Flavor Boulevard

Tag: Farmers’ Market

  • Work at the Farmers’ Market

      StonestownFarmersMarket
      September was an extremely busy month. In addition to the usual school work, teaching, a part-time job and my editor job at the Daily Cal, I took on editing a special issue on Food (how could I resist?) and I worked for Sinto Gourmet for two weekends (again, it’s food work, I just couldn’t resist). The first weekend, Hyunjoo Albrecht, Sinto’s owner, asked me to be at the Stonestown Farmers’ Market at 7:30 am on a Sunday.

      I told myself that waking up early is good for me, and that after the Farmers’ Market finished I would have the rest of the day to study. That was all good in theory, until I couldn’t sleep the night before and ended up working all night, then begrudgingly got dressed to leave at sunrise. (My friend Nancy was so unbelievably kind to drive me all the way from Berkeley to Stonestown, otherwise, I would have had to take the bus at 5:30 am and made a few transfers)

      After leaving me with the kimchi, Hyunjoo rushed to another Farmers’ Market to set up her stall. Other vendors slowly arrived and filled up their space, but not the stall to my left. The wind blew fiercely from Lake Merced in the west, which is also on my left side. Of course, I didn’t dress warm enough, had no scarf, and had to mentally fight off the cold by reading about sushi. I hated the first two hours at the Farmers Market.

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    • Old school market


      Ten minutes walking from Studio 3, dwindling around blocks of old houses with small flower-filled garden, crossing Yale Street, you reach the Sunday morning Farmers’ Market on California Avenue. (Click on the image above to see more pictures) Tents are set up alongside the carless road. Housewives scrutinize the artichokes, the blueberries, the fresh caught, filleted fish, the vinegar and oil. Little kids keep tugging their parents’ shirts’ lower hem. Teenagers crowd the fruit tent, continuously chewing and filling up their mouth with pieces of plums, pineapples, grapes, peaches, and apples put out for sampling. It’s not the most busy market, but it has cooked food, vegetable, meats, fruits, flowers, handbags, coasters, jewelries, spices, a lot of things to entertain your eyes and remind you of the old days in Saigon, where markets are more common than grocery stores. The only difference here is it’s a little more pricey than a grocery store, and it doesn’t have various kinds of cereal for your morning bowl (in fact I don’t think they have cereal at all at Farmers’ Market, is it not something handmakeable? What did people do before machine age to make cereal?).
      We didn’t get much, just a couple of artichokes, 2 boxes of eight truffles from the Barlovento Chocolates tent (the old couple and their tiny samples were just too inviting), 4 little Suha Suha coasters (which came with an unexpected (handmade?) card of choice, and are 3 times more pricey than each truffle box), and something else.

      No, the something else isn’t the chocolate. I have indulged myself in all kinds of chocolate multiple times, but I must say munching this something else is far more soul-fulfilling. I found it the best buy of the day, thanks to Mudpie.

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