Market News - June 29, 2010
From the Market Manager
We are in the midst of the best time of year for food. Every week we have more things at the market to choose from. The hard part is deciding what to buy because it all looks good. Last week I sautéed some vegetables with some olive oil and added a little kosher salt. So many people asked me what I had added to the vegetables. When I said it was only olive oil and salt they were incredulous because the mixture was so delicious. When you have superior ingredients, you don’t have to add lots of extras; the freshness of the vegetables made what I cooked so delicious.
That is part of why I encourage young people who say that they don’t like a particular food, usually a vegetable, to try it now that they are an adult since our tastes change. All of us can remember not liking something (for me it was mushrooms) when we were a kid, that we like as an adult.
Where to Donate Books
- Book Sale Finder; booksalefinder.com Find out about upcoming sales in the area.
- Longmeadow Recycling Center; Hands Across the Water program; longmeadow.org. Pondside Rd., Longmeadow.
Goodwill Industries; goodwill.org - Goodwill store, 473 Sumner Ave. Springfield. 304-2710
- Books for Charity. Collection bin located in Temple Beth El’s parking lot, 979 Dickinson St., Springfield
- Local nursing homes and senior center
- Hampden County Sheriff’s Dep’t. hcsdmass.org
- Reader to Reader, Inc. readertoreader.org. 24 Mtn. View Circle, Amherst. 256-8595
Swap/Give Away Cookbooks
We did this last year, so let’s do it again. Next week and the week after, bring cookbooks that you don’t want anymore to the market and we’ll put them on a table for anyone to take.
Interfaith Service
Just a reminder about a short service to be held at 6:30 tonight on the Trinity Church lawn to gather together to share feelings and concerns about the crisis in the Gulf of Mexico. All are welcome.Free Lunchtime Riverwalks
Free lunchtime river walks will resume on June 30th until early September. Meet at
the Monarch Place fountain downtown on the corner of Boland Way and Main St.
The volunteer led walks are designed to call attention to the 3.5 mile riverwalk along the Connecticut River that stretches from Wason Avenue in Brightwood to Riverfront Park.
Tour goers will be able to see more of the river thanks to extensive clearing of brush along the river. For further information call Bob McCarroll at 736-0629.This ‘n’ That
Someone did a study that found that the reusable plasticized bags could carry bacteria, so wash them out every so often.
If you’d like to learn about a way to keep berries fresher longer, go to “Prolonging the Life of Berries” which you can find at nytimes.com. Plunging berries into very warm water for several seconds/minutes evidently helps to keep them fresher longer.
Someone emailed me after last week’s market and said that she’d just had a conversation with someone about the value of buying food from a farmers’ market. One thing she mentioned that I
hadn’t mentioned, is that when you purchase your food in one place, you don’t use up gas going from place to place.
New England Wild Edibles hasn’tbeen at the market recently because there hasn’t been enough rain to make the mushrooms grow. If you recall Paul grows them on logs in the woods, so they are totally dependent on Mother Nature for their moisture. Check out our Facebook page for pictures.
Susan Parks won’t be at the market next week, so if you need soap or lotion, buy it this week.
If you have garbage that will get stinky before trash pickup day, put it in the freezer until the last minute and then toss it out. Why didn’t I think of that on my own?!Too Many Farmers’ Markets?
There are now over 5,000 farmers’ markets in the U.S. and it is expected that by 2012 there will be over 6,000. Since we started our market in 1998, markets in Massachusetts have more than doubled.
Last year I had two people tell me that they thought that they needed a farmers’ market in Agawam. When I said that they had two terrific farm stands there, so why did they think there was a need, they had no answer.
I attend meetings having to do with farmers’ markets and other aspects of agriculture. This is a topic that is coming up much more often. If there are so many markets that few vendors earn what they need to earn to keep them viable, then who benefits? Since we started our market several have begun in Springfield, Hampden, Wilbraham, Longmeadow, Northampton, South Hadley, and Amherst. And those are just the ones I know of.Soup Recipe
This is for any creamed soup. Don’t use eggplant or green beans, but just about any other vegetable would be good.
Onions, vegetables, broth, half and half or cream, seasoning, salt and pepper.
Sauté onions until soft, add some cut up vegetables, cover with vegetable or chicken broth, cook until veggies are soft. Cool, then puree and add whatever seasonings you like (curry goes well with squash) and half and half or cream. If you are using spinach or another leafy green, add some potatoes to the broth as that will add some body to the soup when you puree it.
