If, like our frugal foremothers, you’re into preserving, now’s the time to mobilize. You can buy up berries for jam, freeze pitted cherries for future pies, pickle zucchini, turnips, garlic and beets, and put up enough pesto to see you well beyond tomato season. Or take the modern approach to seasonality, and eat up while the getting is good.

Next week we turn to specialty and gourmet markets in search of seasonal produce and other ingredients. We'll return to Union Square with springtime's ramps and fiddleheads; in the interim, stalwart Greenmarketers can look forward to a winter's worth of greens, onions, garlic, potatoes, and apples — not to mention fragrant rosemary garlands, cranberry-pecan sourdough, guinea hens, Christmas trees, and jars of golden pear chutney.

When the ground grows cold, root vegetables, winter squash, and hardy greens start storing sugar to help keep from freezing. Why not stock up on some sugar of your own, in the form of cider doughnuts or molasses cookies?

Thanks to the cool weather, the produce at Union Square looks perky this morning, as hardier lettuces and winter squash replace their delicate summer counterparts. Even late-afternoon visitors will find the stands looking fresh.

What to Look For
Purple-black Concord grapes are a flavor-packed fall phenomenon. Their sweet-tart intensity is easiest to appreciate once the seeds have been separated from the aromatic flesh. Try them in sorbets and gelées, or make them into Concord-grape ketchup (recipe) ($5 per quart at Cheerful Cherry Farm, available Friday and Saturday).