Old Strathcona Farmer's Market

Saturday was a scorcher! 24 degrees and even I was feeling hot. What lovely weather to start the weekend with. I even managed to get a lie in after Friday's party, which the guests assure me, was a success :-) The Chai Ice Cream, particularly went down a treat!

But anyway, my lie-in was was rudely interrupted by a little voice yelling, 'mummy, mummy daddy wanna go to farmer meerkat (sic)' Aha, the famed Old Strathcona Farmer's Market!! So up I get, groaning and moaning, and manage to find enough energy to scramble off to the market, muttering 'Its not going to beat Borough Market, grumble, grumble'.

Lets just say, it was not a let down and I was so glad I went. The first indication was the loads of people carrying fresh veggies that passed us on the way to the market. Ooooh! I was impatient and wanted to get to the market asap after eyeballing those gorgeous tomatoes. And when I got there, I was not disappointed. It was a mini-version of Borough Market in London with the food comparing very favourably (though I missed Neal's Yard Dairy!). I found the grocery selling all the lovely veg I saw in the bags and promptly went about buying loads. Its not cheap, but trust me, I would rather pay the dollar or so more that it cost to buy those fresh, just off the farm fragrant vegetables than skimp and settle for the bland supermarket ones.

I got some gorgeous baby cucumbers, fresh tomatoes on the vine (that actually looked and smelt like they'd been vine-ripened!), a bunch of long, sweet red, yellow and orange peppers and a plump, shiny, purple aubergine. We're sorted, for a few days at least! I also bought some fresh pasta and pesto, plus anjou pears and apple pears (those won't last in our house, and as I write this, half of them have disappeared down the greedy throats of the man and child!)

This evening I made the pasta and stirred in chopped baby cucumbers and a tomato into it with the pesto. I didn't like the pesto at all, and I think I will skip buying that and make my own instead. The pasta was amazing, just the right mix of soft and al dente, so that's going to be a weekly purchase. The baby cucumbers were nothing short of amazing, my regret is that I didn't buy the bigger bag, because we are down to our last one already. Aditi loved them and wandered around the kitchen crunching on them. Tomatoes were full of flavour and actually tasted of the sunshine. Lovely!

I am planning to make babaganoush with the aubergine, and I have some chickpeas that I boiled yesterday, so those will be turned into houmous. I am planning to stuff the peppers with a mixture of couscous, feta, herbs and chopped olives, so tomorrow's dinner will have a Greek theme. The tomatoes are getting made into a sauce for the remaining pasta.

So that's us sorted for two days (I hope!). I will blog on the stuffed sweet peppers tomorrow or so, so keep an eye out!

Toodles for now, peeps!