Hello!

Don’t forget about the Wednesday South Anchorage Farmers’ Market—it just started this week, and it’s perfect if you’ll be out of town for the weekend and can’t come to the Saturday market. It’s behind the Dimond Center, in front of the Dimond Center Hotel.  The hours are 10am-4pm.

vegetables: tomatoes and eggplants and arugula!
Did you happen to notice last week that there were a few lovely tomatoes from A&M Farms’ greenhouse?  I just talked to Arthur, and he’ll be bringing more tomatoes (the little cherry tomatoes and the big beautiful ones) to the market on Saturday!! I’d make sure I get there early if you want to be sure of getting some of them!  And would you believe, his eggplants are ready to go! So you can pull out your summery cookbooks for ideas this week—I’ll have an eggplant recipe for you next week!

Every week there are more kinds of gorgeous, exotic (and not so exotic) greens at the market! Rempel Family Farms has salad mixes, Asian greens of all kinds, turnip greens, kale—everything you need to make wonderful salads and fantastic braised sweet young greens. That braised turnip greens recipe I sent out last week can be adapted to any kind of hardy winter green—just adjust the blanching time to fit the type and tenderness of the green, and the braising time, as well. Of course, greens like spinach and chard don’t need to be blanched before cooking them (with or without onions and garlic). And we’re also starting to see herbs! Bunches of dill and cilantro are waiting for you to, so you can spruce up all kinds of recipes!

And lettuce! You can get big beautiful heads of lettuce from A&M Farms—now they have red and green leaf lettuce, and butter lettuce, as well! I love these big heads of lettuce—I bring them home and cut the stem end off, then soak the leaves in a big sink of water until they are crisp and perfectly clean, then put them in the salad-spinner and pack them in big clear plastic bags, sealed with a twisty-tie. Then I have gallons of greens to take out and tear into pieces for a salad at the drop of a hat! I often eat salads for lunch and dinner these days—why eat anything else when the greens are so fresh and delicious?

So of course I’m including a couple of salad recipes this week! They aren’t the typical dressing and lettuce leaves, though! If you’re looking for lots of great salad dressings, I’ll have some more of them in the next couple of newsletters—but you can find lots of great green salads and dressing recipes in my farmers’ market cookbook! Look for it at the Wednesday or the Saturday South Anchorage Farmers’ Markets!

One recipe this week will focus on using two vegetables that we do really well here: Butterball potatoes and ARUGULA!  Are you thinking that I’m an arugula fiend? You’d be right. Nevertheless, if you haven’t tried it, I’m just going to insist that you give it a whirl. The peppery little tender leaves from Rempel Family Farms are just so good! You can use Alaskan red onions for this salad recipe, as well, so make sure you load up on the fresh AND storage vegetables when you go!

The other recipe is a great way to enjoy the wonderful hothouse cucumbers from A&M Farms! It’s got a really different, delicious dressing that I want to share with you. And if you’re growing a mint plant (we bought ours from Mile 5.2 Greenhouse stand at the market) you can collect some of the leaves for a delicious (but optional) garnish!

bread
Rise & Shine Bakery will be taking this week off for the holiday, but we’ll be back on July 12th! You can get breads of all kinds from Mary Jane, though, 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!

farmers’ market cookbook
The cookbook 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. While the book includes some seafood recipes, the book contains 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. 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. At the market, the cookbooks are $15, which includes a really cool folding wire cookbook holder while supplies last. (Holders sold separately for $6.)

farmers’ market cookbook in the News!
Did you see the photo and article about the farmers’ market cookbook in the newspaper?  It was on page A2 of the Anchorage Daily News last Thursday (6/26)! And then there was another article on Sunday in the Life section of the newspaper! I was so excited to see it there!

other places to get the farmers’ market cookbook
Would you like to pick up a copy of the South Anchorage Farmers’ Market Cookbook when no farmers’ market is happening? Several of my favorite places around town are selling the cookbook, including Side Street Espresso (412 G Street, downtown), Summit Spice & Tea Co. (1120 East Huffman Rd #4), and Title Wave Books (1360 West Northern Lights Blvd, or 415 West 5th Avenue, downtown). Or you can order it along with your bulk food orders through Organic Alaska (http://www.organicalaska.com). If you’re passing through Soldotna, you could stop by River City Books (43977 Sterling Hwy) and pick it up!

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 me at 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

http://www.southanchoragefarmersmarket.com/index.php/site/single/arugula_and_roasted_potato_salad/” title="arugula and roasted potato salad">arugula and roasted potato salad
cucumber salad with peanut-jalepeno dressing