Hello!

Greens! Greens! And more greens!!
I feel like Rapunzel’s mother—craving fresh spring greens after all winter and spring of not having these tender leaves! Luckily you don’t have to sacrifice your first-born child for these greens—you just have to show up early enough on Saturday morning to get them before they are gone! You can find beautiful tiny, tender and mild arugula, small baby kale, cress, and beautiful piles of radishes at Rempel Family Farms, along with all kinds of other Asian greens. A&M Farms will be selling their lovely big heads of lettuce, red and green, as well as their hot-house cucumbers. I’ve included a recipe for an arugula salad with grilled onions at the end of the newsletter—check it out! You can use Alaskan arugula and Alaskan onions from Rempel and A&M Farms for this yummy recipe!

In addition to vegetables, you can get strawberry baskets, and rhubarb stalks! I’ve included a recipe for rhubarb crisp at the end of the newsletter for those of you who need something to do with the rhubarb plant threatening to take over your house. It’s similar to last year’s rhubarb-apple crisp, but this is for serious rhubarb fans.

And speaking of rhubarb, if you’re growing it in your yard, now is the time to think about processing it to freeze! It’s so nice and tender now, you’ll be glad this winter when you’ve got bags of it frozen in the freezer! See the end of the newsletter for directions.

You can find eggs, sweet breads, and other interesting treats at A.D. Farms—and there are still pigs available for order.

bread
Rise & Shine Bakery will have a new Alaskan bread flavor this week: a big, beautiful Alaskan baked potato pan loaf!  It’s the same size as our regular 100% whole wheat sourdough levain, but it’s made with lots of lovely potatoes, in addition to the organic whole wheat flour. The potatoes condition the bread dough, adding a softness and tenderness to the bread that you just have to taste to believe! It’s wonderful for any kind of sandwich—but maybe the best ever choice for peanut butter and banana. Truly a multi-purpose loaf, I think this will be a real kid-pleaser, as well as something you adults can sink your teeth into (and appreciate for its nutritional qualities). 
And it’s time to make the cheese & roasted garlic bread again! We’ve been waiting for Cranberry Ridge’s new cheese to come on line again, but it’s still not quite ready yet. We’ll grate big chunks of parmesan cheese to bake into the bread this week. If you haven’t tried this bread yet, give it a taste. Bring it home and if you don’t eat it all on the first day, slice it and put it in the toaster—it’s a heavenly cross between garlic bread and a toasted cheese sandwich! I’ve included a pasta recipe to go with this bread—inspired by the seafood at the market!

The other three flavors we’ll be making are the regular 100% whole wheat sourdough (levain) pan loaf, our toasted walnut hearth loaf, and our kalamata olive bread. See the long-term bread schedule and list of ingredients toward the end of the newsletter for more information about these breads! 

You can also get breads of all kinds from Mary Jane, selling loaves from the French Oven bakery. She will also have those yummy macaroons, ham and cheese croissants, and those delicious, layered, buttery cookies called palmiers!

recipes galore!
Have you looked at the Farmers’ Market cookbook! It is filled with 100 pages of delicious, healthy recipes that showcase our flavorful, fresh local Alaskan produce. Recipes provide inspiration for ways to use Alaskan vegetables, fish, fruits, bread, and other products that can be found at our farmers’ markets. Mostly vegetarian and vegetable recipes, many of which are dairy- and egg-free, the cookbook focuses on recipes that have fantastic flavor and top-notch nutritional value. These vegetable dishes can act as great main courses, or as side dishes to go along with meat and seafood! The directions in each recipe include lots of hints about how to prepare these recipes with speed and efficiency. The cookbook also includes directions for processing Alaskan produce to freeze for the winter. The book also includes information on when and where the farmers’ markets are held.
The cookbook is a compilation of all the recipes from my previous summertime farmers’ market newsletters, as well as from my wintertime Rise & Shine Bakery Bulletin emails, plus some additional recipes. The book contains over 100 recipes, on full-sized, spiral-bound pages, thoroughly indexed, organized, and cross-referenced, so you don’t have to worry about organizing or printing out anything from last year. They are $15, which includes a really cool folding wire cookbook holder while supplies last. (Holders sold separately for $6.)

seafood
Arctic Choice Seafoods will have all kinds of fresh, delicious, Alaskan fish! Here’s a list of what they are likely to have, along with lots of free seafood recipes for you to take along with you.
• fresh king salmon
• fresh sablefish
• fresh rockfish
• fresh halibut
• fresh clams
• fresh oysters
• halibut cheeks
• king crab
• snow crab
• spot shrimp
• side stripe shrimp
• Dungeness crab
• scallops
• smoked salmon bellies

Saturday South Anchorage Farmers’ Market
Dates: May 10-October 4
Hours: 9am-2pm
Location: Subway/Cellular One Sports Centre at the corner of Old Seward and O’Malley

Wednesday South Anchorage Farmers’ Market
Dates: July 2- October 1
Hours: 10am-4pm
Location: behind the Dimond Center, in front of the Dimond Center Hotel

Please pass this email along to anyone you think might be interested in receiving the weekly market news—they can email if they’d like to be added to our newsletter list.
For more information about the market, contact Arthur Keyes, South Anchorage Farmers’ Market Manager, at 907-354-5833, or at . Please respond to this email if you’d like to be removed from the newsletter list.

Cheers! And see you at the market!
Alison Arians
Farmers’ Market Reporter

related recipes

arugula salad with grilled onions & roasted red peppers (or tomatoes) with grilled polenta slices
rhubarb crisp