What's In Season: Your August Produce Guide

There's a reason peaches feel like a homecoming this time of year. If you grew up in the South you know the smell before you know the taste. August is peak season for them.

Eating with the seasons isn't just a nice idea. Produce picked at peak ripeness carries more nutrients and it costs less because it's not being shipped across the country or pulled off the vine early to survive the trip. God also just knows what it needs when. Watermelon and cucumber in August aren't a coincidence. They're hydration showing up exactly when the heat asks for it.

Here's what's in season this month.

Vegetables Bell peppers, black-eyed peas, cabbage, cauliflower, carrots, celery, corn, cucumber, edamame, eggplant, green beans, lima beans, mushrooms, okra, peas, potatoes, spinach, sunchokes, summer squash, sweet potatoes, swiss chard, tomatillos, tomatoes, watercress, yams and zucchini.

Fruit Apples, avocado, bananas, blackberries, blueberries, cantaloupe, cherries, figs, grapes, honeydew, kiwi, limes, mango, nectarines, pears, peaches, plums, raspberries and watermelon.

A few ways to work these in this month:

Lean into the tomatoes. August tomatoes need almost nothing done to them. Slice, salt, add good olive oil and and vinegar and you're done. This is the month they don't need a recipe.

Let stone fruit be dessert. A grilled peach with a little cinnamon does more for you than most things labeled "healthy dessert." Nectarines and plums work the same way.

Use okra and black-eyed peas together. These two showing up in the same season isn't random — they're a classic Southern pairing for a reason and they hold their own in a simple stew with tomatoes and corn.

Blend the melons. Watermelon and cantaloupe are both mostly water which makes them ideal for cooling juices and smoothies when the heat is at its worst.

Eating seasonally is one of the simplest ways to eat closer to the earth and closer to your ancestors - the people before us who ate what grew where they were, when it grew. There's a kind of trust in that. The land provides what the season calls for.

Whitney is a certified holistic nutritionist, plant-based chef, raw juice alchemist and certified yoga instructor based in Atlanta. She's the founder of Eat Plants & Prosper where she helps people heal mind, body and spirit through holistic nutrition.