This Week at Smart Markets Springfield Farmers' Market

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Uncle Fred Jackson and his Smoke Shack specialties have returned, and they are special. Even my granddaughter was cheering at the news, and she knows good BBQ. The pulled pork is excellent on a sandwich bun, but we also have interesting recipes for you if you want to buy a pound of pork to make a quick batch of Summer Brunswick Stew or an even quicker pulled chicken and summer veggie pasta salad with smokey undertones. We even have a recipe for a pulled chicken pizza. These recipes will hopefully fire up your own creative juices. Let us know what you come up with, and we will pass the recipes along.

I would also like to introduce you to Maria, who comes to sell for Crazy Farm. While I have met several members of the family of brothers who have started their own farm just this year, I haven’t yet met one who seemed at all crazy. There must be a story behind that name, though. They are learning as they grow what to plant and when to pick, and I have offered marketing and consumer-preference advice in response to their questions.

They are sending lovely produce, and if you would like to see a particular vegetable or new variety of something they are already growing, share your wishes with Maria or your market manager. We will pass the word along. They have a great selection of heirloom tomatoes at very reasonable prices, and they showed me last week how they are carefully separating them in sectional boxes to bring them to market in good shape. Such pride in their product and devotion to their customers will serve them and you well.

Remember to check our Facebook page for menus of individual vendors. Tanya of Soul Cakes by Tanya and Denise Hicks of Postmodern Foods usually get their menus to us after I have written this update, but we post them as soon as we get them on Facebook. Kylie’s Pop Shop will not be with us this week. She is providing individual cake pops for the guests at a wedding this Saturday. We wish her well and will look forward to her next new idea.

Celeste of Fabbioli Winery will not be with us even though it is her regular rotation week; she is on vacation. But we are hoping to bring in a new winery that will be rotating with her in the near future so you will have wine every week at this market.

Jacob Horst will have Maple Bacon ice cream this week and all of his other delightful ice cream flavors, including the new organic flavors. He will also have chicken, beef, pork, and veal, all raised by hand on his farm and all permitted to roam free without the “benefit” of hormones, antibiotics, or any other junk that the animals don’t need. Windmill Meadows is also your stop for minimally processed milk, yogurt, cheese, and those great country eggs.

See you at the market!

From the Market Master

What a week we all experienced last week; the heat at the markets was as bad as most of us can remember. This week we are all looking forward to a little break and some rain for the farmers.

It doesn’t take many days of mid-90s temperatures to cause some withering in the fields. We are lucky at our Reston market to have farmers coming from the north, south, and west, as the weather in all those places can be very different on the same day. When it was raining here every day for two weeks, Tyson Farms in West Virginia and our sustainable farmers west of us in Virginia were not getting nearly so much rain. At the same time, Ignacio was losing newly planted crops to heavy rains that washed the seedlings away.

One thunderstorm with just two minutes of hail can wipe out a crop; tree fruits are especially vulnerable. But a week like last week can burn up a field in no time. We look at the weather as a matter of convenience; our farmers depend on it for their livelihoods. While we may lose a day at the pool, they could lose thousands of dollars and lots of invested time and labor. It’s important to think about what they go through to bring food to our tables.

For now they are all bringing their best and brightest crops to market, and the market really is abundant with the bounty of the good earth. We enjoyed the tomatoes, corn, and squash all weekend at my house, and I have a recipe for you today for Summer Bread Salad that is simple, fast, and really does taste like summer. Feel free to add and subtract as you wish—take out the beans, add corn. Use whatever herbs you have on hand and whatever tomatoes you picked out this week. Work color into the mix with a variety of tomatoes and peppers. Have your way with this recipe, and it will still reward your efforts.

Which reminds me of a couple more tips. I keep seeing a suggestion for cutting the kernels off an ear of raw corn that involves putting the ear of corn into a bowl and slicing straight into the bowl. That’s a pain in the neck! If the idea is to reduce the number of kernels that go flying off the counter and across the floor, then the easiest thing to do is cut the ear in half, which can be done with a sharp knife pushed into an ear that is lying on your cutting board. Wiggle the knife back and forth until you can just break the ear in half. Watch this video to see what I mean. A farmer taught me that, and I have used the technique ever since. You do not really have to cut all the way through the ear, which can be tricky.

Another technique tip for you: When you are using just-picked tomatoes from the market or your garden, they will peel very easily; the skins will almost slide off once you start on a section. Even if you are peeling as many as 10 tomatoes, hand-peeling them with a sharp paring knife is still faster than boiling a pot of water and dropping the tomatoes in for a minute and then “slipping off the skins.” This works as long as the tomatoes are fresh from the vine (a nearby vine, not one in California).