by Mario Bartel

The New West Farmers Market is idyllic, a refuge from the bright fluorescent lights and hurly burly of the grocery store. It’s a place to meet your neighbours, chat with the vendors, linger in the sunshine. So why has it suddenly become so stressful?

Now that school is in full swing, and the end-of-summer traffic has slowed the commute, squeezing in market day has proven to be a bit of a challenge. Doing the market shopping is a race against a tuckered five-year-old who has not yet developed time management skills, hunger pangs from the long day and a lack of adequate pre-planning because of, well, life.

To swing the odds in our favour, we try to simplify on market day. In our household, more often than not that means omelettes for dinner; crack a few eggs, fold in some cheese, green onions, mushrooms and basil and you’re good to go in minutes.

At least, that’s the theory.

It never quite works out that way.

Throw in chatting-with-the-neighbours time, a game or 12 of crossing the rock “bridges” in the ponds at Tipperary Park, a languid visit to the outhouse by our five-year-old (sorry to anyone he’s kept waiting; albeit he does tend to sing or keep a running commentary while he’s doing his business), the unpacking of the market haul along with any other sundry groceries acquired that day and easy-going market day inevitably descends into a race against bedtime.

This week we decided to fight fire with fire; we made our omelettes mostly from ingredients sourced from that day’s market haul. At least we wouldn’t have to pack everything away:

For the omelettes:

• 1 dozen free range eggs from pastured hens at Out West Ranches $6

• bunch of onions $3.50 from Ripple Creek

• Russian purple potatoes and German butter potatoes $9 from Ripple Creek (these didn’t show up in an omelette until the following week, after they’d been parboiled and then grilled)

• salad greens for the salad $4 from Zaklan

• Zucchini $2.20 from Zaklan (again, they didn’t make an omelette appearance until the following week)

• radishes for the salad $2 from Zaklan

• baguette $4 from A Bread Affair

• box of pears $5 from Harvest Direct

• box of apples $5 from Harvest Direct

Along with the market ingredients, our omelette also included basil from the community garden plot maintained by the New West Farmers Market, some prosciutto left over from another meal earlier in the week, cheddar and mozzarella cheeses and dehydrated tomatoes, part of last week’s market discoveries blog.

We all had our favourites.

For five straight days, the borrowed dehydrator hummed its white noise day and night. We made apple chips, peach chips, pear chips. There was zucchini, cherry tomatoes, raisins, kale chips, and even banana chips.

Everything we dehydrated, aside from the bananas, was from the bounty we got for $40 at last week’s market, or stuff we still had in the crisper from the previous market.

The purpose of this experiment was to build up a healthy snack section in the pantry for both my son and I; my husband was somewhat leery of it all… I’m working on him 😉

It was fascinating to watch. The apples shrivelling, the grapes caramelizing, the intensely sweet smell of the tomatoes seeping through the centre opening. My son loved the opportunities of tasting to see if the process was complete. Not so secretly, I did too.

When all was said and done, we had 10 glass jars of dehydrated goods, and if we’re being honest, we probably would have actually had two more jars without the continuous “completion” checks.

My favourite was the zucchini. I did two batches: one plain, and another with a little bit of salt and a lot of pepper – those were the best. They came out super crispy, like an actual chip, and had a bit of a peppery nip to them.

My son loved the peaches and bananas. Every time he saw the jars, he was opening them for another slice. These are MY favourites, he repeatedly told me. He chastised me for only doing a small batch of pears. And he kept pulling out different fruits and vegetables from the fridge, asking if they could be next.

I did three different types of apples: gala; macintosh; and sunrise. Interestingly, the macintosh, which were my least favourite fresh, were the ones that came out with the most intense flavour throughout, as well as overall crispness. The sunrise were chewier, and had the least amount of flavour, while the gala’s flavour popped more at the end with the skin, then throughout.

The grapes took the longest. They were small grapes, so I didn’t cut them in half, but i’m wondering had I cut them in half, would they have taken less than two full days to complete? When I pulled them off the tray, there was a stickiness all around. I wondered if all the sweetness was drawn out, but no, when I popped one in my mouth, it had a burst of sweet with the first cut of my teeth. I don’t think I’ve ever had that with any store-bought raisins!

The tomatoes came out looking perfectly sun-dried. I liked them as was, but still, I took the vendor at Ripple Creek’s suggestion and put them in the freezer. Once frozen, I took one out, and holy moly, the flavour! I don’t know if I would call it candy like, but I did keep sticking my hand in going back for more – so addictive!

I was leery to try kale. I’ve had kale chips before, and yes I did enjoy them, but I found they were a lot more work than they were worth. However, Courtney – a dehydrating guru – at Zaklan Heritage Farms convinced me to give them a second chance. She guided me to a recipe that included tahini and nutritional yeast, both of which I had on hand. She said once you had those, you wouldn’t be able to wait to make another batch. It was the last thing we dehydrated, and maybe that’s just because I wasn’t overly inspired. I whipped up the glaze, stuck the kale in the machine, and let her roll.

It smelled.

Like, really smelled.

I was worried.

My husband said no way was he trying those.

Even my son turned his nose up.

When they were done, I had a bite; I still wasn’t sure – it wasn’t the same as the balsamic kale chips I’d made previously. Yes, the crispness was perfect, but the flavour, I just didn’t know.

Two days later I had another bite. I wasn’t expecting much. I’d pretty much given up on these guys. But then, w’oh! They were good. No wait, they were great!

Aged! Yep, total snobby kale eater here 🙂

Market Loot

Zaklan Heritage Farm

• 1 bunch kale $3
• 1 bunch mustard greens $3
• 1 bag mixed greens $4

Ripple Creek Organic Farm

• 1 pint red cherry tomatoes $5
• 1 pint orange sunrise tomatoes $5

Greendale Herb and Vine

• 1 pint green grapes $4

Harvest Direct Farms

• 1 basket macintosh apples $5
• 1 basket gala apples $5
• 1 basket sunrise apples $5

Nature Village Farms

• 1 zucchini $1.50

Total spent $40.50

Overall, it was a lot of work. We got a good amount of snacks, but for all the work it was, I wish we had maybe had double the supply. We’re already running out.

That said, I now understand the jacked up prices on apple chips in stores!

If you were to Pinterest birthday party snacks, you will find reams of posts featuring Rice Krispie squares, cookies, chocolate-covered anything, chips, pretzels, greasy snacks galore. And I get it. Birthdays are all about debauchery.

BUT…

Do they have to be 100 per cent debauched?

Nah.

Last week we celebrated my son’s fifth birthday with a superhero theme. And you know superheroes – Superman, Batman, Spiderman, Ironman, even Flash – they all need super fuel.

Word has it, they love their fruits and veggies 😉

Our fuel-up station was 100% market fresh. The tomatoes were a mixture from both Greendale Herb and Vine and Ripple Creek Organic Farm. The super vision carrots (extra super because of the rainbowness) were from Zaklan Heritage Farm. And the energizing apple slices were from Harvest Direct Farms.

Yes, we had a super fantastic, super hero cake that a friend made, but we also had our health too. And that made this mama feel superhero fantastic!

This Week’s Loot

Greendale Herb and Vine

• 1 basket mixed cherry tomatoes $5

Ripple Creek Organic Farm

• 1 basket sunrise cherry tomatoes $5

Ossome Acres

• 1 bunch green onions $2
• 1 bunch collard greens $3
• Zaklan Heritage Farm:
• 2 mixed bags of salad greens $9
• 1 head purple lettuce $2
• 1 bunch mustard greens $3
• 1 bunch rainbow carrots $3

Harvest Direct Farms

• 1 basket apples $5

Fresh Quality Produce

• 1 bag English snap peas $3

Total spent: $40

How many parents out there were feeling frantic about back to school this week? Or was it just me?

I’ve been making my son’s snacks and lunches for four years, but suddenly now that he’s in kindergarten I felt the game has changed. He needed brain food. He needed energy food. As do I, now that I’m also back at UBC, in the dietetics program, with a super full course load, and three of my days starting at 8 a.m.!!!

Can the Farmer’s Market help?

Right now, we’ve got a lot of fruits and veggies on display. Carrots, tomatoes and snap peas are a no brainer for fresh veggies mid-afternoon. Fresh fruits are always a go-to for both the boy and I. But we’re not always going to have this abundance of freshness. In fact, with the leaves already falling in spots of New West, our days for summer fruits are fast dwindling.

One friend suggested borrowing her dehydrator for quick pick-me-up snacks well into the winter months.

Fermenting carrots, radishes, and onions might also be an option for added flavour and health snacks.

Eggs can be used in healthified baked goods that can be frozen for extended access. They can also be boiled and packed for a hearty snack or lunch.

My plan for next week is to create as many snack foods as possible with my market fare. How about you? What are you doing to amp up lunches and snacks?

Originally published on local blog Tenth to the Fraser, The Farmers Market Challenge, written by Katie Bartel (and the odd guest star) seeks to challenge the notice that you can’t get hardly anything for $40 at the farmers market. Each market, Katie explores what’s the best deal, and discovers food she’s never heard of. 

Remember when my child was given the budget a few weeks ago, and remember how he had absolutely no interest in purchasing mustard greens? None. Well folks, last week I was prepared for payback.

Yes, I am that parent 😉

I saw Zaklan Heritage Farm had a full supply of mustard greens, as well as several other greens. Ossome Acres, Ripple Creek, and Nature Village Farms also had a wide variety of salad greens to choose from. Hmmm, I thought. Why not fill the bag full of greens. Not just mustards, but purple and green and spiky lettuces and kales. That’ll show the boy. We’ll have greens every day, and not just in salads, I thought. We’ll cook them, have them as side dishes, combine them into the main courses.

It will be a greens-o-ganza.

That was the plan.

I loaded up on greens. Nearly half the budget went to greens.

But the thing is, this past week, we had several social engagements; we barely ate at home. As such, those greens sat and sat and sat. Some of them fared quite well (the spiky purple lettuce is a champ for durability) but others like the arugula and kale wilted and became limp by Monday.

What to do? What to do?

Heyyyy, wait a second.

About a month ago, the market featured Love Food Hate Waste, an organization with the sole purpose of reducing food waste in Metro Vancouver. I remember grabbing a few recipe cards, and after rifling through a stack of papers, I found the one I wanted:

Fridge Harvest Stew.

Although I didn’t follow this recipe to a tee, I did use up all the wilted greens, as well as leftover chicken that had been in the fridge for several days, shrivelling tomatoes, a wrinkling zucchini, an onion that I purchased two weeks ago, and aged sweet peppers. I didn’t have cannelloni beans, but did have chickpeas and black beans.

Based on the size of the pot, I figure I’ve got at least five freezable lunches in there.

I loved the concept of this meal. It helped clean out my fridge of foods that likely would have been composted otherwise. I do not eat raw tomatoes or peppers once they start wrinkling, nor wilted greens. But when cooked, none of that matters. It’s no longer a texture issue, it’s just pure taste.

According to Love Food Hate Waste, a 2014 study showed that in Metro Vancouver we are wasting over 100,000 tonnes of avoidable food a year – things that could still be eaten with a little creativity. Broken down further, that’s the equivalent of 16,000 heads of lettuce, 40,000 tomatoes, 80,000 potatoes, 32,000 loaves of bread, 55,000 apples, 70,000 cups of milk, and 30,000 eggs – In. A. Day.

That’s huge.

And it’s costing households approximately $700 a year.

I don’t have that kind of money to spare.

It annoys me to no end when I have to toss aged foods from my crisper and fridge shelves.

This recipe, and hopefully others on lovefoodhatewaste.ca, has helped breathed new creativity in using up those so-called wasted foods.

Market Loot

Zaklan Heritage Farms

• mini head of lettuce $1
• 1 head spiky purple salanova $2.50
• 1 bunch mizuna mustard greens $3
• 1 bunch radishes $2.50

Ripple Creek Farms

• 1 bag arugula $4
• 2 pounds German butter potatoes $4.50
• 2 tri-coloured peppers $1.75

Ossome Acres

• 1 bunch ursula kale $3
• 1 garlic $1.20

Mandair Farms

• 1 bunch fall-coloured dahlias $5

Harvest Direct Farms

• 1 basket plums $5
• 1 basket sunrise apples $5

Fresh Quality Produce

• 1 large bag English snap peas $1.55

Total spent: $40

There are a couple things to note here.

The English snap peas were my son’s choice. After giving him full reign a few weeks ago, he’s taken a keen interest in the shopping side of things at the market. It’s no longer just about running the bridges and getting his face painted, he wants to be able to choose at least one item of the shop. This week it was the snap peas – he LOVES snap peas!

Also noteworthy, the apples.

For one of our dinner excursions, I was charged with making dessert. With a basket of in-season apples, there was only one thing to make: Apfelkuchen!

Yum. Yum.

Originally published on local blog Tenth to the Fraser, The Farmers Market Challenge, written by Katie Bartel (and the odd guest star) seeks to challenge the notice that you can’t get hardly anything for $40 at the farmers market. Each market, Katie explores what’s the best deal, and discovers food she’s never heard of. 

When you’re given a $20 pack of chicken tenders, there’s really only one thing to do: build the budget around that chicken.

A few weeks ago, I did a comparison of chicken breasts, comparing Rockweld Farms to that of a supermarket. The results, although not bad, were not resounding. We thought Rockweld’s chicken certainly had more flavour, but was drier than the supermarket’s bird. We acknowledged the dryness was likely an error in our cooking approach given that chain chicken is so often loaded with water and other such fillers, whereas Rockweld’s chicken is more au naturel.

Still, Aaron at Rockweld Farms did not want our taste buds to have that memory.

He called me into his truck. We chatted about his chicken. He told me that he, himself, does a tender check of each bird he cuts to ensure its quality. He said his chicken requires minimal grilling time, just a couple minutes for each side. Comparatively the chicken we get from the grocery store is typically on the grill for 8-9 minutes.

Aaron handed me a pack of his “fail-proof” chicken tenders, a part of the bird, he said, you can’t go wrong with. He would not take payment.

“Tell me what you think after trying these,” he said.

With chicken in hand, I had a plan.

This week was all about fajitas!

Market Loot

Rockweld Farms

• Package of 11 chicken tenders -$20.60

Zaklan Heritage Farms

• 1 head spiky purple salanova $2.50
• 6 long red tomatoes $3.25
• 1 pound tomatillos $4.35
• 1 bunch cilantro $2
• 1 bunch radishes $2.50

Ripple Creek Farms

• 1 cucumber $1.50
• 1 bunch (of 2) giant white onions $3.50

Ossome Acres

• 1 garlic bulb $2

Mandair Farms

• 1 pint of slightly spicy peppers $3
• Harvest Direct Farms
• 1 basket peaches (5) $5

Fresh Quality Produce

• 4 ears corn $3

Steel and Oak

• 1 bomber smoked hefeweizen  beer $7

Total spent: $39.60

It was a meal that maybe would have been suited more to Cinco de Mayo than a random Saturday, but then, we wouldn’t have had fresh tomatillos or local corn. And that, just would not do.

These fajitas were bursting with flavour.

My husband made salsa verdé, roasting and chopping the tomatillos, peppers, onion, tomato and garlic , and then combining with cilantro, lime juice and salt. The only non-market ingredients were the lime juice and salt.

I wasn’t expecting the heat that came off the peppers. My eyes weren’t quite watering like they were when I took a bite of the cherry red pepper offered by Jasbir at Mandair Farms, but my taste buds were certainly on alert. (Note: I am somewhat of a wimp when it comes to fiery spice.) And yet, without that added heat, I don’t think the salsa verdé would have been as good. All the ingredients were perfectly complimentary. The flavours, the freshness, the texture, the combination of colours, they were so beautiful, so Mexican.

Housed in a corn tortilla, we piled in caramelized onion and peppers, strips of chicken tenders, cheese, and the homemade salsa verdé. That combination of market-fresh ingredients, from the tomatillos right down to the chicken, was a taste explosion in my mouth. On the side, we had barbecued corn, and a salad of salanova greens, along with a pint of Steel and Oak smoked hefeweizen.

It was light. It was refreshing. It was summer perfect.

Beyond the fajitas, though, how did the chicken fare on its own? Did we cook it properly this time? Or would it again be flavourful, but dry?

Like the breast we purchased weeks ago, the chicken tenders were grilled as well, but at a much more reduced time. The results were significant.

They were tender and moist, and they presented intense flavour. There was no dryness whatsoever. On a bed of salad, they added to the overall taste. They weren’t just an additional, meaty texture. They had substance. I felt my stomach filling faster with less than I usually do with store-bought chicken breasts. They demonstrated, with great panache, that they belonged – on salad, in fajitas, on their own.

My son, who sometimes balks at that amount of chicken we eat, asked for a second helping. With chicken, that rarely happens.

The package had a total of 11 meaty sized tenders, giving us one full meal for three, plus three adult lunches, and a kid’s meal.

At $20, for us, it is still a splurge. Seeing that $20 tag, if I had to pay for it, I would have had to think real hard about whether it was a necessity or a treat. I would have thought of all the other things I could get, and how fuller my bag would be, without the cost of the chicken cutting into my budget.

As a single-income family, we don’t have the luxury to be able to splurge weekly on locally farmed chicken no matter how enjoyable it is. But now knowing Aaron, learning more about his farm and the practices at his farm, seeing his passion for his chicken, and, yes, experiencing that flavour too, it is a splurge I would be interested to indulge in again one day soon.

Originally published on local blog Tenth to the Fraser, The Farmers Market Challenge, written by Katie Bartel (and the odd guest star) seeks to challenge the notice that you can’t get hardly anything for $40 at the farmers market. Each market, Katie explores what’s the best deal, and discovers food she’s never heard of.