Farmers’ Market Haul #WeekendCooking

One of my favorite summer activities is shopping at farmers’ markets. When we’re on vacation in a tourist spot and see one, that’s where I want to go for edible souvenirs of our trip. These are some photos from last fall’s cruise port call in Saint John, New Brunswick, which claims the oldest continuously running farmers’ market in Canada, with a charter dating from 1785.

If we’re away for a weekend, I’m always excited to see a Farmers’ Market.

If we’re just on a day trip, stopping off at a farm stand is almost as good!

A Saturday farmers’ market has been held the past several years across the street from where I work, making a visit very convenient on the Saturdays I was working. This year, so far, the market has been virtual, and my mother and I have tried it out twice. We placed our orders together on Monday night – each using the Market2Day app on our own device – so we would be assigned the same pick-up window for the following Saturday.

When we drive up, we stay in the car, give our order numbers, and the bags are placed in the trunk of the car. Then it’s like Christmas morning to unpack the bag of goodies, because I don’t always remember everything I ordered and haven’t reviewed the order confirmation I received by email.

Yesterday, my order included two herb plants – dill and sage– which were at the bottom of the bag (!) so I worried that they were damaged, but it seems they may have survived, as they look OK today. My one refrigerated item (a container of stuffed grape leaves) was still cold in the insulated bag.

I didn’t order any baked goods (although scrolling through all the muffins, cookies, granolas, and other goodies offered by the vendors it was tempting when selecting my items the previous Monday as I ) but I did splurge a bit on farm-grown popcorn, even though I have two bags of Jolly Time popcorn on stand-by, already.

Also, in my first virtual farmers’ market order, I bought rhubarb compote and basil-strawberry jam – sweet treats I haven’t opened yet – and I’d just finished reading a book about the dangers of too much sugar.

With all this fresh produce plus what my husband bought at the supermarket for the next two weeks, I want to make sure nothing goes to waste. We cooked up all the Swiss chard last night (sauteed with olive oil and garlic) and are deciding how best to use the quart of strawberries (so much better than supermarket ones!) after having a few in our fruit cups at breakfast this morning. We have fresh raspberries growing in our backyard, too!

I hope the virtual farmers’ market is only temporary, due to the pandemic, as it seems as though outdoor shopping might be done safely with precautions in place. It would be interesting to know if this news report from NPR from last spring about the over-saturation of the market for farmers’ markets is still accurate, or if only a small number of farmers’ markets survive the pandemic, would they have gone under anyway?

Why Are So Many Farmers’ Markets Failing? — NPR, March 17, 2019

Although it’s certainly better than nothing, ordering in advance using an app isn’t as much fun as wandering from stall to stall and smelling all the delicious food items and fresh produce. Although my mother found a free sample cookie in her bag and I got a bottle of hand sanitizer in mine, it’s just not the same!

We have basil growing in the garden, but not enough for pesto yet, so I bought some from the farmers’ market and am going to try a low-fat recipe using tomatoes instead of olive oil from the Moosewood Restaurant Low-Fat Favorites cookbook, since I have fresh cherry tomatoes in addition to the basil. I’ve also noted down several other recipes from that cookbook to make over the course of the week.

Maybe I’ll report back next weekend!

Happy Weekend Cooking!

Shared to Weekend Cooking, hosted by Marg @ The Intrepid Reader.