Fresh food in Old Zionsville

Today’s the first weekend of the Upper Milford farmer’s market, which means there’s actually something within walking distance from my house other than greasy pizza. Not that there’s anything wrong with Vito’s (except their lack of vegan options), it’s just that I like to be able to walk down and get some nice, fresh vegetables from the farmers in my community.

It’s a very small farmer’s market in the parking lot of the municipal building (old Kings Highway elementary school), with only two regular vendors–one who sells fresh produce and another selling jams and baked goods. Both were there today. And of course I didn’t think of taking any pictures until after I already got back home.

I went to the produce guys first, and eyed the beautiful plants they were selling. While the idea of growing my own food sounds awesome, I bought some watermelon plants a few weeks ago from the Kutztown University biology club and I’ve already killed them. Even the basil I got from them is already looking limp. And trust me, I know I’m the common denominator in this equation; it’s not that their plants are prone to dying.

I swear, there were living plants in here a few weeks ago!

So I convinced myself not to buy any more plants. I was torn between getting some asparagus for grilling or rhubarb for strawberry-rhubarb pie, but the latter would require going to the grocery store for berries. I got some beautiful, tall purple-tipped asparagus for $3.

This asparagus is so tall, it won’t fit standing up in my fridge.

Then I went over to look at some homemade jams. There’s nothing better than homemade strawberry jam or apple butter. Since I didn’t get rhubarb at the first place, I decided to try something new and get strawberry rhubarb jam ($2.35) to eat on the bread I made a few weeks ago and stuck in the freezer.

I bet this would be even better on homemade English muffins.

I wish the farmers luck in their growing and selling season, and hope the market will grow this year! They’re open Saturdays 9-3 and Sunday 10-2, so make sure to stop on by sometime and support them.

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Kiwi berries!

The other day I was at work and noticed something new and different on our produce manager’s cart. I asked her what they were, and she told me they were kiwi berries and told me to try one. So I opened the package and picked one out, wondering how to eat this little thing… was I supposed to just pop it in my mouth? It looked like a little, fuzzless kiwi, and most people don’t eat the skins of kiwi.

But Mel told me to just eat the whole thing, so I bit into it and it looked just like a miniature kiwi… tasted like one, too. The berries were a little underripe, so it was tart like a kiwi, though once they ripen they become sweeter.

Mel then told me that she had ordered them on a whim, without asking our boss, and he was a little annoyed about this. So I decided I’d buy a package and took it upon myself to get other people to buy some too so that the boss couldn’t have anything to complain about. They weren’t hard to sell, because people saw something new and unusual in the produce case and were eager to try it out. In fact, when I went back to work today I wanted to buy some more but we were all sold out! Take that, Mr. Skeptic Boss Man.

I decided to look kiwi berries up online, since I had never heard of them before, and see what kind of nutritious value they had. The label on the package called them a “nutrient-dense superfruit,” so I wanted to find out just what they meant by that.

According to oregonlive.com,

“a 6-ounce portion contains significant amounts of 20 nutrients, including twice the vitamin E of an avocado, with only 60 percent of the calories. They have five times the vitamin C of an orange and more potassium than bananas. Kiwi berries are also high in fiber and rich in folic acid.”

Wow! If Mel decides to order more, I will definitely buy some to cut up and put on top of pancakes.

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