A New Season , A New Diet

What better time of year to change your diet than autumn. You can  rid yourself of the excesses of summer and gear up for the gorging of the holiday season. right now you can take advantage of what the farms  have to offer. There are many heart healthy foods out there  that are going to be fresh picked.It's also a good time to tweak your diet  and lower your cholesterol and blood pressure.

Fall means bounty and luckily there are a number of veggies out there that are ripe for the picking .  Kale and squash are reappearing in big numbers right  now. The first is one of the most versatile greens ever.It can be made into everything from a snack to soup to  salad. One of the most popular is kale chips - a simple recipe that just requires baking leaves until they are crisp and crunchy. Kale can also go into soups as well. Try it instead of spinach in an Italian wedding soup. Supermarkets are almost overstocked with squash. You can enjoy an acorn one, brimming with olive oil and garlic or a butternut one, cut into cubes or mashed.

Pears and grapes , other heart healthy and also cholesterol lowering fruits, are also gracing markets. You can just eat a pear plain but also try it baked. Add some low fat Greek yogurt sweetened with dark honey as a side. Black grapes are big right now as well. These can be added to sauces to give them sweetness as well as to salads. Black grapes or deep purple ones are perfect for making fresh grape juice as well as homemade jams (without all those preservatives.) Of course we all know that seasonal standard , the apple is big. There are so many varieties  to chose from, from Gala to Granny Smith.. These can easily be added to a salad to give it zing or baked with some cinnamon and wine for a simple but elegant dessert.

Fall gives us the perfect opportunity to eat healthy and change our diets. The bounty out there is rich and varied, ripe for trying out good for you recipes. Give any of these fall standards a chance and you'll not only eat well but be well too.