I was in the neighborhood for a meeting and took the opportunity to make my first pilgrimage of the year to the Union Square Green Market. What can I possibly say that hasn’t already been said about this all things local/seasonal/urban farmers market? It is awesome. And if I wrote about “Things that are great,’ like my good friend Chris Vincent, the Green Market would be at the top of my list. I like it because it is colorful, native, funky, tasty and fun to explore. Even if I don’t need local boysenberry jam, or burp-less cucumbers, it is a great place to spend a few hours.

So what’s happening at the Market? Very exciting times as we are getting close to peak of summer. We are starting to see some local fruit, like peaches from Southern NJ, plums of every color and local blueberries. Every kind of lettuce, salad mix, deep green veg you can imagine. Garlic and onions of every variety, new potatoes and greenhouse tomatoes (pic below from S&SO Produce Farm’s stand). We still have some time before locally grown, non-greenhouse tomatoes are available in the tri-state area.

I am posting this pic of dandelion greens for my mother-in-law Kay, who told me a great anecdote about dandelion greens over the weekend. Kay said that when she was growing up in Vermont, her Italian-American father used to pick dandelion greens and prepare them with olive oil and garlic. No one thought this was such a sexy idea at the time. Flash forward ___  years…