SF Bay Area Farmers' market good finds

Thanks! Much appreciated!

Today at Ferry Plaza, Peach Farm had greenhouse tomatoes (heirloom type) for $4.50 lb., but #2s (which were really quite lovely), for $1 lb. Caprese salad tonight, and fresh tomato sauce tomorrow. The olive oil man in front of the building has olive oil made with REAL white truffles (not “truffle oil”). $5 small $15 large. Nice flavor.

Today at Swank Farms, Fort Mason FM the first good English Peas. $3 lb. Did you know that “English” peas were first bred in Venice, and were the first pea bred to eat fresh?

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First sighting of fresh ume this week. Time for umeboshi.

Any good strawberries or blueberries yet? The ones so far seem watery (strawberries) and small (blueberries)

Any idea which type?

I just know they’re not globe. Kind of long and with deadly spines. They drew blood.

The oysters are from Point Reyes. Havent seen uni or hamachi recently. Someone else is arriving before me and buying up all the collars, grrrrrr.

What are people paying for asparagus? The Noe Valley farmers market had it for between seven and 10.50 a pound, in stores are selling it for between six and 7.50.

My ignorance was revealed and corrected by the farmer who said that umeboshi is pickled with riper umes, when they turn orange around August. So I bought a box of their own umeboshi instead for $6.

Naigamos are in the market.

Momos are now at the MoMo CooK stall at the Irvington Farmers Market in Fremont.

What are these?

They have a few names: nagaimo 長芋 in Japan, chinese yam ć±±è—„ in China. (I actually misspelled the name in the original post). Many other countries has it too. It has a little bit of medicinal quality. Dried, its called huaishan and can be used in e.g. Cantonese double boiled soups. Sometimes you find it in Japanese restaurants, like this dish at Iroriya:

Thank you. I had googled it and got no real information, probably from spelling. I have had Japanese yams.

Cherries are here. Some appear very light in color, but are deceptively flavorful. Many I saw were small but I found some that were medium size and firm, plus very flavorful. Cant remember the name of the farm but try the samples and you might find some good ones.

Among Lone Oak Ranch, Frog Hollow, Twin Girls, the Brooks from Lone Oak won the taste test this week. But Frog Hollow- $10/lb, things are getting expensive around here.

Scattered sightings of stone fruits. Spotted the galaxy peach, but its still greenish looking and it tastes raw. I am curious why they bring under-ripe fruits to a farmers’ market. Is there strong demand for them?

Frog Hollow says their apricots were wiped out by a recent storm. Other stone fruits are fine.

The going rate in Oakland was $4-5/lb for cherries. As for the unripe stone fruit, maybe consumers don’t know better? Or dont care if they eat unripe fruit? My kid has been asking for peaches for a few months so I bought her a few.

CJ Olson’s had really great cherries for about $10/lb. They were large and flavorful, definitely better than the farmers market but also twice the price.

Frog Hollow is always the high-price leader.

Agreed. But I also remember they were maybe $8 or so a pound last year. I recall they were good so it caused me to splurge a little from time to time. But I haven’t cracked the double digit a pound psychological barrier yet. At least their other fruits have a 10 lb bulk discount that considerably lower the cost.

That reminds me I need to go this year. Perhaps a good place to crack that barrier. Every year I said I’d go and before long the stone fruit season is over.

Hamada retiring from Ferry Building, and eventually all markets in the Bay Area:

http://www.sfgate.com/insidescoop/article/Hamada-Farms-Longtime-vendor-retiring-from-Ferry-11159793.php

No more concords : (

I’ll miss their concords and concord crosses, but as a consolation, in grape season, Lagier has a great variety, the bronx grape that has a lot of concord influence. Also there’s a mostly walnut guy in front of the plaza with true concords in season.

The name of the farm is Gotelli, went back this week and their cherries are top notch. $6 per pound for premium cherries, $5 per pound for others.