What is in season in May
67 ingredients with a short season — three months or less — are at their best in May in France. Not only fruit and vegetables: the fish, the mushrooms, the game and the cheeses have a season too.
May gives less than it takes: fourteen things arrive and thirty-eight end. The whole spring forage closes in a fortnight — ramsons, nettle, dandelion, wild asparagus, the morels, the fiddleheads — which makes the last week of May the most urgent of the year. What comes instead is sweet: first cherries, peas, elderflower and acacia blossom for fritters, damask rose petals, and the Bonnotte, which has three weeks and not one more.
New this month 14
In season now and not in April.
Acacia honey Angelica Black locust flower Bonnotte de Noirmoutier Cherry Damask rose petals Elderflower Garlic scape Haskap Meagre Pea Prussian asparagus Rocambole garlic Vine leaf
Last month for 38
In season now and gone in June.
Agretti Alexanders Ashitaba Bamboo shoot Black bryony shoots Black morel Bonnotte de Noirmoutier Dandelion greens Fiddlehead fern Fuki (butterbur stalk) Gariguette strawberry Garlic mustard Ground elder Gyokuro Hijiki Japanese red seabream (madai) Japanese Spanish mackerel (sawara) Kinome (sanshō leaf) Mitsuba Morel Nettle Orange blossom honey Ramps Rapeseed honey Rosemary honey Sencha Shad roe Spruce tips Sweet woodruff Takana-zuke Tara no me Tupelo honey Udo Urui Wild asparagus Wild fennel fronds Wild garlic Yomogi
Everything in season in May
Vegetables 24
Agretti Alexanders Ashitaba Asparagus Bamboo shoot Black bryony shoots Bonnotte de Noirmoutier Dandelion greens Fiddlehead fern Fuki (butterbur stalk) Garlic scape Green garlic Nettle Pea Prussian asparagus Purple asparagus Ramps Rocambole garlic Tara no me Udo Urui Warabi (bracken shoot) White asparagus Wild asparagus
Fruits 5
Cherry Gariguette strawberry Haskap Loquat Rhubarb
Herbs 15
Angelica Douglas fir tips Garlic mustard Ground elder Kinome (sanshō leaf) Mitsuba Oxalis Reflexed stonecrop Spruce tips Sweet cicely Sweet woodruff Vine leaf Wild fennel fronds Wild garlic Yomogi
Flowers 3
Black locust flower Damask rose petals Elderflower
Mushrooms 4
Black morel Blonde morel Morel St George’s mushroom
Seaweed 2
Nuts & seeds 1
Fish & seafood 4
Allis shad Japanese red seabream (madai) Japanese Spanish mackerel (sawara) Meagre
Roe & caviar 1
Condiments & ferments 1
Tea & infusions 2
Sweet pantry 5
Acacia honey Orange blossom honey Rapeseed honey Rosemary honey Tupelo honey
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