My Farmers' Market Basket
The first Saturday after Thanksgiving
“Eating seasonally inspires your menus, gives you a sense of time and place, and rewards you with the most flavorful food.” – Alice Waters
No doubt, to somebody like Alice Waters, “eating seasonally” includes winter–otherwise commonly overlooked in this context. But winter is approaching and, with it, comes our farmers’ winter offerings.
How passionate am I about farmers’ markets? Well, I’m starting this newsletter at a time of year when thoughts of farmers’ markets–with their warm weather fun, their heaping abundance and sparkling variety–are fading from the public conscious. Because of this, many don’t realize that some farmers’ markets continue on beyond Thanksgiving. Year after year, for the decade that I was the market manager of the Chestnut Hill Farmers’ Market, people would ask me: “When do you stop for the season?” My proud answer: “We are year-round!”
It’s true. We don’t stop.
With storage vegetables, storage apples, and items grown in hoop houses, greenhouses and the like, our farmers come to market nearly every Saturday of the year, including the winter months. This is quite a feat, especially as winter progresses. I am not in California. I’m in Philadelphia. Our farmers are working in Mid-Atlantic conditions, yet making local produce available even in the dark, cold months.
And what they provide is good. Lucky are the shoppers at the Chestnut Hill Farmers’ Market. No wonder this market has such an intrepid, dedicated fan base. Even this past Saturday, fresh off the fullness of the Thanksgiving holiday, with the chilliest temperatures of this year’s autumn (about 29F at opening), people bundled up and came out. And, with my baskets full, I stood in the long, though quickly moving, line at my very favorite organic farm: Taproot Farm.
This week I purchased: spinach, radicchio, dandelion greens, shallots, romaine lettuce, round cabbage, honeynut squash, buttercup squash, Swiss chard, collard greens, curly kale, carrots, eggs, and stew meat (Taproot just started selling their own farm-raised beef).
I also signed up for a Fall CSA from Taproot Farm (Saturday pick-up) which, this week, contained: delicata squash, arugula, Swiss chard, romaine lettuce, fingerling potatoes, shallots, and cilantro. (And, yes, wanting two of each, I purchased one bag of Swiss chard and one head of romaine lettuce, knowing that one of each was also in the CSA box.) The delicata squash and the cilantro, unless I missed them, were not on the tables for regular sale. Sometimes, when you have a CSA, you feel kind of special.
With my sweetheart, Chris, and my older daughter, Anna, accompanying me, we next picked up cremini and trumpet mushrooms at Primordia Mushroom Farm, then finally headed to the once-a-month vendor Rafiki: Taste of Africa.
For Chris and my younger daughter, Lena, we purchased an assortment of samosas, stuffed grape leaves, falafel, harissa spiced hummus, Ethiopian lentils, and beef pie. Unlike her sister and me, Lena is not much one for the kitchen, and she also works long, intense hours as a freelance translator so she doesn’t have much time for cooking beyond the basics. For this reason, I like to pick up high-quality prepared food for her which she can just heat up or enjoy as is.
Rafiki, run by the husband and wife team Roger (from Uganda) and Dorothy (from Kenya), is a winner. They started at our market in 2022 as a guest vendor because, one week, we had extra space. Then, in the days that followed, unprecedented customer enthusiasm nearly crashed our Facebook page as so many pleaded with us to have Rafiki come back more regularly. We listened, and found a way to fit them in. In addition to being master chefs of their specialty cuisine, Roger and Dorothy also run the Rafiki Africa Foundation and return to Africa every winter to do charitable work there. We miss them when they are overseas, but always wish them well, and look forward to their return.
Ingredient Focus: Buttercup Squash and Spinach
The menu for one dinner this week is spinach quiche, with a side of buttercup squash (roasted, scooped out, mashed, then re-heated with butter, kind of like mashed potatoes.) Anna adamantly holds to the opinion that quiche is not worth having unless it comes with a side of squash. Any dry, potatoey winter squash, such as buttercup or kabocha, will do.
I disagree and, other times of the year, have tried to convince her that quiche does well with a variety of side dishes…to no avail. That’s ok. There are so many other good things to eat that I’ll happily do without quiche most of the year and enjoy this comfort-food combo, as an autumnal meal, just like she does.
I almost always buy spinach when it’s at the market because it cooks well, adding texture and flavor, into any number of dishes. Swiss chard, beet greens, turnip greens, and others I’m surely forgetting, are also terrific to use in the same way. I consider these types of cooking greens “soft” because of the way they cook down. Spinach is famous for this. “Durable” greens would be, say, collards, kale, and spigariello. Durable greens can be cooked into a variety dishes as well, but hold up with greater presence, so I prefer to save them for use in other ways. More on durable greens another time.
Growing up, I don’t remember any cooking greens other than spinach. (Salad greens were a different story.) The one exception would be my mother’s special-occasion “baked watercress and goat cheese” dish, which I adored. Other than that, I can’t recall anything but spinach, usually purchased in a tightly-packed frozen cardboard box, and then made “creamed.” This was very child-friendly and perfectly Popeye pleasing. But times have changed and more cooking greens have become more common. Still the classic–spinach–endures and, this week, is heading into our quiche.
Because Anna needs to stay away from the SCD-illegal potatoes, I get very excited when winter squash starts showing up at the market, usually late August or early September. “Winter” squash would therefore appear to be quite the misnomer. Perhaps this is the problem because annually, it seems, Anna, wearing shorts and sandals, a balmy breeze wafting through our open windows, looks at the list Taproot sends out every Friday of what they’ll be bringing to market, sees the different winter squash varieties and says “I’m not ready for that,” even though I know she loves winter squash.
This dichotomy may well be compounded by the idea that winter squash is often prepared in ways that call to mind cozy, chilly evenings. But here’s a thought: maybe, just maybe, that association exists because of the term “winter,” a power of suggestion kind of thing.
In any case, most years I need to persuade Anna that, if Taproot Farm has winter squash at the market, then it is the time for winter squash, even if it is still summer. “And who knows how long it will be available?” I argue. That usually gets her. The time for buying those favorites is when our farmers bring those favorites to market. That’s what I think, anyway.
So why, then, do we call it “winter” squash? I read that this is because of its long-keeping qualities, its endurance that can possibly extend well into the winter. A squash is unlikely to last that long on my kitchen counter, but it can hang in there for quite a while. Rugged stuff. Delicious too.
Want a vegetable tongue-twister?
Try saying “butternut, honeynut, buttercup” ten times fast. We know the differences between these guys, but sure do stumble when using any of them in a sentence. “Mommy, you meant buttercup, right?”
For our dinner with quiche, yes.
Market Scenes
I started watching the second season of the Max series Julia this week, and the opening scene of the first episode shows Julia Child with Simca Beck, shopping at a Provence farmers’ market. Julia swoons over the scent of a peach, and I swoon over all the visuals. The wide shot, showing the whole market, made me think of this lovely watercolor “Market Day in Provence” by my artist friend, Mary Lynn.
Mary Lynn and her husband, emerging artist Bill, spent eight weeks last spring painting and traveling around France.
As an aside, I’d like to note that Bill will be 91 years old this January and he only just started art lessons, along with learning Italian, while in his 80s. Bill is an excellent example of “Age is only a number,” “It’s never too late,” and all other sayings about living well and living long.
Below is Bill’s 2022 painting “Venetian Fruttivendolo” from when he and Mary Lynn spent several weeks traveling around Italy.
Till next time…
Happy Marketing everybody!
With thanks to: Chris for his tech support; Lena for her proofreading and editorial input; and Anna for her culinary companionship. I love you guys!
Oh fun! I look forward to that scene and seeing you there.
I was scampering around in the background when Julia goes to the station and sees her new fridge.