It’s my first Saturday alone without a Farmer’s Market to get to, and I’m focusing on completion of much neglected domestic chores. My husband Dan is on the tractor chiseling in the manure that was spread in the last few days on the Cassidy Road fields.
I’m already missing the meat-on-a-stick kabob guys (mainly because I haven’t had lunch yet). The food in City Hall Park was really good this year, even after my tummy went funny and became wheat-intolerant. Which is literally and figuratively, a real pain, I don’t mind saying.
We were offered an opportunity to do a one-day-a month winter farmers’ market in Montpelier, but declined due to lack of product; we couldn’t get in to the processors with another beef until January, and I didn’t think I could make the trip worthwhile selling only cheese and country-style pork ribs. No one, it seems, wants country-style pork ribs. It is financially tempting to extend the retail-selling season for a few more months, but it takes planning ahead. Maybe next year.
“Eating Well” magazine called Montpelier’s market one of the best in the country (this summer), so I am more than curious to find out what makes it such a pinnacle of farmer-to-consumer commerce. I know that they have some well-known heavy-hitters among their regular vendors: Lazy Lady Farm goat cheese (Westfield), Red Hen Baking Company breads (Duxbury), and Pete’s Greens (Craftsbury).
Besides greens, Pete’s sells CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) shares. Each week participants get an assortment of whatever is harvested from the farm. The thing that makes him so interesting to me is that in addition to vegetables, shareholders receive eggs, chicken, lamb sausage, breads, tofu, apple pies, yogurt, cream, dried beans, cider, flour, sunflower oil, and prepared food like sauerkraut and soup starters made in their own commercial kitchen. If you want to eat local food, they’ve pretty much got all your bases covered. Did I mention they also provide recipes? Holy Cow, they work hard marketing that farm!
Fellow Burlington farmers’ market vendor, Willow Smart of Willow Hill Farm (Milton) will be joining about 40 purveyors of local goods in Montpelier this winter, selling her lamb and cheese. The Capital City Winter Farmers’ Market starts December 1st, Saturday from (10-2), at the Vermont College Gymnasium.
There are seven other Vermont towns with winter markets, or just Christmas and/or Thanksgiving markets – probably more, since support of local farmers is increasing in popularity. Our Burlington farmers’ market does not have a winter schedule and indoor locale, at least not yet.
Now, you’d think that if the price that dairy farmers are receiving for commodity milk was up, we wouldn’t be thinking of other commercial venues, or exploring what other farmers are doing to bring in additional cash. But I am, because modern dairying is a commodity industry that practically defines “reversal of fortune”. It’s always best, instead of putting all your eggs in one basket, to have that second basket of free-range, brown eggs equally full.
