Eating seasonally can be fraught at the best of times, but what if we had
it wrong from the get-go? The alternative, writesALEXANDRA CARLTON,
might require a whole new approach.
OPEN
SEASON
L
ast year, in the middle of winter, our
flock of four Isa Brown hens deposited
a yellow cherry tomato seed on our
lawn in Sydney’s inner west. Within
weeks, it had become a full-grown
plant and was pumping out at least two
punnetfuls of the sweetest yellow cherry tomatoes every
day, entirely out of season – which was nice but also
faintly shaming, as my deliberate attempts to grow
tomatoes in summer had failed spectacularly. Around
the same time, I was served a dish at Firedoor in Surry
Hills that included fresh, bouncy spring peas. Chef
Lennox Hastie explained that yes, they were also out
of season but a mate of his grows them in the backyard
and an unusual warm spell had caused them to burst➤GOURMET TRAVELLER 73