Because a majority of my food comes from the farmers market, I am often tied to the schedule of farmers markets around the Bay Area. I missed my home market twice in a row due to scheduling conflicts in recent weeks, but I made up for it by visiting the brand-new Divisadero Farmers Market and the Napa Farmers Market. I was in Napa for the unbelievably great Taste3 Conference and snuck out between speakers to visit the small, but extremely friendly and adequate, downtown market. Cruising the markets, I noticed a proliferation of plum and apricot-like stone fruits: pluots, plumcots, apriums, plums, and apricots. It wasn't until I came home and perused the Internet that I figured out the...
Continue reading »
The Grocery Ninja leaves no aisle unexplored, no jar unopened, no produce untasted. Creep along with her below, and read her past market missions here. A few years ago, I went with my por por (grandma) to the cinema to catch Pride and Prejudice. She used to bring me to Chinese operas staged beneath giant, makeshift tents in fields, and I remember promising her that when I grew up, it would be my turn to bring her to the theater. (I knowwhat a lousy deal my por por made; she brings me to watch an underground staging of a dying art form, and I bring her to the cinema down the road!) Anyway, my por por was a good sport...
Continue reading »