“When we think winter in Australia, we always think citrus. It is the best time right now,” says Julio Azzarello, director of sales at Gourmand Providore in Sydney.
“You’ve got your standard lemons and limes, but you’ve also got Cara Cara oranges and grapefruit.”
Mandarins – including Daisy and imperial varieties – are still in their prime, selling for $3.50 a kilo, and tangelos are in full swing, at about $4.50 a kilo.
But the citrus we’ve been waiting for is blood oranges, which are due in the next week. They’re known for their delicate, sweeter flavour and they’re as good on their own as they are baked into desserts or used in savoury dishes.
Blood oranges’ sunset flesh makes them a beautiful cake topper, as Claire Ptak’s orange upside-down cake shows, while their sweet and sour flavour is a perfect foil for salt in Nigel Slater’s baked feta with blood oranges.
Navel oranges have about three to four weeks left in season and are less than $3 a kilo in supermarkets for now. Use them to make Yotam Ottolenghi’s chocolate, orange and chipotle fondants.
Bananas and apples are still going strong. Missile apples have a short season, so seek them out now while they’re at their best. Try Ravneet Gill’s winter warmer: baked apples with kadaif (a shredded filo pastry used in Middle Eastern desserts) finished with honey syrup.
Berries are getting sweeter. While cold weather has stunted the growth of blueberries, the double-digit punnet prices we’re seeing at the moment should drop in coming weeks. Azzarello says strawberries have been stung by the cold too, slowing down supply and affecting their quality. “They have had white shoulders, so they don’t colour all the way through,” he says.
Raspberries are full blush, though, and consistently about $4 a punnet, with excellent quality blackberries not far behind (about $6 a punnet).
Sprouts are budding
“June and July are always the toughest months with the change in the season and the solstice,” says Mark Narduzzo at Pino’s Fine Produce in Melbourne. “In Victoria especially, greens have been super expensive.”
Narduzzo, who sells fruit and veg produce boxes, says the past two months have been the worst for leafy veg, with rain affecting supply levels.
Herbs are scarce, with the cold shrivelling up supply. “If you think something is frail in your hand … it’s going to be frail at the moment,” he says.
Broccoli, beans and cucumbers have all shot up in price too, so Narduzzo recommends kale, leek, bok choy, capscium, zucchini, onions and potatoes instead.
Brussels sprouts are back. At about $12 a kilo in supermarkets and coming down, there is no end to their potential. Try Jose Pizarro’s roasted sprouts with manchego crust, or simply wrap them in bacon.
Avoid cauliflower, which has gone “silly” at up to $9 a head in supermarkets, Narduzzo says. They’re likely to remain expensive for two or three weeks.
Avocados are back in shape though, for about $1.20 or $1.50 each.
Stick to your roots
Beetroot, radishes, carrots and all root vegetables are abundant, Azzarello says, and some of the best buys right now are sweet potato and pumpkin.
Throw them together with beets and chickpeas in a midweek sweet potato, beetroot and chickpea roast with crumbled feta. Or try plant-based comfort eating with Meera Sodha’s bright red spiced beetroot and walnut bolognese.
Make use of plentiful carrots in a Moroccan-spiced stew, using the veg from top to tail.
And there is hope for tomatoes, which have had a beating in recent months. “Some of the plants have drowned in Queensland, which puts everything back six weeks,” Azzarello says. “If I’m six weeks behind, you’re going to be eight to 10 weeks behind as the consumer.”
As supply and demand shifts, Azzarello says tomato prices could come down to as little as $2 or $3 a kilo in another three or four weeks.
Buy:
Avocado
Banana
Beetroot
Blackberries
Carrots
Capsicum
Kale
Kale sprouts
Potato
Pumpkin
Radishes
Raspberries
Rhubarb
Spinach
Sweet potato
Watermelon
Zucchini
Watch:
Blueberries
Strawberries
Tomatoes
Avoid:
Cabbage (red and green are both expensive)
Cauliflower
Iceberg lettuce
Herbs
Honeydew
Snow peas
Sugar snaps
Rockmelon