{Yesterday part one, today part two of the farmer’s market pictures.} The other week I brought my list with me to the farmer’s market. As you can see, strawberries (!) were the first item on the list and the very first thing we head for at the farmer’s market this time of year. We go for the strawberries first because they sell out so fast in the beginning of the year. They’ve been arriving at the Groundwork Organics booth about a half hour after opening. (9:30 for those locals wanting to know.) Our friends there are used to us checking for the strawberries right away and then swinging back by to see if they’ve arrived yet. I joked that Bracken had a sixth sense that told him if there were any berries at all in the vicinity and he had a feeling right when the strawberries arrived each week and pulled me over to them. (I joke, but if there are any berries to be found, he will certainly find them.)

Years ago I would hem and haw over buying asparagus. Could I justify spending that much for a small portion our family would eat up so quickly? Now I buy asparagus with no hesitations. Why? Because there’s only a small part of the year when it’s available, so I want to enjoy it while we can. (I learned recently that asparagus is a prebiotic food, which feeds our beneficial bacteria. The asparagus from Circle h Farm was excellent, by the way.) Jeff was craving some applesauce and I picked up a jar of SLO Farm‘s blackberry applesauce. Yum! We didn’t get any applesauce made last year, and I looked for it at the grocery store a few times over the winter, but there always seemed to be additives which surprised me. I was so was happy to find SLO Farm’s applesauce which had just apples and blackberries as the ingredients.

We love fermenting things around here and make sauerkraut regularly, but we eat it up so quickly that we can’t seem to keep up with making it fast enough these days. I get the kimchi from Grateful Harvest Farm on occasion, which helps fill in the gaps when we’ve run out of our sauerkraut, and it’s so good. (Though Bracken sticks with sauerkraut, the kimchi is too spicy for his liking.) We also love their black currant fruit rolls. Not only are they delicious, but I’ve been reading about the incredible health benefits of black currants lately. (Did I mention the wrapping is biodegradable? Awesome!)

Bracken brought his basket to market that day and he decided to spend his own money to buy himself a marigold for his garden from Fox Hollow Creek Nursery. And speaking of flowers, the kind people at Yep Yep Farms who sell edible flowers, gave him a nasturtium flower sample. Ours are quite a ways off from blooming in the garden, so he was pretty happy about that.

I start out with my list, but of course there are always other things I see that we come home with too. Like those fresh spring carrots from Sweet Leaf Organic Farm. Oh, how I love their carrots! So sweet and crunchy, they make the best snack. (Nothing like the tough carrots from the grocery store that we’ve been steaming as well as adding to our soups all winter.) Of course I come away with lots of greens too because we always need those. Greens for our salads, and greens to steam and to add to soups. I’ll be walking along and then ‘Look at that basil! It smells so good. We haven’t had fresh basil in so long, we must get some. Oh, and some hazelnuts from Honor Earth Farm would be great to make some more hazelnut coconut oil spread… And the zucchini from Lost Creek Farm is just what I need to make a batch of muffins this week since I ran out of all the shredded zucchini I froze from the garden.’ And before you know it, I’ve come away with quite a full bag of good food to nourish our family throughout the week. And our money went to supporting hardworking local farmers. That feels good.

P.S. The new Locally Grown Guide is out! I look forward to pouring over the pages each and every year and learning about new farms in the area. I’m excited to say that this blog is included in it this year! I’m so grateful to be listed among the pages!