I’ve just returned form the first of undoubtedly many early Saturday runs to the Dayton farmer’s market. In a long, narrow warehouse, the quaint market can be forgiven for not being outdoors. It’s still spring, so my expectations were not high for fruits and veggies. At the very least, I hoped to come away with some fresh and fragrant strawberries, some tender asparagus, and maybe some local eggs.
I had to drive, toting my 3 wildebeests along, but in the future, I hope to be able to ride a bike, if I can figure out a suitable method of transporting the bounty home in the mid-morning sun.
As markets go these days, you can find much more than produce and local meat, and our market is no exception. Many permanent vendors featured hand made soaps, jewelry, handbags, honey, even some Ohio maple syrup.
The syrup vendor had a griddle set up, and made free plate-sized pancakes for market goers, requesting a voluntary donation to offset the rising price of grain. My boys took advantage. We parked the stroller in the aisle, and the boys sat right down on the floor, while I was forced to watch a steady stream of people buying artisan breads that looked irresistible.
There were also pastry chefs, a breakfast booth with diner-style offerings, a pet-treat baker, a middle-eastern booth, many fantastic flowers, and a new-age musician with his keyboard and karaoke machine set to extra loud.
I was dismayed to find, among the local seasonal fruits and vegetables, grapes from Chile, pineapples from Hawaii, and avocados from Mexico. They seemed so incongruous. There were also a few hard, pink tomatoes, and they just reminded me of Barbara Kingsolver’s essay on how the attitude in America of having everything now, regardless of season or regional availability, is hypocrisy in a culture that’s trying to teach teenagers to abstain from sex, to wait until the time is right. Buying tomatoes in winter, she says, is promiscuous. Which is funny to me. For several years, if I eat at a restaurant or home where tomatoes are served in the winter, I always feel a little dirty. Like I’ve sacrificed my morals for instant gratification, regardless of the fact that the object of my desire is inferior, and will never measure up to a real, ripe, height-of-summer tomato.
Having just read the late-winter and early spring chapters of “Animal, Vegetable, Miracle,” I was just itching to get something seasonal, and regional. That’s really not that hard in Ohio, but little did I suspect that I would find freshly dug morel mushrooms for $50 a pound (cough, cough, choke). Needless to say, I didn’t get a pound. I got about 7 small mushrooms for as many dollars. Alongside the mollys were the asparagus, and having just drooled over the recipe for Asparagus and Morel Bread Pudding, guess what we’re having for dinner? I’m pretty sure I won’t be needing the whole recipe, which does, indeed, call for a full pound of morels. I’m reluctant to even offer it to the kids, because $50 a pound for mushrooms they will pick out and not eat is pearls before swine, for sure. They’ll undoubtedly object to the asparagus as well, but that’s what’s for dinner.
I also came away with two pints of red strawberries with no hint of a hard, white core, a pound of firm new potatoes the size of marble shooters, a pound of asparagus, a pound of rhubarb (for that pie I’m making for dessert), a dozen brown and almost green local eggs, a whole chicken, a loaf of crusty sourdough bread, and two bagels. Are you jealous? I know Derek is. He doesn’t get back until Tuesday.
May 10, 2008 at 12:29 pm
Yes, I’m jealous. I’m also going to be trying that recipe soon.
May 10, 2008 at 12:30 pm
Mmm, fresh local veggies. Denton has a budding farmer’s market, but it is mostly people selling stuff out of their trucks in a parking lot. I bet it will be growing very quickly in the next few years though, because Denton is growing fast and I think rising fuel prices will make food that hasn’t traveled far significantly cheaper than the other stuff. Maybe it already is. Dallas has a HUGE incredible farmer’s market – everything’s bigger in Texas – it’s like an acre of big, permanent warehouses and tents filled with fruits, veggies, handmade stuff, even antique-mall-ish stuff, and a whole section where they sell plants, flowers, and small trees. I’ve only been once though, because the 45-minute drive sort of offsets the whole idea of being green by eating local, unless you buy a lot of stuff! Anyways, I’m glad farmer’s markets are in the summer, because that’s when our schedules allow us to cook more. Happy eating!
May 10, 2008 at 12:30 pm
Hey I like my monster. Somehow it looks a little like me…
May 10, 2008 at 1:42 pm
It sounds marvelous.
And I agree about the tomatoes. I’ve gone so far as to not let Guille eat a tomato right now so that his lifelong impression of tomatoes isn’t sandy and gross.
May 10, 2008 at 8:32 pm
Oh, my. Everything sounds delicious.
Do you have a recommendation for a good “beginner” cookbook? I feel like I’m only just starting to cook, because everything I was raised learning to fix is very Southern Soul Food Heart Attack on a Platter. We’re eating much healthier these days, and I’d like that to continue, but my recipe arsenal is pretty limited.
May 11, 2008 at 12:12 am
Yipes! I feel so DIRTY and so HUNGRY!
May 11, 2008 at 12:52 am
I’ve never even thought about the tomato issue before. Interesting.
May 11, 2008 at 7:47 am
A farmer’s market already in May? Oh how lovely! I may have to move.
May 11, 2008 at 12:27 pm
We so look forward to visiting next month. I t will be wonderful to enjoy your cooking once again. My mouth started to water as I read about what was for dinner.
May 11, 2008 at 2:53 pm
You’re making something like that without the husband around!? When Greg’s away, it’s scrambled eggs for dinner. Or sandwiches. Possibly cold cereal. Poor Derek. I’m sorry I don’t live nearby because I’m pretty sure I would often have a book to return to you, or have something really important to stop by and tell you at around 6 pm.
May 12, 2008 at 7:49 am
Yum!
The area we live in is actually renowned for its asparagus, and for good reason. I have a hard time eating non-local asparagus because once you taste the good stuff, the rest is just inferior. In fact, I think I will pick up a bunch tonight…
I am jealous of your farmers market haul and counting the days until start getting stuff from the farm share we are splitting with my friends A&J.
May 19, 2008 at 11:00 am
Mmmm. Thought of you and this post yesterday as we were tucking in to the first fresh local asparagus of the season. The area we live in is renowned for its green asparagus and they are so very good that I rarely eat storebought ones during the year. In a related fact, people around here also seem to spend a lot of time talking about the weird pee smell asparagus causes. We are mature like that.
May 19, 2008 at 11:00 am
Mmmm. Thought of you and this post yesterday as we were tucking in to the first fresh local asparagus of the season. The area we live in is renowned for its green asparagus and they are so very good that I rarely eat storebought ones during the year. In a related fact, people around here also seem to spend a lot of time talking about the weird pee smell asparagus causes.
May 19, 2008 at 3:09 pm
Hey – here I am! Did I end up in the spam box or something before? 🙂