Indian Trails Greenhouse Room View

Joan Lambert Bailey was in Tokyo while preparing this farmers market update from her recent trip to her Madison. I’m happy to report that though Joan and her family were startled by the earthquake, they are all okay. To contribute to the relief effort in Japan, please visit The Red Cross.

Joan lives, farms and gardens in Tokyo when she’s not visiting her native Midwest. Follow her from seed to harvest to market at Popcorn Homestead and Everyday Gardens as well as Twitter!

Farmers Market Update: Madison

by Joan Lambert Bailey

Visiting Wisconsin in February is to enter the heart of winter. Brilliant white landscapes shimmer and snap in the cold wind, and anything green seems months away.

Home from Tokyo for a month-long visit, I ventured down to an old haunt – the Dane County Farmer’s Market in Madison – to find a winter food culture veritably humming with activity and tasty treats. A distilled version of the much larger summer market that rings the Capitol Square twice around, the Late Winter Market (and presumably the Early Winter Market, too) offers up an excellent seasonal selection from the Wisconsin table: maple syrup, a kaledeoscope of cheeses, hearty breads and organic tortillas, mushrooms, and an assortment of meats along with winter greens and root crops.

Dane County Farmer's Market Breakfast Table

Held at the Madison Senior Center, this day’s Late Winter Market felt more like a church bazaar or community dinner. Rosy-cheeked patrons shook off parkas and hats while deciding whether to start perusing the vendors or grab a table for enjoying the Winter Market Breakfast.

Bleu Mont Dairy Cheese

True to my Wisconsin roots, I went straight to Bleu Mont Dairy and their bountiful cheese display. A good sharp cheddar is hard to find, but their five-year-old cave-aged bandaged cheddar I tasted there proved a little piece of heaven. The creamy texture and nutty flavor were more than I could have hoped for. Willi Lehner, chief cheese-maker at Bleu Mont, guided me through a few more samples as we talked about his creamery (he’s added a cheese cave and is incorporating alternative energy into the operation), and his own evolution as a cheese-maker (some time spent apprenticing in Switzerland to learn a few old tricks of the trade and his increasing use of organic milk as it became more readily available) since first coming to the market twenty-five years ago.

After tucking a block each of Swiss Reserve and Cave-Aged Banadaged Cheddar into my bag to savor with friends in Tokyo, I ventured around the corner for a closer look at the whimsical cutouts at Gypsy Travelin’ Market. Started at the market twelve years ago with her own recipes, Jae Almond appears to have found a niche offering items made with whole grains, wheat alternatives, non-refined sugar, and vegan recipes. Even as she mentioned business at the market was slow that day due to the protests and a snowy forecast, I couldn’t help but notice a steady stream of her treats fleeing the table. I nabbed the last winged cow cutout for my afternoon coffee, and moved on to see what savory and gluten-free options Silly Yak Bakery and Bread Barn might have.

Silly Yak Great Grains Breads

Gyspy Travelin' Market Winged Cow

Made fresh daily from non-certified organic wheat berries, the Bread Barn loaves tempted with swirls of cinamon or flecks of jalepeno’s and cheese. The Silly Yak products stored in a cooler to the side (and made in an entirely separate yet neighboring facility) were just as tempting albeit rather picked over by the time I arrived. I opted for a couple rice flour rolls for their heft and golden crusts. (They were utterly fantastic the next day toasted with a bit of unnecessary but oh-so-delicious fresh butter and jam.)

Just as the first flakes of that day’s snowstorm began to fall, I found myself admiring Indian Trails Greenhouse display of lush-leaved edibles and blooming ornamentals. An oasis within an oasis, the table brimmed with the dark green leaves of parsley, the thick ruby-red stems of Swiss Chard, along with sweet-scented jasmine and vibrant primroses, to name but a few.

Such breath-taking greenery put me in a weakened state, when I arrived at Snug Haven Farm’s sign for ‘frost-sweetened’ spinach just down the line. Founded in 1897 as a dairy, the farm uses organic methods to raise hoophouse spinach in the winter months and flowers and tomatoes in the summer. Calvin Hageman, patriarch of the farm and clearly a well-known figure at the market (paper invitations to his birthday party the next day went out with nearly every bag of spinach) offered me a leaf to taste. Talk about truth in advertising: the velvet leaf tasted so deeply sweet and green – so spinach – that I bought a half-pound on the spot for that evening’s salad.

Carl of Snug Haven

Snug Haven Spinach

At Don’s Produce the greenery again caught my eye – bags of brightly colored mixed greeens looked like the perfect companion to Snug Haven’s spinach – but their dried sweet potatos ultimately stole the show. Straight-up sweet potato chips – no salt or seasoning of any kind – struck me as a perfect addition for soup or to cook with rice. Another customer snapped up a bag saying her dog just loved them, and I was sold. (Our canine friends, though, enjoyed bison liver crackers from Paws Four, a division of Daval’s Bison Meats.)

No trip to a Wisconsin market would be complete without a bit of maple syrup, and so I found myself at Cherokee Bison Farms’ table. Alongside the syrup and their extensive offerings of bison jerky, roasts, ground meat, sausage, bratwurst, etc., they also sold organic sunflower oil. While it might seem odd at first glance – maple syrup, bison meat, and sunflower oil – Leroy and Cindy Fricke bring it all together. The bison pasture in the sunflower fields after harvest and feast in part on the oil processing leftovers – meal and oil settlings – throughout the year to creates a richly flavored meat their customers love.

Cherokee Farms Sunflower Oil

Cherokee Farms Maple Syrup

As the market wound down for the day, I took one last look around the room. Throughout the morning, my eye kept returning to Garden to Be’s table tucked in a corner. Verdant trays of the certified-organic microgreens they grow and sell year-round to area restaurants might have been temptation enough, but the real draw for me were the Black Spanish radishes. Black and crusty and all roughly the size of a tennis ball, the piqued my curiousity. (I’m a fan of root crops almost as much as leafy greens.)

Garden to Be Black Spanish Radishes

While chatting with co-owner, Scott Williams, after giving in to my inner vegetable geek I learned about their CSA for canners. Members receive a Processor’s Share four times a growing season with all the ingredients one might desire for homemade sauerkraut and kimchi, the perfect pickle, killer tomato sauce, pesto, rhubarb butter, or a salsa hot enough to thaw winter’s frosty edges. I would have signed up on the spot if I lived here.

What I bought:

• Bleu Mont Dairy’s Reserve Swiss Cheese and Cave Aged Bandaged Cheddar
• Gypsy Travelin’ Market Winged Cow Cutout Cookie
• Silly Yak’s Rice Flour Rolls
• Snug Haven Farm Spinach – a half pound bag (that barely made it to the car)
• Don’s Produce Sweet Potato Chips and Salad Greens
• Daval’s Bison Meats Paws Four Dog Treats
• Cherokee Bison Farm’s Maple Syrup – Four half-pints
• Garden to Be’s Black Spanish Radishes