think of comfort foods and they’ll think of like traditional foods that have come, maybe recipes passed down for generations or something that, whether it’s a Thanksgiving dish or a holiday dish that they want to eat. I just think of like the you know, that traditional green bean casserole, you know, is one that you often think of with Thanksgiving and green beans aren’t necessarily in season right now. But when I think of comfort food, there’s often some tradition tied to it that goes back and it’s nostalgic in some way. So I don’t know. There’s something about that, too, where it’s it’s like emotionally comforting on top of being physically satisfying.

Paul Kriegler

Absolutely. I just think of my own kind of normal rhythms in the fall. It’s like, OK, I’ll go out and rake the yard. And it’s a little cool in the fall and while I’m doing that, there’s a pot of chili on the stove or there’s a roast in the slow cooker or there’s a batch of wild rice soup that I’m going to make. They complement that hard work is still being done in the fall, but you got to come in and warm up with a nice meal.

Jamie Martin

Especially in these northern parts like you and I, we’re in Minnesota, whereas David, you’re down in Texas. I don’t know, I mean, how cool does it get in Texas? I’m just going to ask that right now. What is fall like in Texas?

David Freeman

I mean, it’s I would say it’s comfortably hot. Since we were talking about comfort, I think you can bear it if you’re if you’re going from certain level of heat to something that’s a little bit more tolerable. It’s comfortable. I say it would be comfortable. And just being in this space as long as I now have been since 2019, I love the fall. I love the fall because you get to see the changes as far as within the season with the leaves and so on and so forth. And that to me, it brings about the word that we’ve been talking about now for the past few minutes, comfort. And I love the changes and yeah, the weather to me, you can’t really beat it.

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Jamie Martin

Well, so speaking of that, these are cyclical changes. You’re talking about the natural changes that we see in nature. There are also, in practices like traditional Chinese medicine and Ayurveda, there’s like this belief that our bodies need certain things with the changes of seasons as well, you know? So what are some of the seasonal adjustments that we should be thinking about this time of year, whether it’s in terms of, you know, how we hydrate or whatever that may be?

Paul Kriegler

Yeah, there’s a few that stick out to me and work on, you know, when with clients or people who reach out for help around this time of year. And not to get too nerdy, but like technically the relative humidity drops and it’s, it’s a little bit more extreme probably up in the northern parts of the U.S. but it also happens in the southern states like Texas where David is, but that RH dropping, you know, from the 50s, 60s, 70s down into the 30s that creates a need for, for better hydration habits to keep your mucus membranes and your airway defenses nice and robust and resilient. Because it’s at the same time of year that we end up spending more time indoors in dry air conditioned or dry heated environments with more people. So there’s more exposure to pathogens and your barriers naturally dry out. So you have to be on top of healthy hydration or you’re going to be more susceptible to respiratory infections and colds and that sort of thing.

It’s a very real effect. That’s why cold and flu season happens when cold and flu season happens. There’s a physical change in our body and in our environment. And that mismatch creates opportunity for pathogens. I mentioned that more time indoors and usually that air isn’t quite as clean as if we’re outdoors more from a pathogen standpoint. So you just have to be on top of immune system support. And part of that is coinciding with a, maybe a drop in the intensity of the sun that you’re exposed to so your vitamin D levels naturally drop in the fall which has a tremendous impact on your immune resilience as well. So this is the time of year where your vitamin D should naturally be at its peak in the northern hemispheres, so you should you should check if it is at its peak — get a blood test and make sure it is high and if it’s not you better top it off with some supplementation before you enter cold and flu season for real. Otherwise, you’re going to be calling in sick a lot and hopefully you don’t have trouble recovering and rebounding from those illnesses, but you should try to minimize the chances that you’ll even catch them.

A lot of people end up decreasing their total activity. If they go from gardening and doing a lot more outdoor stuff to then spending more time indoors where it’s warmer, that might warrant some adjustments to their carbohydrate intake. Because carbohydrates are pure fuel. You need more of it the more active you are, or you can handle or tolerate more of it the more active you are. Sometimes people do really well notching back on the carbohydrates a little bit in the fall and winter months if they’re not maintaining their high activity levels.

So, you know, there’s some other supplements that I’ve covered in an EL article, Experience Life article in the past that are, you know, really great to consider at this time of year. So for listeners that want to expand kind of what should that be? Like how should I go through my supplement routine and kind of update or recalibrate that for the fall time? I think that’s a good resource to consider.

Jamie Martin

Well, yeah, we’ll link to that in the show notes for sure.

Paul Kriegler

Yeah.

David Freeman

And Paul, with that, just knowing that this is a mini episode, we want to make sure we didn’t miss anything. So is there anything else that you feel we should capture when it comes around seasonal eating?

Paul Kriegler

You know, at the beginning, this is a chance to kind of recalibrate after maybe a busy or hectic summer. And I can’t understate the importance of just take this time to pause and, you know, almost recalibrate with some of your resolutions from the prior winter, the beginning of the year and just, you know, lean into the seasonal change. And if that means you have to do a kind of a hard reset, fine. You know, find some, find some friends or family members that want to really focus on healthy habits and get reset and recalibrated before the, you know, the holiday craziness starts in a few months or a few weeks that is. just use this time to connect with yourself and reset some routines and habits and know that every ounce of effort you put into healthier nutrition, better sleep and stress management and, you know, purposeful, beneficial exercise is going to, you’re going to reap rewards from that, you know, several fold from the effort and time you invest in, in the front end.

Jamie Martin

Well, Paul, thank you as always for joining us. We, as you mentioned, you have some articles on Experience Life. So if people want more about those supplements for fall, specifically that Paul mentioned, they can find that at ExperienceLife.Lifetime.Life plus a ton of other content that Paul has created. There’s also past episodes of this podcast where you can find Paul and Paul, you are on Instagram @_cafepk_. And we’ll link to all this if you didn’t quite catch that, but anywhere else they can find you or those the primary places.

Paul Kriegler

That’s it. The best place is Experience Life. Just search my name and a lot of content will come up. You’ll be disappointed in my Instagram. I’m not super active on there. I used to a lot more of my food and maybe I’ll get back to that to accompany this episode. But yeah, that is my Instagram handle.

Jamie Martin

Alright. Well, Paul, thanks so much. We’ll talk to you again soon.

David Freeman

Thanks Paul.

Paul Kriegler

Alright. Thanks Jamie. Thanks David.

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Thanks for joining us for this episode. As always, we’d love to hear your thoughts on our conversation today and how you approach this aspect of healthy living in your own life. What works for you? Where do you run into challenges? Where do you need help?

And if you have topics for future episodes, you can share those with us too. Email us at lttalks@lt.life or reach out to us on Instagram @Lifetime.life, @jamiemartinel, or @freezy30 and use the hashtag #LifeTimeTalks.

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Life Time Talks is a production of Life Time Healthy Way of Life. It takes an amazing team to pull together each episode, including executive producer, Molly Kopischke, audio engineer, Peter Perkins, audio and video editors, Kevin Dixon and Riley Lester, and podcast coordinator, Sara Ellingsworth. A big thanks to Coy Larson for sound and video consulting and George Norman for project management, as well as the rest of the team at Life Time Motion who supports and provides feedback for Life Time Talks.

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