7 August 2011 Market Report

Well, this is going to be a short one. Why? Because I wasn’t at the market this past week. I passed off the duties to my fabulous assistant/intern Krysti. She did a great job, with few calls or texts to me for clarification.

She had a few more vendors than expected, which resulted in a more dense market than usual. I hope that next year this will be our norm, but it’s going to take a lot of work to attract the vendors. I think we can do it.

The morning was pretty rainy, which is a good way to get a dead market. However, the rain cleared up around 11am (I believe – I’ll have to double check later), and the vendors all agreed that we had a large influx of patrons after the rain.… Continue reading →

31 July 2011 Market Report

This was the first time I had enough volunteers who could stay all day long on hand to implement one of my single biggest goals for this season. Counting people.

This comes, in part, from my scientific training. Those of us who run the market can say “It seems busier than usual” or “It seems slower than usual”, but it’s based entirely on gut feeling. Which, to be frank, is going to be influenced by exactly what is going on at the moment you say that. I would not be surprised to find we had a day where at one point someone said, “It seems busy today” and a different point said, “It seems slow today”. Or two different people felt two different ways.

For example, I thought the market seemed about normal in attendance.… Continue reading →

24 July 2011 Market Report

Well, I missed Monday & Tuesday in a frenzy of baking, invitation discussion, and cleaning. However, I imagine Jen is still curious about the market. So, what happened last Sunday with PCM?

It rained. And rained. And rained some more. And then finally it stopped around 11:00 am, which was nice. Until 1:00 pm, when it went back to being oppressively hot. I hate the oppressively hot days, so I was thankful for the cool hours in between.

So, what does rain mean for our market? I don’t know what is “normal” for PCM, since this is my first year, and thus first rain day, but here’s what it meant on Sunday.

Mostly? It means business as usual. People still want food, even if it’s raining.… Continue reading →

BACON!

Okay, quickie post. I’m planning to write something up later too (after I make gluten-free cookies), but I had to share.

Today we had the first of the bacon from our hog. It was super tasty! I actually liked it better than what we normally have from Meadow Haven. This still had the delicious flavor of the pig, but was less salty.

Which, to be honest, probably means we need to eat it faster. Tragic?

We also had chocolate-blueberry semi-whole wheat pancakes. They sound better than they were. Next time, less whole wheat flour & more chocolate.… Continue reading →

Maybe a break in the heat.

I need to be testing recipes for the wedding. I haven’t done any testing since the last recipe I posted which was, “oh, like a million years ago.”:http://www.metacookbook.com/archives/244-Cherry-Almond-Butter-Cookies.html

I also have about a bazillion pounds of zucchini in my fridge. Basically, I made the mistake of buying zucchini at a market days before my CSA showed up with mostly zucchini in it. I think, given all the zucchini, I want to make a few loves of zucchini bread.

However, like much of the country, we’re in the midst of an impressive heat wave. The thought of turning on the oven makes me die a little on the inside. Where I keep all my water.

All of that said, we seem to have a break in the heat today.… Continue reading →