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Weekly Market Notes Library

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Weekly Market Notes for August 21, 2014

We're open every Thursday, rain or shine, from 3 to 7 pm. Don't let a shower or two keep you indoors, you've still got to eat (and so do the farmers)!

Hello Market Friends:

Lots to tell, where to start? Maybe it would be polite to tell you about our guests first:

We get many more requests to participate in the market than we can accommodate on a regular basis, so we've decided to invite some people to come as 'visiting vendors', for a market each. We hope you'll enjoy learning about the interesting things they're making and growing.

This week, Diana Hsu of Pablo the Dog will be attending with food for dog pals: "We believe that our dogs deserve to be fed real food without the addition of chemicals and preservatives. Our MuttBalls are handmade with local ingredients and have been certified by a canine nutritionist as fully balanced meals for your dog. One MuttBall a day is so much better than no MuttBalls at all."

The very popular Ghostbuskers will be serenading us again and at 6:30 there will be a special treat in the park: Scottish Country Dancing, for one and all! Come and try it, the dancers have invited everybody and promise to make it easy for you.

Summer holidays aren't over yet, but soon a lot of our youngest customers will be back at school. Our friends at FoodShare have produced some nice activities for kids at markets, so for the next couple of weeks we're inviting all kids to stop by our market info. table along the lower path and try them out.

Vendor Notes:

From Jessie Sosnicki: "Well, good news and bad news this week. Bad news is that blight has hit the tomato patch. Those poor tomatoes have taken a beating this summer. Cool, wet weather, then bursts of humidity. Therefore no bulk Roma orders for sauce. We will go through the patch week by week and salvage what we can and we'll bring as many cases as we can. Won't be tons. I expect 2 weeks (probably less) to pull off viable tomatoes. The heirlooms under glass are holding their own, so we should have those guys for a while...but those blight spores will find them too I'm afraid. It always hurts when this happens when you figure the investment and the fact we put them on bio mulch with drip irrigation (which was not used once due to lots of rain) And there are OODLES of ripening huge Roma's out there that will have to be composted....BUT as organic farmers we do NOT bank on one particular crop, so there is no time to whine. It just isn't a tomato year, and not much of a pepper year either.

THE GOOD NEWS: Sweet Corn is up and going this week!! Late, but worth the wait! Crop looks nice. Red Potatoes are coming! Carrots and beets of all sorts and colours are thriving and doing awesome. Kales, Chards, Onions, Cabbage too! And a look to the future, we are making an effort to grow fall Cauliflowers and a huge patch of Broccoli. Brussel Sprouts, cooking Onion crops are looking glorious. We had our annual organic inspection/audit this past week, with a new inspector, very thorough and it went very well. Very proud to have been certified organic for a decade now! :)))

See everyone at market, with a great spread of veggies regardless of this sucky summer weather!!" Jess, Ben & Sadie.

Some farmers will tell you that you just can't grow corn organically. Thank the Sosnickis for proving them wrong! Sometimes you might find a little 'buddy' known as a corn worm in the very tip of a cob. Don't freak out; be glad that your food is non-toxic!

With the results of previously suppressed studies showing serious health effects on rats from both genetically modified feed and the residues of Roundup (the herbicide tolerated by GM crops), as well as all the information linking neonicotinoids (used to treat conventional corn seeds before planting) to bee die-offs, it is more important than ever to show your support for organic farming. Here's some information from the Canadian Biotechnology Action Network (CBAN) on corn:

To avoid buying genetically modified sweet corn this year, buy organic sweet corn or ask your farmer and grocery store. Last year, CBAN tested samples of fresh sweet corn from across Canada and found GM sweet corn in grocery stores, roadside stands and farmers markets. Anywhere that you can buy sweet corn, you need to ask about GM. We have reports of lower GM sweet corn plantings this year as a direct result of you asking farmers and writing to grocery stores! Your consumer actions are very influential.

To learn more, check out the new resource “GM Sweet Corn in Canada: Information for Action” 2014, at http://www.cban.ca/content/view/full/1939

Beautiful things are happening on the Tapioca Gourmet grill with market ingredients, including Waymac's gorgeous mushrooms on the savoury side, and luscious organic peaches on the sweet one. Their pancakes are crispy on the outside and loaded with good stuff on the inside, and gluten-free, too.

Knuckle Down Farm will have lots of beautiful red beets again, along with head lettuce, tender chard, fresh herbs including dill and cilantro, carrots and baby white turnips. We will also have green peppers, fennel and piles of beans for the first time this week! Jenny

Debbie Wiecha promises a beautiful load of ready-to-eat peaches, plus blackberries, elderberries, and a few raspberries. Don't wait, the season won't last....

We have a few vendors absent: Evelyn's Crackers will be back September 4th, Floralora Flowers and Urban Harvest return next week, and the Akiwenzies will not be down.

See you at the market!

Anne Freeman

P.S. A number of our vendors have been nominated for outstanding market setups in the Greenbelt's Local Bounty Vendor Display Contest. You can send more nominations by taking a photo of a great vendor display, writing a sentence about it and sending it to cbrown@greenbelt.ca. To vote, visit the Greenbelt Facebook page and 'like' photos. You could win a basket of goodies by participating, and the ten vendors whose photos get the most 'likes' by August 30th will win $300 each! Full details here: http://greenbeltfresh.ca/news/nominate-a-farmers-market-vendor-for-the-2014-local-bounty-vendor-display-contest

Vendors this week:

• Ali Harris (rotis and fritters, hemp pesto and seeds, beverages),
• Bees Universe (honey and bee products),
• Beretta Farms (organic and naturally raised meats),
• Best Baa (cheeses, yogurt, sheep's milk, ice cream),
• Brixton Grill (vegan barbeque and ice cream cookie bowls),
• Chocosol (coffee and chocolate, tortillas),
• Country Meadows (eggs, cheese, olives, oil),
• DeFloured (gluten-free baking),
• Dufferin Park Bakers (wood-fired oven breads, soups,and snacks),
• Earth and City (raw foods and smoothies)
• Everdale Farm (organic vegetables),
• Feast of Fields (organic berries and tender fruits),
• Field Sparrow (pastured meats),
• Forbes Wild Foods (dried mushrooms, nuts, syrup, preserves)
• Kind Organics (sprouts, kombuchas, teas, salad blends),
• Knuckle Down Farm (organic vegetables),
• Niagara Lavender Farm (organic fruits),
• Pine River Organic Farm (organic vegetables),
• Plan B (organic produce),
• Shared Harvest (organic vegetables, ferments),
• Sosnickis Organic Produce (organic vegetables),
• Spade & Spoon (jams, pickles, soups),
• Tapioca Gourmet (gluten-free tapioca pancakes with seasonal fillings),
• Ted Thorpe (veggies),
• VQA Wines (rotating roster of organic wineries, Tawse Winery this time),
• Waymac Farms (oyster and shiitake mushrooms),
• Ying Ying Soy (tofus and miso).

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