Taking your Oregon Trail card on the road
Olivia Spitzer
The last few years have been tumultuous for all of us. For customers participating in food benefit programs, the recent road has gotten even bumpier.
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Grapevine Articles
Collection of featured articles from the weekly market newsletter, known as the Grapevine. Subscribe today and never miss a thing!
Road to Radiance
Olivia Spitzer
What do you get when you combine a popcorn popper, a lavender farm, a man on the move? This isn’t a riddle – it’s the road of twists and turns that lead Alex Newton to success with his business, Radiant Coffee Roasters.
Read MoreSeeing the Market as a Village
Olivia Spitzer
When raising children, you’ll often hear that “it takes a village.” The adage refers to two separate things as one: your children need more lessons than you alone can teach them, and you will need community that you can rely on. Today we are looking at how a local farmers market can be a part of that community for parents AND children, supplying lessons and connection, and becoming an important part of a family’s village.
Read MoreCooking for Community
Olivia Spitzer
Frerich is the woman behind Nouriche Broth. Her line of chicken bone broth products is simple, high quality, and intentionally made. With names like “Feel Better,” “Light My Fire” and “Nightcap,” it is easy for shoppers to imagine how these broths could be incorporated into their kitchen and their life.
Read MoreFrost's Final Days
Olivia Spitzer
March comes in like a lion and out like a lamb. It is a time of transition. Here we are, in the middle of March, and our weather seems to change every hour, much less every day. Pouring rain opens to sweet sunshine, which is in its turn wiped away by thick dark clouds. It can be hard to know what is coming next, or how to plan. Today, we’ll be focusing on a faithful tool of farmers around the world: frost dates.
Read MoreWinter's Fun One: The Onion
Olivia Spitzer
What vegetable is the MVP of your kitchen? For a lot of homes, that answer is an easy one: the omnipresent, ever versatile, hard-working onion.
Read MoreFamigila e Ravioli
Olivia Spitzer
This is a love story. It begins, like so many do, with a dinner beside the sea. Imagine, if you will, the waves, the soft light, the couple. Except in this story, our protagonists are not dining together. They’re not in the same room. He’s not actually dining at all.
Read MoreYour Local Chocolatier
Olivia Spitzer
With Valentine’s Day just around the corner, it feels like the whole world is suddenly thinking about chocolate. We all have our cheap chocolate favorites, but you cannot deny the glorious indulgence that is fine, quality chocolate - chocolate to enjoy with a glass of wine, or a sweet sunset, or a close friend at the end of a long day. Cloudforest’s chocolate is that second kind –the exquisite and nuanced kind.
Read MoreMore Market Voices
Olivia Spitzer
When it comes to bringing a farmers' market together, there are a lot of moving pieces. The market managers tend to be a visible element but there are so many more people involved, often behind the scenes.
Read MoreArgentinian Flavors Come to Hillsdale
Olivia Spitzer
Chimichurri is a traditional Argentinian sauce made from cilantro, parsley, garlic, oils, and chiles. The result is a tangy, savory green sauce that is ready for any dish. It can be used as a marinade, a topping, a salad dressing, or a stand-alone dip. Jessica Causey, the woman behind La Porteña describes chimichurri as an everything sauce – and it truly can be.
Read MoreGiving Back
Lacey Waldon
We are one of the few local farmers' markets that run year-round. While we remain a very "farmer forward" market focusing on farmers, ranchers, fisheries, bakers and other local food producers, we also welcome artisan craft vendors for the holidays as some of our seasonal produce vendors leave the market for the colder months.
Read MoreWinter is Coming
Olivia Spitzer
Stock Your Shelves is all about preparing for winter. This event gives the Hillsdale community a chance to buy in bulk and save, all while preparing for the leaner months ahead.
Read MorePerhaps Persimmons
Olivia Spitzer
What is orange, smooth, and crowned in leaves like a strawberry? The answer to this riddle is persimmon, one of nature’s unsung fall and winter fruits.What is orange, smooth, and crowned in leaves like a strawberry? The answer to this riddle is persimmon, one of nature’s unsung fall and winter fruits.
Read MoreIns and Outs of a CSA
Olivia Spitzer
If you are a farmers’ market regular, you’ve likely heard the term “CSA” before. Today we will be delving into what a CSA is, and how it benefits both shoppers and farmers alike.
Read MoreThe Bardo Between Science and Magic
Olivia Spitzer
“There’s a whole invisible world that you’re working with, that you’re trying not to have work against you. A lot of things can go wrong. There’s a lot of what feels like magic involved – things you never really know until you see the results.” This is not the tagline for the next best-selling sci-fi novel. This is daily life for Troy Plemmons, the farmer behind Harvest Moon Mushrooms.
Read MoreBecoming the Cookie Guy
Olivia Spitzer
Draw your mind back to the summer of 2020, when many pandemic lockdown measures were still in place. Neighbors and friends were slowly starting to gather outside, trying to take advantage of the better weather to break the shell of their isolation. If you were living in Oakland, California at the time, a sunny weekend might include a trip to Lake Merritt with a blanket, a book, or a buddy. Circling that lake you would have found Nathaniel Lown, pushing a small cart, peddling his mothers’ original recipe for homemade vegan oatmeal cookies.
Read MoreSpice Up Your Life
Olivia Spitzer
Salsa is both ubiquitous and versatile. It can be fresh or canned, red or green, sweet or spicy. But maybe you didn’t know that salsa is also ancient.
Read MoreThe Best of Both Worlds
Olivia Spitzer
In Oregon, late September and early October are our golden days of fall, and nowhere is that clearer than at the farmers’ market. The sun is still shinning, though the heat has dropped. The mornings are crisp, the evenings coming on sooner and sooner. At the farmers’ market, it is easy to see the way summer and fall blend into one another.
Read MoreFarewell
Eamon Molloy
Reflecting back on my years at the market, there are many funny moments. You need a good sense of humor to run a farmers’ market and the opportunity to laugh presents itself nearly every week.
Read MoreToken Talk
Olivia Spitzer
A common question we get at the info booth is, “why should I get tokens to shop the market? Don’t the vendors take cash and card?” Today we’re diving into tokens – when they’re needed, why you might consider using them, and how they are used.
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