farmers' market: last outdoor market of the season
Because today was the last outdoor market, I stocked up on... well, kind of a lot of things, actually.
I stopped at my favorite all-purpose vegetable vendor and took a good look around; I'd just picked up a bag of spinach when I heard someone say, very brightly, "All set?" I looked up and one of the girls behind the counter was holding out her hand.
"I'm just getting started," I said. The girl looked confused. One of the guys who's been working the stand for three or four years now gave her an elbow in the side and said "Don't bother her. She knows what she's doing. She even does the math."
I ended up with spinach, shallots, a big bag of onions, a big bag of sunchokes, a slightly smaller bag of carrots (I don't have a sand crate yet this season), a celeriac the size of a small squash (though of course not as heavy), four beautiful heads of garlic, some parsnips, a few turnips, and an unusually flat three-pound orange kabocha squash, which the smaller of the cats is currently menacing with impressive, though ineffective, ferocity.
Stopped briefly at the mushroom vendor's for a pound of buttons (cream of mushroom soup!) and half a pound of portobellos. I had exact change, which always pleases her. I don't know whether it was that or the fact that it's our last transaction of the season that unbent her a little, but she smiled at me, actually smiled, and said "Have a good winter" with none of her usual brusqueness.
I had hoped to pick up a few pounds of Cortlands from my apple vendor, but I got there late and the bin was pretty picked over. Instead I got a few pounds of Snow/Fermeuse for applesauce, some Northern Spy for apple crisp, and a few Black Gilliflower and Smokehouse for eating. And half a gallon of cider, made yesterday. Mmmm, mulled cider.
Then there was a stop to chat with my favorite potato vendor, whom I hadn't seen yet this year. He said that the cranberry potato crop has been fine this season, but I got about three pounds anyway just because I was so glad to see them, and him. A couple of pounds of blue potatoes, too. And I was tempted by the purple vikings (very large, with bright purple skins and pure white insides), which make The Most Amazing Mashed Potatoes Ever, but my basket was already full and my bag was getting pretty heavy so I stopped myself. I've got several weeks for potatoes, since he comes to the indoor market too.
It didn't actually feel like a stocking-up-on-storage-vegetables morning; it's a gorgeous sunny day, so warm it hardly even qualifies as brisk. I shucked off my sweatshirt before I got so much as halfway round the square. But oh, those bins of potatoes, those crates of apples, those piles of squash! I am positively luxuriating in the number of delicious things I could make for dinner tonight.
I stopped at my favorite all-purpose vegetable vendor and took a good look around; I'd just picked up a bag of spinach when I heard someone say, very brightly, "All set?" I looked up and one of the girls behind the counter was holding out her hand.
"I'm just getting started," I said. The girl looked confused. One of the guys who's been working the stand for three or four years now gave her an elbow in the side and said "Don't bother her. She knows what she's doing. She even does the math."
I ended up with spinach, shallots, a big bag of onions, a big bag of sunchokes, a slightly smaller bag of carrots (I don't have a sand crate yet this season), a celeriac the size of a small squash (though of course not as heavy), four beautiful heads of garlic, some parsnips, a few turnips, and an unusually flat three-pound orange kabocha squash, which the smaller of the cats is currently menacing with impressive, though ineffective, ferocity.
Stopped briefly at the mushroom vendor's for a pound of buttons (cream of mushroom soup!) and half a pound of portobellos. I had exact change, which always pleases her. I don't know whether it was that or the fact that it's our last transaction of the season that unbent her a little, but she smiled at me, actually smiled, and said "Have a good winter" with none of her usual brusqueness.
I had hoped to pick up a few pounds of Cortlands from my apple vendor, but I got there late and the bin was pretty picked over. Instead I got a few pounds of Snow/Fermeuse for applesauce, some Northern Spy for apple crisp, and a few Black Gilliflower and Smokehouse for eating. And half a gallon of cider, made yesterday. Mmmm, mulled cider.
Then there was a stop to chat with my favorite potato vendor, whom I hadn't seen yet this year. He said that the cranberry potato crop has been fine this season, but I got about three pounds anyway just because I was so glad to see them, and him. A couple of pounds of blue potatoes, too. And I was tempted by the purple vikings (very large, with bright purple skins and pure white insides), which make The Most Amazing Mashed Potatoes Ever, but my basket was already full and my bag was getting pretty heavy so I stopped myself. I've got several weeks for potatoes, since he comes to the indoor market too.
It didn't actually feel like a stocking-up-on-storage-vegetables morning; it's a gorgeous sunny day, so warm it hardly even qualifies as brisk. I shucked off my sweatshirt before I got so much as halfway round the square. But oh, those bins of potatoes, those crates of apples, those piles of squash! I am positively luxuriating in the number of delicious things I could make for dinner tonight.