It was a busy weekend for our farmers' market. In addition to our regularly scheduled Saturday morning market, we provided a Friday evening market too. With fifteen vendors on Friday and another 24 on Saturday, there was plenty of fresh food to choose from. Of course, I'm harvesting lettuce, tomatoes, chard, collards, green beans, kale, lambs-quarter, basil, and sage from my backyard garden and I still have plenty of those wonderfully juicy plums and peaches from the previous market, so I really didn't need much, but when has that ever stopped me?
I went home with whole wheat flour, carrots, corn, purple-hull peas, two peppers, an onion, and a bag of greens (some of this was given to me by friends).
With more than 2 dozen ears of corn, I did a bit more canning on Saturday afternoon - another 6 pints for the pantry shelves and winter's corn-less months. I also have about 3 quarts of wheat berries, 4 pints of rice, home-canned soups, stewed tomatoes, corn, and pinto beans (all of it local) lining the pantry shelves; local eggs, plums, peaches (dried), and blueberries (dried) in the fridge; and my homemade whole wheat bread (honey is local; flour ground locally) as well as the purple hull peas in the freezer.
Needless to say, with so many greens now both in the fridge and growing in the backyard, it'll be another very green week in food and there'll be no need to dip into pantry and freezer supplies. But those carrots, the extra corn I held back for the week's meals, and a tomato here and there will keep my salads and stir-fries fresh and colorful. The only question then is, what should I eat first?
Stay tuned for Thursday's Market to Table post to find out what I did with all these fresh local goodies. In the meantime, have a great week! And, as always, Happy (and mindful) eating!
4 comments:
I tried to call yesterday. I have a problem with my oregano. It is taking more space than it is supposed to. Also, I bought some herb seeds which included oregano, which is fine, but I don't need it right now or anytime soon for that matter. My oregano was planted from a single plant over a year ago. So, if you want the seeds(I bought the herb seeds because I wanted the cilantro and basil, cilantro is one of our fav fresh herbs--my cilantro went to seed and so far the resulting seed had not come up, so...) or if you want, I will try to get a plant out of my pot to give you. I also have a packet of garlic chives you can have from the same.
About the market, wow, wow and wow.
Needing nothing really, I got there kindda late. I managed to take home soap from two different vendors, shower gel, 6 jars of salsa, 2 small jars of strawberry rhubarb jam(my stepson's fav), two jars of bread and butter pickles, two dozen eggs, a few tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, cabbage, peanuts, coffee, banana nut bread, a bunch of yellow squash, zucchini, patty pan, some eggplant, green beans, banana peppers, bell peppers, a bunch of cucumbers, corn, and purple hull peas. Some of it was given to me by a vendor who was closing and asked me to take a grab bag of stuff for a dollar. I did it because I knew that I have people who can't get to market who love this stuff almost as much as I do.
So, Saturday afternoon, I had my sis come to take a share of my bounty. She just had the baby, so she needs good food, but she doesn't drive by herself yet(she has a permit now) and her hubby works on Saturday mornings. She received a jar of salsa, eggplant, green beans, some corn, some squash, several peppers and a bunch of cucumbers to make a salad for a barbeque they attended that afternoon.
Also this week, I had received a bounty from Vicki which included chard, greens, radishes, peppers, tomatoes, squash, zucchini, potatoes, broccoli and green beans.
I have onions drying in the back and I am harvesting a few green beans, yellow squash, zucchini, a few raspberries and strawberries, carrots, some pak choi, spinach, some tomatoes and cherry tomatoes, a few cucumbers, lots of bell peppers, some new potatoes, onions, and herbs. My steamer overflowth with summer's bounty. I have become semi-vegetarian in my quest to consume delicious vegetables and my husband is almost matching my enthusiasm, he loves to eat a full plate of veggies sans meat for lunch or dinner during these hot summer days. So, I do have support on this, lol. Eating lighter helps to keep your energy up when you are hot, we learned this long ago when we started working in the Texas heat...salads and veggies, no heavy foods.
Tammy - Sorry I didn't pick up. I was feeling really crummy and I had the phone silenced.
Looks like you ended up with another amazing haul of goodies. Was it James that had the Bread and Butter Pickles? Those are my favorites :) I'll have to check it out next week, although I have cucumbers on the vine and will probably be making my own before long.
I agree with the coolness of summer veggies. The Texas summers are made nicer with a nice cucumber, tomato, onion salad. Or boiled potatoes - right out of the fridge (I just had that as a snack). Anything cool is good!
I have tons of herb seeds right now, but the chives sound nice if you already have plenty...
I really enjoyed the Friday market. Those peaches were amazing!
Sharli - they were good, weren't they? You'll have to come with us in July to visit the orchard. The same woman also makes soaps and in addition to seeing the orchard, we'll get a tour of her soap making facility (and how she does it) while we're there.
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