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Farmers Market Challenge: Week 15

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Oh. My. Goodness.

Wow!

Is that real?

It can’t possibly be bread, it must be cake!

They assured us it was bread.

Chocolate bread!!!

Last week was the final week of the summer market bringing the $40 market-spending challenge to a close. And in proper, good Katie form, I went all out.

Early in the challenge, I would never have purchased an $8 loaf of bread, chocolate or not. My spending was based on a strict budget where veggies took precedent. But, as the summer market started preparing for fall, the veggie selection became less vast, and, well, sometimes you really do need a reward for doing a great job.

I think I did a great job; chocolate bread was my reward.

Sadly, I did not read the ingredients. I did not realize there was orange infused into that bread. I do not eat orange-infused sweet treats; haven’t since I was about five years old and some totally evil person decided to underhandedly slip marmalade onto my toast – blech! In my mind, orange does NOT belong in chocolate.

Sigh.

Plus, we may have overdone the sweet factor: Chocolate French toast, syrup and all. Holy decadence!
Plus, we may have overdone the sweet factor: Chocolate French toast, syrup and all. Holy decadence!

FINAL WEEK’S LOOT:

Zaklan Heritage Farm:

  • 2 bunches of mustard greens: $5
  • 1 mini lettuce: $2
  • 2 purple onions: $2.65
  • 1 bunch parsley: $2

Ossome Acres:

  • 1 zucchini: $2

Ripple Creek Organic Farm:

  • 1 garlic: $3

A Bread Affair:

  • Chocolate bread: $8

Wild West Coast Seafoods:

  • 1 lb tuna: $16

Total spent was $40.65.

When I started this challenge 16 weeks ago, I didn’t know what exactly it would present. I considered our family on the upper scale of health prior to going in, but admittedly we were a bit stale and stagnant in meal planning, eating the same-old, same-old week after week.

The market changed that.

It gave us new foods, new recipes, new cooking adventures, new menus, new tastes, new perspectives.

This is what the market gave my family:

A collage of tasty goodness
A collage of tasty goodness

In my first post of this challenge, I asked if the market was true to its negative stereotype of being “too expensive,” a sentiment I have heard echoed several times by my fellow Food, Nutrition and Health peers at UBC. After 16 weeks, I can handedly say that yes, some of the product is pricier than you’d get at grocery stores. But, and this is a huge but, the quality, flavour and freshness is bar none far superior to that of the chains.

When you know your food was picked that day, when you know your food hasn’t undergone chemical procedures to stall the ripening process, when you know every bite is going to be infused with an intense flavour that tickles your differing taste buds, when you know it’s going to last longer than a few days, as long as a FEW weeks even, that has to be factored into the budget.

When you know how to shop the market, as I quickly learned, when you know how to search out the best deals (two for $5 mustard greens made my list EVERY week), when you know how to plan, when you build relationships with the farmers, when you know how to use so-called wastes to your advantage (onion stems was a favourite discovery), you DO see a savings.

We did.

We stopped going to the veggie stand three times a week; our foods were lasting. We stopped buying salad dressings; the intensity of the greens didn’t require added flavouring. In meal planning, we started looking at multiple ways of using the entire vegetable – limited waste, so an environmental savings as well.

There were challenges. A vegetable one week was not guaranteed the next; something you had hoped would be there, didn’t make the cut that week; if you weren’t there early, chances were the items you wanted were all gone.

The week of no perogies!
The week of no perogies!

Our final market meal was a trusty favourite we discovered the third week of the challenge – tuna loin. Unfortunately it had jumped in price since the beginning of the summer; what cost $12 in June, cost $16 in October due to a “crummy” season. It meant fennel was scratched from the list. It meant none of the maybes on the list would get into our bag. But man, that tuna – a drool-worthy, dream-worthy delicacy! Worth every sacrifice. Worth every penny.

Challenge complete. Where oh where to get my mustard greens now?
Challenge complete. Where oh where to get my mustard greens now?

Dear summer market, so much of you I shall miss.

Luckily, winter is coming!

Winter market starts November 5, and runs the first and third Saturday of the month, uptown on Belmont street until the end of April.

See you there.

Farmers Market Challenge: Week 14

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Last week’s post was all about summer; this week’s is all about fall.

The air is crisp, the orange, red and yellow leaves are blowing in the wind, children screeching with glee as they scatter through the organized piles, hoodies and winter leggings taking over shorts and tanks, hot chocolate fast replacing ice cream.

‘Tis the season for belly warming, hearty recipes.

The Bartel menu has officially embraced fall – tortilla soup; quinoa, kale and squash stew; stir fry; and cheesy, cheesy quiche were staples of the week – made all the more comforting by market-fresh goodness.

To be honest, I didn’t know we were going all in with fall, in fact, our market shopping list this week was quite lacking. We had our usual meal-planning session, but both husband and I were stumped as to what to put on it. Meals were suggested, but ultimately rejected – we were not inspired.

So we went in with a list of our staples: greens and a few veggies, and that was it. We left it to the market to decide.

This week’s loot:

Zaklan Heritage Farm:

  • 1 mini purple cabbage: $1
  • 1 leek: $3
  • 1 purple onion: $1.60
  • 1 bag arugula: $4
  • 2 bunches mustard greens: $5

Greendale Herb and Vine:

  • 1 eggplant: $2.50

Country Village Market:

  • 1 basket Brussels sprouts: $3

Golden Ears Cheese Crafters

  • 1 medium-sized  chunk of smoked gouda $8

Wild West Coast Seafoods

  • 1 pound petrale sole: $12

Total spent was $40.10.

Of the loot not on the original must-have list were the Brussels sprouts (screams fall), red cabbage, leeks, eggplant, onion, smoked gouda, and petrale sole.

Smoked gouda
Smoked gouda

We knew we wanted a fish, tuna to be exact, but unfortunately, due to a “crummy” season, what was $12 for a pound a month or so ago is now $18 to $20. Sadly, out of our price range. Ron “the fish guy” suggested we try the petrale. We were hesitant at first because every time we’ve purchased sole from the grocery store it has significantly shrunk upon grilling.

That’s filler, Ron told us, all water. Apparently most fish sold in chains have added water filler to beef up their appearances!!! Ron assured us it was a tasty fish that would retain its size, and at $12 a pound, it was within our family friendly budget.

Because it’s a lighter fish, we didn’t want to overload it with seasoning – keep it simple, Ron advised.

We splashed it with olive oil, added dill, salt and pepper, wrapped it in tinfoil and threw it on the barbecue, along with tinfoil wrapped veggies, including the eggplant and zucchini from last week.

Fish
Fish

My only concern with the fish, which by the way, my four-year-old devoured without any prodding, is the bone content – there were a lot of small, fine bones littered throughout. Good thing the boy doesn’t care about appearances of his foods just yet; it was quite mangled by the time I was through with it.

The Brussels sprouts and eggplant were grilled on the barbecue – sooo yummy! A portion of the leeks and cheese were used in the quiche; the remainder of the leek was used in a quinoa stew that also used the delicata squash, tomatoes and tatsoi from last week, as well as the Russian garlic from two weeks ago, and the onion, and purple cabbage. Pretty much I threw everything I had in there!

Essentially, a kitchen-sink stew
Essentially, a kitchen-sink stew

The stir fry incorporated the green beans, red pepper and garlic from last week, as well as this week’s onion. And with one more day to go, a little bit of onion and cheese remaining, I am heavily considering making a single-serving French onion soup.

Fall, it’s a beautiful, tasty time of year, don’t you think?

Farmers Market Challenge: Week 13

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Last week’s market day may have been the first day of fall, but my brain was not letting go of summer. With the sun shining, warming my skin every time it peeked around the clouds, I could not shake summer from the mind.

Neither could my shopping list.

Roma tomatoes, onion, garlic, cilantro, and hot pepper filled the definites.

You see, I had recently been gifted Thug Kitchen, a vegetarian cookbook, with, ahem, rather racy language. I love cookbooks, I love looking at the pictures (pictures are key), and I love setting a new cooking challenge for the chef of the house, which is usually not me.

But perusing through the pages it was me who was drawn to the mid-summer, pico de gallo style salsa– everything in it reminded me of summer; everything in it reminded me of market freshness; everything in it screamed I could make it.

fm13salsa
Mid-summer salsa courtesy of Thug Kitchen.

I was dubious at how it would turn out at first, I mean, I’ve been all sorts of loving Muy Rico’s pico de gallo all summer long. What if I didn’t pick out the most perfect tomatoes; what if I didn’t chop the onion the right way; what if I didn’t use enough garlic; what if I made it too spicy, or not spicy enough? Yes folks, these are the questions that dominate my brain when taking over the meal-making reins. Baking, which I love to do, is exact, cooking is subjective – too much room for interpretation.

But here’s the thing, this recipe was crazy, crazy, crazy easy. I made it with a four-year-old running all around me and didn’t get frustrated once. Chop a few veg, don’t burn your fingers or eyes with the hot pepper, mix it together, throw it in the fridge, and BAM, done!

The unique touch: a 20 cent Macedonia hot pepper. Gemma at Zaklan Heritage Farms told me it was on the milder scale of hot peppers, but I was not taking any chances, I’ve been burned by the heat of jalapenos one too many times before!
The unique touch: a 20 cent Macedonia hot pepper. Gemma at Zaklan Heritage Farms told me it was on the milder scale of hot peppers, but I was not taking any chances, I’ve been burned by the heat of jalapenos one too many times before!

Some might associate easy with lacking – don’t do it!

I know I’ve said it before, but wow, the power of ultimate freshness – grabbing those ingredients right off the market tables, ingredients that have been picked fresh that day, and plopping them into your mouth hours later – is HUGE! So fresh. So flavourful. So marketlicious!

All but two of the ingredients (salt and lime) were acquired at the market.

We decided to appropriately pair the salsa with our vegetarian Mexican stuffed peppers (featuring market tomatoes, corn, and cilantro) that we discovered awhile back through this market-buying challenge. I made what I thought was a huge batch of salsa; it said it was good for 4-6 servings. We ate ALL of it. We had leftover fillings for the stuffed peppers, but no leftover salsa. We had leftover tomatoes, cilantro, onion, and hot pepper, but no leftover salsa.

The kitchen was most definitely calling for more!

Mid-summer salsa paired with end-of-summer stuffed peppers.
Mid-summer salsa paired with end-of-summer stuffed peppers.

This week’s loot:

Zaklan Heritage Farm:

  • ~ 2lbs roma tomatoes: $2 per pound
  • 1 red onion: $2.50 per pound
  • 2 sweet peppers: $2
  • 2 bags mustard greens: $5
  • 1 head red lettuce: $3
  • 1 Macedonia hot pepper: $0.20

Ripple Creek Farm:

  • 1 bunch cilantro: $2
  • 2 Georgian Fire garlic bulbs: $3.50
  • 1 zucchini: $2.50
  • 1 delicata squash: $3.50

Bose and Sons Family Farm:

  • 2 corn: $1

Nutrigreens:

  • 1 bag microgreens: $5
  • 1 bag green beans: $2

Jam Shack Preservery

  • 1 jar pear and pineapple ginger jam: $5

Total spent was $41.40. We had 90 cents to spend from the previous week, leaving us in the red for 50 cents.

You may have noticed I don’t have exact dollar amounts for the produce acquired at Zaklan Heritage Farms; I admittedly got excited, and distracted, by the Macedonia hot pepper, which I had never seen before!

Loot of the week
Loot of the week

Other market-lovely meals of the week included paella that featured the green beans, onion, garlic, and peppers from the market; weekend frittatas that also used peppers, zucchini, and onion; and a whole thwack of lunch and dinner salads.

My husband and son drooled happily over their morning (and snack) toasts thick with the pineapple and pear with ginger jam from Jam Shack Preservery.

We had hoped to get a loaf of chocolate bread from A Bread Affair, but sadly it wasn’t on the shelves due to quality control. It will again be on the list for this week with fingers crossed.

The expenditure wasn’t all summer, though. With a few of our definites for the week dashed, we had some unexpected money to spend to fill up the budget. On a whim, I grabbed this delicata squash off the Ripple Creek Eco Farm table; I have no idea what to do with it.

What oh what to do with a delicata squash???
What oh what to do with a delicata squash???

Please help – I am looking for any and all suggestions! With the dwindling days of the summer market, just one more left to go (don’t forget, the winter market starts November 5 in Uptown New West), any items you’ll be missing?

The complete series. 

Farmers Market Challenge: Week 12

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Ask and you shall receive.

Two weeks ago there were at least two, possibly three market vendors displaying large, beautifully green and white fennel bulbs, this week, there were none. I was about to settle into panic mode, I was frantically stalking table after table looking for the feathery fronds.

I did NOT want to veer from this week’s plan.

With desperation in my voice, I asked Noella Oss of Ossome Acres if she had any, knowing full well there were none on her tables.

A winking smile spread across her face.

“We have one, but it’s old, from last week,” she said.

She opened up a plastic bin from behind the tent and pulled out a giant bulb. The fronds weren’t the luscious green of the week before, rather a light green, bordering on brown in spots. But the white bulb was large and thick and that’s exactly what I needed.

I told her my plans.

She told me the bulb would suit them perfectly.

Even better at the week-old, discounted price she gave!

And with that, the first cioppino of the season was born.

Ingredients
Ingredients

For cioppino, I usually use the Bon Appetit recipe as it has never steered me wrong. But this time I got a little adventurous and veered from the word-for-word recipe. While I kept to the base, I changed things up a bit to make it more market-fresh.

Because cioppino is usually a cold-weather meal, the veggie content has never been market-fresh. It’s always been canned tomatoes, shipped in fennel, onions, and seafood too. But with Saturday’s forecast calling for heavy rain, I thought it a perfect opportunity to experiment with my cioppino.

Instead of canned tomatoes, I used fresh roma tomatoes that I crushed in the blender; my onion, garlic and fennel were also fresh and local. The major seafood component, pacific cod, was acquired from Ron “the fish guy” at Wild Westcoast Seafoods.

In recipes past, I’ve used halibut for the white fish, but halibut is crazy expensive right now. Ron steered us towards the pacific cod (“chunkies”) that is similar to halibut, albeit a bit chewier, and at a fraction of the cost.

Technically the crusty bread wasn’t acquired at the market, but we did pick the loaf up from Bread Affair at Granville Island, which also has a booth at the market, so it, too, had a market connection.

Honestly, I don’t know if the taste was any better, but I do know it wasn’t worse. I love my cioppino. I’ve loved it ever since my first recollection of it when in San Francisco years ago, and this batch did not disappoint. Every slurp was a savoury adventure of glorious goodness.

Another market score!

Cioppino
Cioppino

This week’s loot:

Wild Westcoast Seafoods:

  • Pacific cod: $8

Ossome Acres:

  • 6 German butter potatoes: $2.30
  • 1 bag of dragon-tongue beans: $2.10
  • 1 fennel: $2.25

Zaklan Heritage Farm:

  • 1 onion: $0.70
  • 4 sweet peppers: $4.65
  • 2 mustard greens: $5
  • 1 garlic bulb: $1.80
  • 4 roma tomatoes: $2.28

Harvest Direct Farms:

  • 5 ambrosia apples: $5

Muy Rico:

  • 1 container pico de gallo: $5

Total spent was $39.10, leaving 90 cents to spend on next week’s $40 budget.

Last week Aaron Oss encouraged me to take a chomp out of one of his purple and white dragon tongue beans. It was crisp, it was juicy, and by golly that colour tugged at my pretty little taste buds.

Beans
Beans

I had hoped to throw the beans into a salad, but got so bogged down with my first week of physics, I didn’t end up using them beyond mixing them into a stir fry and eating them raw with hummus. Both of which were fine, but I wanted to really showcase their uniqueness. So for this week, I tracked down a salad recipe that called for fingerling potatoes, which I switched out for German butter potatoes.

I baked the potatoes, made my own viniagrette, blanched the beans, which were supposed to change from their pretty spots to green, but in the end only partially changed, mixed it all together.

Wow!

Every bite was an explosion of succulent flavour. So tasty. So good. So going to be making again.

Dragon Tongue Salad (recipe from:
Dragon Tongue Salad Recipe

Can you guess what I’m making next week?

I’m on the hunt for tomatoes, onion, garlic, jalapeño, cilantro and salt. It’s something already offered at the market, but something I’m going to try my hand at making market-fresh, homemade.

What are you on the hunt for?

Farmers Market Challenge: Week Ten

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Last week I had my heart set on pierogies, I even started this post before the purchase, only to discover the Old Country Pierogi stall was nowhere to be found.

This week, the pierogi table was back and the flavours were aplenty.

fmpierogies
So many flavours, so hard to choose.

I’ve been doing this challenge for 10 weeks, and have become a face known to several of the vendors – mostly of the veggie ilk. I love my veg! But farmers’ markets aren’t just produce. There’s meats, baked goods, prepared foods, beverages, even high-end crafts.

It’s those vendors that have mostly eluded my attention.

It was time to go out of my comfort zone – pierogi style!

To be honest, pierogies aren’t that new to me. Coming from a family with a Russian background, pierogies and borscht were prominent features on the weekly menus. But as I grew older, and more health conscious, I started sneering more at the unhealthy components of those crescent-shaped dumplings than longing for their taste.

Can you blame me? My history of them involved smothering them in sour cream and butter!

But, after walking past the Old Country Pierogi table several times over the last few weeks, I started to wonder, are they really that unhealthy? Could I find a balance between their yummy goodness and my desires for being on the up and up with good nutrition?

I was determined to find out.

I had initially wanted a more risqué flavour, like the spinach and feta, but with a four-year-old in mind, we ended up with the potato and cheese. We boiled and baked them instead of sautéing in a vat of oil. The first two bites I took were as is, no topping.

They were dry.

Too dry.

And so, with a salivating mouth, and no other options coming to mind, melted butter was poured on top.

D’oh.

In hindsight, a dollop of salsa, or balsamic vinegar, or whipped avocado would have been great healthy toppings.

The $9 bag contained 12 HUGE pierogies. Did I mention they were huge? They were huge! I thought I would have five; I was full by the last bite of the fourth. My son had two, exclaiming their yumminess with every bite, and my husband had six.

Besides the butter, they were a hit.

This week’s loot:

Old Country Pierogi:

  • 12 cheese and potato pierogies: $9

Zaklan Heritage Farm:

  • 1 head of lettuce: $3
  • 1 bunch dandelion stems: $3
  • 1 garlic bulb: $1.70
  • 1 bunch cilantro: $2
  • 4 roma tomatoes: $2.50

Ripple Creek Organics:

  • 2 cucumbers: $2.50

Harvest Direct Farms:

  • 4 jumbo Jonagold apples: $5

Fresh Quality Produce:

  • 1 zucchini: $1
  • 2 corn: $1

Bread Affair:

  • 1 baguette: $4

Muy Rico:

  • 1 pico de gallo: $5

Total spent was $39.70, leaving 30 cents extra for next week.

Bruschetta made from this week’s market tomatoes, garlic, and baguette.
Bruschetta made from this week’s market tomatoes, garlic, and baguette.

Also new to us this week was the discovery of dandelion greens.

As soon as I saw the dandelion greens mixed in with the mustard greens under the Zaklan tent, I was intrigued. (Odd factoid about me, I am one of the few in this world that love dandelions as a flower; they’re the only flowers I don’t kill!) Owner Gemma McNeil suggested we mix them with an anchovie-based dressing, but I’m not one for caesar salads, so I mixed them with the other greens and drizzled lemon on top.

The taste was strong and bitter. I tried them again the next day with an apple-cider, oil-based vinegar dressing that was much more effective in tempering the bitter. But overall, my husband’s assessment was perfect: they’re nowhere near as good as mustard greens.

You win some, you lose some.

The challenges series. 

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Land Acknowledgement

Our market is grateful to operate on the unceded land of the Qayqayt, Kwikwetlem, and other Halkomelem speaking Peoples. We acknowledge that colonialism has made invisible their histories and connections to the land. We acknowledge the incredible gift this land is to our market and BC Agriculture. We commit to the ongoing work of decolonization and allyship.