Green Zebra Tomatos

This weekend marked the first ever Summer Tomato Farmers Market Boot Camp! A small group of people met up with me at the farmers market for a tour and lessons on how to tackle shopping when overwhelmed with awesomeness.

First Farmers Market Boot Camp

I had such a good time with the class that I scheduled another one in two weeks, and I expect to be doing more throughout the summer. If you’re in San Francisco for one of them I’d love to meet you.

Dirty Girl Strawberries

We went a little nuts today, I’ll admit. I got so excited explaining to the group how good everything is I bought way more stuff than I normally do. I don’t regret a bit of it, and I’ll certainly eat well this week, but if you compare today’s shopping list (below) with previous weeks you’ll see what I mean. It was amazing.

Tokyo Turnips

SF has officially migrated to summer. The stone fruits (those with pits like cherries, plums, peaches, etc.) are out of control delicious right now. At the sampling dishes we all had the same experience: 1) Gently choose fruit piece with tongs, 2) place fruit in mouth, 3) moment of silence, 4) “Oh my god. I have to buy those.” Today it was the yummy rosa pluots that had us all hypnotized.

Yummy Rosa Pluots

Fruit is always spectacular, but for my day-to-day cooking I’m most excited about all the fresh greens, vegetables and herbs.

Lemon Cucumbers

I’ve been making the best salads with radishes, turnips, carrots, cucumbers and other bits of deliciousness.

Summer Tomatoes

Today I even got some green zebra heirloom tomatoes (top) to add to the salad mix.

Salad Fixins

The shear volume of herbs is also incredible. Today we found not one, not two, but four different varietals of basil. There was sweet Italian basil, Thai basil, purple basil and lemon basil. Who knew?

Lemon Basil

I also found chervil at the market today, an herb I’ve read about but never tried (pics weren’t that great). Any serving suggests are welcome.

Purple Basil

Other summer vegetables are also starting to appear. For the past few weeks I haven’t been able to get enough summer squash. The yellow and green zephyr squash I’ve been getting are so good when cooked with eggs I sometimes mistake it for cheese. I know it sounds weird, but it’s something about the chewy texture and earthy, salty, sweet texture that puts the zucchini I grew up eating to shame. These days you might be lucky enough to find squash with their blossoms still attached.

Zucchini Flowers

I was excited to see yellow wax and green beans this week, they always look so inviting it’s almost impossible to resist digging your hand into the basket and grabbing some to take home.

Yellow and Green Beans

Oh yeah, and I discovered a variety of kale today I’d never heard of before. Anyone familiar with spigariello kale? I didn’t have room for it in my bag this week, but I’ll probably pick some up next time I see it.

Spigariello Kale

Every week I see more varieties of peppers, which makes me ecstatic. Peppers might be my favorite summer treat. These padrons are a little ripe for my taste (they’re best when dark green), but they sure look pretty.

Padrons

I also saw corn for the first time this week, and I went ahead and grabbed an ear, just in case. I’m thinking I’m going to throw it in a stir fry with peppers, beans, squash, cilantro and tomatoes. Yum.

First White Corn

I saw okra too, but I did manage to restrain myself from this one. Next week.

Okra

Did I mention that the flowers are beautiful too? I love this time of year.

Sunflower

Today’s purchases (~$55):

• Summer squash (Lucero Organic Farms)
• Italian basil (Dirty Girl Produce)
• Green shallots (Dirty Girl Produce)
• Broccoli (Dirty Girl Produce)
• Tokyo turnips (Dirty Girl Produce)
• Strawberries (Dirty Girl Produce)
• Collards (Green Gulch Farm)
• Tea bouquet (Green Gulch Farm)
• Green beans (Catalán Family Farm)
• White corn (G&S Farms)
• Blue berries (Triple Delight Blueberries)
• Salad greens (County Line Harvest)
• Cioggia beets (County Line Harvest)
• Dill (County Line Harvest)
• Chervil (Star Route Farms)
• Italian garlic (Star Route Farms)
• Breakfast radishes (Star Route Farms)
• Yummy rosa pluots (Kashiwase Farms)
• Green zebra heirloom tomatoes (Bruins Farms)
• Eureka lemon (Brokaw Nursery)
• Sea beans (Far West Fungi)

What did you find at the market this week?

Summer Beans

Summertime in San Francisco is characterized by amazing food and horrible weather. By that definition, today was certainly summer: cold, gloomy and delicious!

The best tasting foods at the San Francisco Ferry Plaza Farmers Market now are things I associate with summertime. Lettuce greens and herbs are absolutely spectacular. Stone fruits are to die for. Tomatoes are sweet and flavorful in every color, size and shape you could imagine. Potatoes are sweet, creamy and firm. Life is good.

Santa Rosa Plums

Summer in San Francisco

Produce I associate with later in the season is also beginning to appear. Peppers become more interesting, diverse and fragrant by the week, as do the melons. Figs of all varietals are sweet and sticky. Some of the blackberries I saw today were the size of ping pong balls!

Summer Potatoes

Chilies and Peppers

One of the most interesting items I purchased this week was a bunch of chocolate mint from Marin Roots Farm. It actually smells like an After Eight, and I can’t wait to figure out what to do with it. I imagine it would pair nicely with berries. Any other suggestions?

In case you are curious about how I am handling the new bag policy at the market, I’m pretty happy with the way it is working out. I bought a bunch of bags from the CUESA booth the first day for $5 and I still haven’t gone through the whole thing. Many of the vendors provide bags for free, either paper or biodegradable plastic. Others charge $0.25 for a bioderadable bag–that’s when I bust out my secret stash.

BYOB

Peaches

For me the biggest bag annoyance I’m facing right now is getting all my beautiful stone fruits and tomatoes home in one piece, since they tend to get mangled in my bag with all the other veggies in there. I am experimenting with different solutions and will let you know when I get it worked out.

Check out my video if you want to see everything I brought home (except the figs, I ate those right away). I also spill the beans on my absolute favorite summer squash. It takes about 2.5 minutes.

Today’s Purchases:

• Summer tomatoes (Balakian Farms)
• Pluots (Bella Viva Orchards)
• Organic corn (Paradez Farms)
• Figs (Knoll Farms)
• Green shallots (Dirty Girl Produce)
• Yellow wax beans (Dirty Girl Produce)
• Cilantro (Dirty Girl Produce)
• Basil (Dirty Girl Produce)
• Purslane (Marin Roots Farm)
• Lettuces (Marin Roots Farm)
• Chocolate mint (Marin Roots Farm)
• Pullet eggs (Eatwell Farm)
• Zephyr and crooked neck squash (Lucero Organic Farms)
• Mediterranean cucumbers (Madison Growers)
• Swiss chard (Green Gulch Farm)
• Bell pepper (Happy Quail Farms)
• Garlic (Short Night Farms)
• Blue Bottle Coffee

What did you find at your farmers market this week?