I would like to blog about things to do with urbanism and transportation and development, but I seem to be afflicted with a learning disorder that prevents me from understanding anything about basic geography or construction. I am still able to talk about these issues, locally at least, by repeating things that I have read on this excellent local urbanist blog.
The one place you can go in Rochester and feel like you’re in a real city is our Public Market, which was just named (admittedly via online voting) “America’s favorite large farmers market“:
“This is a nice distinction for Rochester and another way to sell our community as a great place to live,” Jim Farr, director of the Public Market, said Wednesday. “We know we’ve got the best market in the country and a huge pool of shoppers every week.”
Farr said the 105-year-old market attracts upward of 40,000 shoppers on a Saturday during the summer. “I like to say it’s the most diverse place between New York City and Chicago on a Saturday morning.”
The Public Market, which has space for more than 300 vendors, won in the category for markets with at least 56 vendors. Winners in the smaller categories were markets in Falls Church, Va.; King George, Va.; and Urbana, Ohio.
What’s great about the Rochester public market is that there is all the high-class organic heirloom stuff along with various cut-rate crap (substandard lemons and limes, cheapo bread and English muffins) and stuff (batteries, especially) that might have fallen off the back of a truck. There aren’t quite enough fast food vendors, though there is a good pastrami sandwich (shipped in from Brooklyn) place along with an excellent-but-too-crowded empanada stand and an Indian guy who sells something he calls “slumdogs”, which I haven’t tried yet.
Everyone says the Reading Market in Philly is better, but I haven’t been there yet.
Do you have a public market/farmers’ market near where you live? Are they real ones or just places where people sell candles and pink Himalayan salt (our smaller ones locally tend towards this)?
Woodrowfan
Yay! Falls Church has a great farmer’s market!!!! We get some good produce and a nice loaf of buns bread there most Saturdays…
stuckinred
Well, they could be in Louisiana where another rig just blew up.
Comrade Jake
Very much real in Durham, NC, and it’s relatively small but excellent.
stuckinred
This is the Farmer’s Market in Athens, GA. Strict on the organic, high prices but they have a program this summer where folks with food stamps can get $2 of food for $1 stamps. Buncha hippies.
Bubblegum Tate
I have one half a block away from my apartment. It happens every Sunday, and while it’s kind of small, it has everything I want from a farmer’s market–high-quality fruits and veggies, terrific locally-made cheese, grass-fed beef from a local ranch, fresh fish (typically line-caught), local honey, and even chocolate–without all that off-brand crap you mention. As I’ve joked many times, if they sold pasta, milk, and cereal there, I’d never need to go to the grocery store again.
The only downside: It can be a gigantic pain trying to navigate around the hordes of slowly-pushed double-wide strollers clogging up the pathways.
MattR
@stuckinred: That sounds like a great program. Good for them. I will have to ask my sister to compare the Athens and Philly farmers market as she lived in the former for about 5 years before spending the last 3 in the latter. And I’ll ask her husband if he can compare them to the one in Rochester since he grew up in the Syracuse area.
stuckinred
@Bubblegum Tate: Our folks were selling unpasturized milk and they got busted!
D. Mason
A nearby town has a tiny farmers market open every other weekend. They have about 20 stands where local farmers sell produce, weird I know.
Dave Fud
I’m partial to this one. It is better than the market in Boulder, CO, I believe, and bigger than the market in Tulsa, OK – probably because of the long growing season. I shop there a fair bit.
superluminar
DougJ:
Are you applying to be the Atlantic’s Urbanism Editor?
stuckinred
@MattR: This market was at a bakery, Big City Bread, until 3 years ago when it moved to Bishop Park. I am very good friends with several of them but their anti-dog policy pisses me off!
gwangung
In Seattle, there’s Pike Place Market. In the various neighborhoods, there are nooks and crannies that host smaller scale markets.
Angelos
Reading Market is fantastic, I go there every time I’m in Philly.
Here in the Capital Region we have an embarrassment of riches, farmers’ market wise.
Saratoga and Troy are fantastic. The regional fruits and veggies, of course; many locally-raised meats (duck, elk, beef, chicken, lamb); and plenty of local prepared foods next up the line from the raw ingredients (artisanal cheeses, pickles, sausages).
Other than that a cuple vendors of handmade soaps and stuff, but nothing cheesy/flea-markety.
All about local foods.
Justin
In the summer, Vancouver has several farmer’s markets that show up on set days, usually Saturday, in a particular location (Comox between Thurlow & Bute, the old train station parking lot, Trout Lake community centre). There’s some woo-woo candle sellers there, but mostly it’s local producers of fruit, vegetables, meat or cheese, and some artisanal stuff like jams. We do most of our grocery shopping at these places when they’re available, and have adjusted our diets to accommodate the seasonality of certain produce. Rhubarb season saw a lot of crisps and muffins, and now that blueberries are fading from the scene it’s apple time, when the dehydrator runs 24/7.
One of the benefits of a more local and organic diet is that, by eliminating as much processed food from one’s diet as possible, your dietary budget for things like butter goes way up. Jesus Christ, I eat a lot of butter now. Pie crusts made by my wife are basically butter with enough floor added to keep them from falling apart.
Angelos
Good point raised by stuckinred.
Many of our local markets take food stamps, WIC cards, etc. at a favorable exchange rate, and they are succeeding and getting more and more people out to buy fresh ingredients.
One local market even has a table where noobs can get help with preparation/cooking questions, so that they’re not so overwhelmed with the choices.
Martin
We have quite a few here in SoCal of varying types and qualities. None are huge, but you usually don’t need to go more than 5 miles to find one.
The most traditional one by me is every Saturday and usually has about 40-50 vendors. We still have a fair number of local fruit/vegetable stands scattered around the city, and these are regular attendees at the farmers market. In addition, there are usually a dozen or so vendors that are bringing up produce from Mexican farms and farms from farms between here and the border. We generally avoid the mexican produce because of the huge difference in pesticide and fertilizer regulation there, but there are a few vendors we have learned we can trust.
We also have quite a few farmers market/co-op places. These are permanent structures about the size of a traditional grocery store with regular grocery store hours. Think of the roadside produce stand moved into a building along with 30 others for one-stop shopping for consumers. That’s a pretty accurate description. These are extremely popular with, to be blunt, anyone here who isn’t white – asians, latinos, anyone who isn’t yet conditioned to expect every scrap of food going into their mouth to be barcoded and shrink-wrapped first. But it’s straight from the farm, low-service (nobody stacking pretty piles of oranges, so you aren’t paying their labor), and very reasonably priced.
You’d think SoCal would be full of the scented candle crap, and maybe that’s more common elsewhere here, but it’s surprisingly down-to-earth where I live. We’ve still got a fuckton of small farms here, though, but we’re right on the edge of that. North is virtually all developed, and south and east are too hilly for much other than orchards until you get a fair way south where the farms pick up again in a major way.
mikeg
Dougj,
I’m coming to Roch at the end of this month to visit a Roch cop friend of mine. He hangs out in “Woodys” bar. Can you give me the 411 on that place and are there late-night-eats places nearby said bar? I plan on drinking and eating, respectively.
thanks
cleek
there’s a good F.M. in Raleigh, NC. not sure how it compares to others, but i like it.
DougJ
@superluminar:
Win.
acallidryas
@Woodrowfan:
A second vote for the Falls Church farmer’s market! Although it is often on the pricier side, but that’s just this region.
Our Saturday ritual is going down there to get sausages for lunch from the sausage guy, and buy all the fruit we can carry on the way through the market. Especially mid- to late-summer when the peaches and nectarines are everywhere.
pika
@superluminar: Oh sweet everything, that was gorgeous. John, do we have any Golden Casts of Tunch’s Posterior to offer teh most excellent of comments?
cleek
@mikeg:
Woody’s = sports bar… or that’s what it was like when i lived in Roch. i didn’t go there much – but it was always packed.
but, there’s a great Vietnamese restaurant literally right next door (Doc Hoa). and there’s a pair of fantastic all-night (i think) diners called Mark’s and Gitsis a few block up Monroe Ave. and there’s a great hipster bar called The Bug Jar right across from Woody’s.
Monroe Ave is the place to be, in Rochester, if you’re looking for bars and all-night food. no question.
joe from Lowell
The farmer’s market in Lowell is where blue-collar farmers, many of them Cambodians growing Asian produce on land they rent outside the city, sell local fruits and vegetables dirt cheap. They take foodstamps and WIC.
So, no, they don’t all sell pink Himalayan salt.
DougJ
@mikeg:
I’ve never been to Woody’s but I think people like the food. You’re pretty near the East End which is the epicenter of Rochester drinking, though it’s a bit of Jersey shore crowd. That said, there’s a British bar I like a lot called Old Toad where the crowd isn’t too bad and a place called Monty’s Korner that has lots of local microbrews for good prices. These places are about half a mile away.
Slightly farther away on the other side of the freeway is a great bar with good food called Tap and Mallet. Also a pretty good Cajun/bbq place called Beale Street right nearby.
I don’t know how late all these places serve food, but I’m pretty sure Beale St. serves it quite late. Woody’s may serve food late too.
EDIT: You can also get stuff delivered in that area pretty easily, pizza, wings, etc.
mslarry
Downtown Los Angeles has the Grand Central Market too…. It’s pretty awesome. Here’s the link…
stuckinred
@cleek: This is a listing for the Morehead City Curb Market, we stopped in the early spring on our way to the Okracoke Ferry. Not much there at that time but it seemed cool.
Josie
I sell my soap at two farmer’s markets nearby. They have fresh vegetables, citrus in season, local honey, breads, jams and jellies. One of the markets is made up of inhabitants from colonias – very inexpensive half acre lots sold to poor people on time payment plan. They are usually outside of city limits and sadly lacking in improvements. The local extension agent has taught them to garden organically (we have a ridiculously long growing season), and they eat their own produce plus they sell it for extra money. It is a wonderful thing she has accomplished. We are not selling this summer – too hot for growing anything but okra and eggplant – but will start again in October.
DougJ
@mikeg:
Also, the stuff cleek said. There’s tons of stuff on Monroe near where you are. For whatever reason, I never end up there, except a little farther down at Rochester Hots and Dogtown, which might a slightly farther walk than the East End.
McWaffle
Madison, WI has a nice one. But I guess I’m biased, since I think Madison has a nice just about everything.
wes g
we have a tiny but interesting farmers market that sells hydroponic lettuce (of many varieties, including arugula, yum) and various goods from “hmong” farmers, who can grow some hella good strawberries.
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
In San Francisco we’ve got the upscale, expensive, fancy, and wonderful Ferry Building farmer’s market with lots of pricy organic produce, prepared food, pretty flowers, and other Stuff White People Like. If you want to pay $1.95 for a single, perfect nectarine, this is the place. Even better, in my neighborhood we have the huge Alemany farmer’s market with all of the above, times five, plus an incredible variety of produce (lots of Asian stuff), plants, honey, eggs, live poultry, seafood, and baked goods – all at about half the price of the Ferry Building. Many producers have organic certification. The only drawback is the huge crowds. Both markets have strict rules about the stuff being grown/produced within a certain radius (I think 150 miles), which eliminates a lot of the cut-rate crap.
dave
Here in Northern Wisconsin I’m very lucky. We have a small, 20 vendor market on saturday featuring fresh baked goods, fresh cut flower, fresh picked vegetables organic and other, honey from local bee keepers, and cuts of bison and elk direct from the farmers. Then on thursday afternoon and evening there is a large market, 100+ vendors, just outside of town. There are many more crafts at that one and several food vendors, fry bread tacos, bison burgers, fresh churned ice cream, funnel cakes, mini donuts, kettle corn, and many more, and produce locally grown fruits and vegetables.
Sly
The Reading Market had this. So, yeah… kind of hard to beat.
Josie
@Josie: I forgot to say that I am in deep South Texas.
stuckinred
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice: What’s the market that is right off the freeway?
McWaffle
@wes g:
Why not just Hmong?
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
@stuckinred: That’s the Alemany market – at the 101/280 interchange. I live a half-mile from there.
mr. whipple
Cleveland, West Side Market
cleek
@DougJ:
2nd the Tap And Mallet.
back when that place was the downtown MacGregor’s, my girlfriend and i got cut off and kicked out at 1:00pm, Good Friday. it was, indeed, a good Friday – though Holy Saturday was a nightmare.
dhd
East Liberty farmers’ market in Pittsburgh is pretty decent for a once-a-week market. We have four or five old-school truck farmers, three somewhat young and hip organic vegetable farms, some Amish cheese factories, old ladies selling pies, pastries, a meat truck, some random people selling sauces in jars, and two competing Middle Eastern fast food stands. You can get bushels of tomatoes and collard greens in season.
I would say that the attendance is a bit wealthier and paler than the neighborhood, but it covers the entire East End, more or less, so who can say really.
Church Lady
http://atlanta.about.com/od/shopping/gr/dekalb-farmers-market.htm
The one thing I really miss about living in Atlanta is the Dekalb Farmer’s Market. I was incredible. I especially loved the spice selections, all sold by the ounce, but the bakery was to die for and the meal and seafood areas were huge. The fruits and veggies were also quite nice. This was back in the ’80s, so before the organic movement really took off. I’m sure that now they have a huge selection of organic produce.
Linda Featheringill
Cleveland’s West Side Market!
Began in 1840 and publicly owned. They have some of everything. Butchers and bakers but no candlestick makers. Lots of ready-to-cook ethnic goodies [Eastern Europe and German]. And a BIG fresh produce section.
The neatest thing about the market is that people from every ethnicity I can think of shop there, peacefully, with cooperation. Even during times of ethnic/racial tension in the outside world. I think the peacefulness derives from the fact that there is plenty for everybody and the prices are quite reasonable.
A very pleasant experience.
Sean
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice:
C’mon Collette, be serious. The Ferry farmers market has very affordable produce also, and you can eat as much as you want for free, too. I know it is fashionable to hate things that are considered “upscale” but the “white people” thing is absolute BS.
Alemany is nice, and the Civic Center market too. Crocker Galleria is a bit foofy (too much prepared food, less produce) but anything in season is usually fairly priced.
I live in the East Bay and work in the city, so I get to pick and choose my markets, but everyone I know from out of town thinks the Ferry farmers market is nice, and most are surprised at how reasonable it is.
Sorry if you don’t like prepared food or organic flowers, but I am pretty sure non-white people appreciate flowers and some mango chutney too. Or maybe the Sikh guy selling Indian food isn’t ethnic enough for you…;
DougJ
@mslarry:
I like that place. My sister took me to another place sort of like it in LA recently too.
DougJ
@Sean:
I think the Ferry Bldg is pretty aggressively upscale too.
Of course in the East Bay, you’ve got Berkeley Bowl (it’s still there, right?) which makes any and all other sources of produce unnecessary.
R-Jud
I always liked the Chicago farmer’s markets; I would go and bring fruit and flowers back to the office when I worked near the one at Prudential Plaza.
The Bull Ring markets here in Brum are fabulous. We go on Friday mornings and get pretty much all of our groceries and cut flowers. Much cheaper than the supermarkets, and you can haggle. The guy I buy my carrots from sings “California Girls” at me when he sees me coming even though I am not, in fact, from California. I’ve also bought cloth for making curtains there.
fasteddie9318
I find this kind of thing incredibly discouraging, because it means that the top 2% are losing the fight to horde food and make the rest of us eat tree bark. Until the only thing you can buy at one of these so-called “markets” (and, come on, if they’re real markets then where are the hundreds of billions in free money for the banks to collect?) is dirt sandwiched between two rocks, the Baby John Galt will not stop weeping for the monster we have created.
MattR
@stuckinred: In that case, nevermind :) Wish I could remember the name of the bagel place she used to work at down there. Was run by displaced NY Jews. Possibly Zimmermans.
Amanda in the South Bay
I know Palo Alto has two, Mountain View has one, and there is one in downtown San Jose. Based on my experiences of the Mt. View one while waiting at the Caltrain station on Sunday mornings, they seem to attract the kind of person I’d ID as “makes six figures at a tech company,” which sorta intimidates me.
No farmers markets for poor people.
growingdaisies
The Baltimore Farmer’s Market is wonderful. Lots of vendors, wonderful produce, locally raised chicken, beef, eggs, and a ton of people selling food to eat on the spot — fresh-roasted coffee, giant candy apples, cajun breakfast sandwiches, etc.
We do have crafters instead of the cut-rate dealers, but I think we still deserve points for the market taking place literally under the expressway.
DougJ
@stuckinred:
I remember Big City Bread. I liked that place.
tamied
dhd @40. We have a similar market on Fridays in Forest Hills. A lot of neighborhoods in Pgh have markets and some friends of mine go just about every day of the week to see what’s going on. They vary in price though. My sister lives on the north side and she said my market is more expensive than hers.
Walker
The farmer’s market in Ithaca is horrible – a lot of crap and little food. But then we have the Ag school and Cornell Orchards which makes up for it.
p.a.
The problem here in RI and SE Mass is that the area is so compact, and has such a long tradition of farm stands, that some of the best producers don’t vend thru the farmers’ markets; they have a large and stable customer base. The farm stands are always cheaper and their quality is at least as good as the farmers’ mkts., but you have to drive to them. So you get great produce at a great price, but use more hydrocarbons.
PurpleGirl
NYC has had a greenmarket program since 1976. There are now some 40 sites and about 24 of them have EBT tables where food stamp users can buy tokens to be used with the individual vendors. The largest markets are Manhattan’s Union Square and Brooklyn’s Grand Army Plaza. The markets usually are open Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. Some are as small as two vendors or upwards of fifteen. Union Square and Grand Army Plaza have dozens of vendors. I’ve shopped at various markets depending on where I’ve worked, particularly Union Square. Some items are quite affordable, some can be expensive. Overall, I like them.
SB Jules
Santa Barbara has a farmers’ market every day of the week. Each day is in a different part of town. Very good stuff!
varmintito
The Reading Terminal is terrific. There are at least two merchants in most categories and a huge regular clientele, which combine to keep quality high and prices reasonable. Some of the food is “best in class” — Termini Bros. makes the best cannoli I ever had, Basset’s has the best ice cream, Martin’s Meats makes the best sausage. I have come to know many of the merchants over the years.
Also, the variety and quality of the eateries (and complete lack of chains as a matter of market policy) makes the terminal an incredible place to eat lunch.
The terminal makes shopping for groceries an occasion to look forward to.
Other good markets: Cross Street market in Baltimore (it’s way smaller than Lexington Market but has a great atmosphere); Haymarket in Boston (completely outside, mostly produce); Ninth Street/Italian Market in Philadelphia (curb market with combination of street vendors and stores).
PurpleGirl
Rechecking the Greenmarket web site, I see that the days open differs market to market. Union Square is open Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. And they’ve opened one a short trip from where I live that is open on Saturday.
geg6
Reading Market in Philly is totally awesome, but I actually prefer the Strip District here in the ‘Burgh. It’s not indoors nor is it all the vendors in one place. It’s more like a wholesale section of the city, with separate stores and only food cart vendors, local artisans, musicians, etc. hanging on the street outside the wholesalers’ and specialty/ethnic stores. It has tons of character, great food everywhere, music, arts, booze, wonderful local bars/restaurants/dives (some of them have been featured on Guy Fieri’s Drive-Ins, Diners, and Dives), art galleries, custom furniture makers…it’s the best place in the ‘Burgh to spend a Saturday, from early in the morning (when the farmers and trucks have finished unloading) until late, late, late at night.
As for locally, meaning here in Beaver County, I have a farmer’s market a block from my house every Thursday until October. It’s all local farmers and no candles, etc. Beaver County is suburban, but is close to and includes some really rural parts and we have a fairly large population (on the fringes) of farmers. If I miss the farmer’s market near my house, I can just drive a few miles down the road to a great farm near the Pittsburgh Airport called Janoski’s. You can buy at their market or you can go out into the fields and get it yourself there.
stuckinred
@DougJ: We walk the dogs there every day. In fact the Bohdi was dumped there as a little pup 6 years ago.
zzyzx
Tons of them in Seattle. This one is my favorite.
geg6
@mr. whipple:
This. In fact, West Side Market might be the absolute best farmer’s market in the entire country. Hard to believe it’s in Cleveland, but I choose to believe it’s due to the fact that Michael Symon and Michael Ruhlman live there. When you have two of the food gods living in your small city, you must have the best market anywhere just to keep them.
RSR
@cleek:
ha, I remember all those places. The Bug Jar and tequila made for some interesting nights.
Don’t forget to try a garbage plate over at Nick Tahou’s.
http://www.garbageplate.com/
Bubblegum Tate
@DougJ:
Not only is BB still there, they opened up the gargantuan, Home Depot-sized Berkeley Bowl West.
But I still prefer my local farmer’s market for produce, for the convenience, if nothing else.
Woodrowfan
@acallidryas:
There are several sausage guys there. Can you recommend one? how much are they??
dhd
@49 Check out Produce Row at the San Jose flea market for a completely different experience…
Bubblegum Tate
@growingdaisies:
I’m guessing there’s blue crab there when it’s in season, right? God, I miss blue crab….
mds
@RSR:
Go ahead and forget to do that, if it means missing out on some of the Monroe Ave and Environs options already detailed above. And I third the Dac Hoa recommendation. (But MacGregor’s original location –> Tap and Mallet? What’s next, putting a new bridge in Charlotte?)
RSR
Philly’s Reading Terminal Market is an interesting setup as it’s entirely enclosed beneath what was the old Reading Railroad terminal shed (now PA Convention Center grand hall). That allows permanent installation of equipment, furniture and fixtures. So there are basically full-blown butchers and seafood mongers there as well as the produce and other culinary offerings. Plus there are full scale restaurants, pizzerias, bakers, steak-sandwich places, etc. You can shop for and/or consume a huge variety of products and services there.
In fact, eating lunch there is one of the reasons my wife doesn’t mind jury duty which is just a block away.
Philadelphia also offers dozens of neighborhood markets, often open one or two days a week, many of which host some of the same vendors from Reading Terminal.
DRN0001
We love the Holland Municipal farmers market in Holland, Michigan.
mds
Oh, and New Haven is not a particularly good place for farmers’ markets, especially coming from Rochester. Which admittedly is setting the bar rather high, but still, even Himalayan pink salt would be an improvement.
RSR
@mds: Yeah, it’d be further down the list than most of those other places.
Park Avenue had some nice places, too, when we lived there.
Ron
We have a real, albeit small Farmer’s Market here in Geneva, NY (a really long stone’s throw from Rochester). Yes, we get the people selling candles and crap, but a lot of local farmers come sell fruits and veggies, and last time I was there there was even a farm from Victor selling meat.
SammyV
The farmers’ market in Bloomington, IN, is fantastic. Big, busy, good food, live music, arts and crafts, salsa contest, etc. I think it was my favorite thing about living there, and there’s an awful lot of great stuff in Bloomington. Here in Garden City, KS, the farmers’ market is four or five stalls selling sad-looking cucumbers and cantaloupes.
goblue72
I’m in the Center of All Things Twee (the Bay Area), so we’ve got farmer’s markets coming out our ying-yangs. There’s the aforementioned Ferry Building farmer’s market, which is expensive, but not over-priced – in the sense that you are paying more than other markets, but you do get what you pay for. It also has a prepared foods section that is to die for – bacon-cheddar donuts right next to a Blue Bottle coffee stand, Korean “tacos” (sashimi on a seaweed taco shell), soft shell crab po’ boys, etc.
Within walking distance to home I have a choice between the Lake Merritt farmer’s market (Saturday), which seems to have some of the same vendors as the Ferry Building but cheaper, as well as the Jack London Square farmer’s market (Sunday) – both in Oakland, each with lots of organic produce options at affordable prices (ripe organic peaches for a $1/pound? don’t mind if i do!) In particular, there’s this guy who build a portable wood-fired oven who makes thin-crust pizzas to order with toppings from the market (blue cheese, figs, marscapone, balsamic drizzle, etc)
We get pretty obnoxiously spoiled our here in America’s Salad Bowl.
slag
I have a Sunday market about two blocks away. And another one about a mile and a half in the same direction. When we have time on Sundays, we tend to walk to our neighborhood market, look around a bit, and continue on to the next one. It’s definitely an enjoyable way to spend the day, and as this guy says:
Community events and spaces like farmers’ markets are a huge sell to people looking for a nice place to live. For us, even in this down housing market, our neighborhood is considered “stable” by home appraisers. The farmers’ market, the nearby shops, the walkability and public spaces are all part of that. Which is why it’s so important to me–as an individual homeowner–that we breathe some life back into this economy. Because the more empty store fronts and vacant market stalls and dilapidated sidewalks I see, the more likely my neighborhood housing market will start to depreciate. It’s all connected.
/preaching to choir
goblue72
@Bubblegum Tate: I have to say, the building exterior for BB West is probably one of the most “industrial chic” looking grocery stores I’ve seen.
Though, once you get inside, the wall to wall entitled Berkeley-ites running you over in their shopping carts obliterates the experience.
Surprised no one has mentioned CSAs (Consumer Supported Agriculture). I signed up for one about 6 months ago and get a box of seasonal organic fruits & veggies once a month for just a hair more than I’d spend at the market without having to dedicate one afternoon a week to farmer’s market shopping. Some places even have Meat CSA’s where you get access to grass-fed, free-range critters. New England even has CSF’s – the “F” being Fisheries. We got a guy out here doing the same thing but with foraged food (wild lettuces, acorn meal, gleaned fruits, sea beans, etc) – but’s taking the Twee a bit too far for me.
Arclite
Saturday Farmers’ Market at Kapiolani Community College is pretty good. In addition to lots of fresh fruits and veggies and breads, I recommend the Thai lemonade and pesto pizza, both homemade and fantastic.
That it’s at the foot of the extinct Diamond Head volcano is a big bonus…
http://www.hfbf.org/FarmersMarketKCC.html
russell
There are several farmer’s markets in my town and the surrounding towns, about 10-15 miles north of Boston.
All local produce, most of it organic, mostly sold by folks who own and/or work on the farms. There’s one booth run by a local youth organization who get the kids farming as some kind of school project. A couple of the vendors sell eggs on the side.
And yeah, we have a Hmong family, selling freaking perfect vegetables.
A good bread vendor from one town over, some meat vendors from folks out in central MA. All the produce vendors are from within about 25 miles of us.
A couple of local craft booths. No Himalayan salt.
anticontrarian
I live in Seattle, so we’ve got the Pike Place Market downtown, which is awesome, and pretty much every neighborhood has a Sunday farmer’s market most of the year.
I recently got to go to this, which paired local chefs of note with local farms to produce a pretty freakin’ magical evening. It was pricey, as such things often are, but worth every penny to get a taste of twenty or thirty different dishes (at least two of which involved pork belly-mmmmm… pork belly) and meet the chefs and farmers.
There’s a huge locavore scene here, along with a great deal of culinary diversity and innovation, which is yet another reason I love living here.
IndyLib
We’ve got a decent weekly farmer’s market in Kenosha, they have a little bit of everything, fruits and veggies, organic beef, chicken and lamb (and the guy who sharpens my knives), fresh, really good Wisconsin cheese, the organic soaps and candles, the pink sea salt, and a nun who sells the most kick-ass bread I’ve ever eaten.
We also have farm stand on every road out of town in any direction this time of year with local corn and lots of veggies. My husband came in from work one day last week with 2 bags stuffed full of roma tomatoes, onions, really hot tiny chili peppers and banana peppers. I took that as a hint that he wanted fresh salsa. The 2 bags together must have weighed 8 lbs and he got all of it for $10.
Comrade Colette Collaboratrice
@IndyLib:
Is it Sinsinawa bread, aka “Mound Bread”? Those nuns can BAKE. I knew a group of them in Alaska years ago who ran the local social services agency on behalf of the Anchorage municipal government. The most kind and selfless people I’ve ever known, even if they must have been putting crack in the cinnamon bread.
Ronnie Pudding
I’m a Rochesterian who’ll disloyally question the top rating for the Public Market. It’s nice, but the best in the country? I think it leans a bit more toward cheap overstock than local, although there’s some of each. (And that ‘slumdog’ guy has great stuff.)
I think foodies might prefer the suburban markets…Brighton is buzzing every Sunday. But that’s strictly high-priced, local, organic, free-range, grass-fed, etc. It also has a band which is a notch above the earnest folk singers who dot the Farmer’s Market.
Bubblegum Tate
@goblue72:
I love the Bay Area. Love it. But dear god, I cannot fucking stand entitled Berkeley-ites.
someguy
These markets sound like a salmonella outbreak waiting to happen. Any idea who regulates the health of that food that you buy there? Is it regulated (more importantly inspected or tested) at all?
Ronnie Pudding
Oh, come one someguy. You think the produce in the supermarket is regulated any more stringently than the farmer’s markets?
losingtheplot
@Walker:
I went to college in Geneva NY 1974-79 just down the road from the Cornell Ag station – one summer I was there, the idea that laetrile from apricot pits could be a cancer cure was a hot issue. We were employed by the Ag Station to extract the pits from what felt like Billions of apricots. We gave the Ag station the apricot pits and canned the leftover tons and tons and tons of apricots (didn’t eat another apricot for about ten years). I worked a winter break at the Ag Station, cross-country skiing thru the apple orchards and pruning the trees. It’s a beautiful part of the world – and if there’d been a farmers’ market in Rochester then, we would’ve gone there. I remember market stands full of beautiful Concord grapes, which I’d only ever experienced before as Welch’s grape juice. I read a post on Common Dreams last week about someone driving up to Skaneateles and how all the farmland round the Finger Lakes is returning back to forest, because so many small farms have been abandoned. It made me really sad – the Finger Lakes was my first experience of a rural landscape, me having been brought up in NYC suburbia.
IndyLib
@Comrade Colette Collaboratrice:
She sells all sorts of different loaf bread and croissants, so I doubt she’s from the same group. I’d ask her what order she’s from but she doesn’t talk, or smile or do much of anything except hand you the bread and take the money. She wears a full-blown habit and it’s always the same nun and she’s always by herself with the longest line in the whole market. Odd deal altogether.
Alan in SF
It’s worth noting that John McCain, who is always thoughtful and insightful about any subject he addresses, has denounced farmer’s markets as a threat to America. No kidding. http://www.chicagotribune.com/health/ct-met-eating-local-20100901,0,3015712.story
draftmama
Vancouver also has Granville Island Public Market – combination of all year round stores including fabulous butcher and the best seafood, and seasonal stalls. Packed most of the time, yum yum….
BD of MN
Well I guess I have to plug my own market too. St. Paul, MN has a very nice market, open both Sat and Sun with smaller satellites every other day of the week; with one caveat I didn’t notice anyone else talking about, all the goods have to be produced within a 50 mile circle, so it’s guaranteed to be local. (no peaches at our market…)
andrea
Menlo Park farmers market is my local market, and I feel like I’m cheating if I go to Palo Alto or Ferry Plaza (I work nearby). Not much prepared food, as there’s a Trader Joe’s one block away and the very upscale Draeger’s market two blocks in the other direction.
frosty
Central Market in York, PA.
Sab
Being born and raised in Rochester (Irondequoit, specifically), and now visiting Roch-cha-cha several times a year, I can say that the Public Market is one of those things about Rochester that I look forward to checking out on my return trips to the hometown. I love the atmosphere! Plus, there’s some great baked goods, meats (those chicken Italian sausages from Hanzlian’s), and other food to be had there. And the fiancee loves to peruse the knock-off handbags.
I live in Abington, PA, now, and have visited the Reading Terminal Market several times down in da Philthy. It’s nice and there’s a broad variety of stores there, but it’s not the same atmosphere compared to Rochester.
Ben Mays
We go the the King George farmers market in the story. Small but nice, out here on the Northern Neck.
Ron
@losingtheplot: I’m living in Geneva now. There are still plenty of farms around here.
cathaireverywhere
Bakersfield, CA has one large farmer’s market and several smaller ones. It is a big farming area, so the produce is nice. Lots of open land around the city, so lots of small local farmers, too. There is one guy, however, who is essentially a produce broker. He buys produce from the same sources as the grocery stores and sells it at the market. Lots of sources for truly free–range eggs from backyard chickens. There are also some other random people selling soaps and baked goods.
davidj
Washington, DC’s Eastern Market, not quite a mile southeast of the Capitol, is the only surviving indoor retail food market in the city (there’s one other intact market building, which now houses a branch of a Manhattan gourmet-food chain, and a market-building shell rendered roofless by a snowstorm cave-in about a decade ago awaits reconstruction). It has a farmers’ and flea market outside on weekends. It’s housed in a lovely 1870s municipally owned building excellently rehabilitated after a fire about three years ago. The post-fire closure was difficult for my family, as supermarket meat and poultry simply couldn’t compare; fortunately some of the vendors were operating out of trucks within a couple weeks. The entire market reopened in a temporary building a couple of months after the fire, and moved back into the repaired and upgraded (with air conditioning and skylights) main building a year and a half later.
There are now regular weekly or twice-weekly farmers’ markets many places in the city and it’s fun to bike out to one or another of them on a weekend morning, see other neighborhoods, and sometimes score stuff even more exotic than usual (recently: fresh blackcurrants and gooseberries), but Eastern Market is the place I go almost every day on the way home from work to buy the makings of the evening’s dinner.
Michael
I live in Ottawa, Canada so we have the famous Byward Market. A very nice section in the heart of the city.
DanF
@SammyV: I’m with you Sammy. As a current Bloomingtonian, I go every Saturday with my wife and kids. It is fantastic – not just for the produce, but the music, political activism, art fairs, salsa tastings, and good friends!
kathleen
seems to me this is a list of markets with a good online presence — not necessarily America’s favorites.
RSR
@Sab: Howdy, sorta-neighbor!