August 8, 2017
Durham Farmers' Market Newsletter
Good, Local Food Year Round!
Saturdays 8 am-Noon
Wednesdays 3-6 pm
In This Issue
Fickle Creek Farm
Hurtgen Meadows Farm
Flat River Nursery & Farm
Boxcarr Handmade Cheese
DFM Accepts
SNAP Benefits
 
 
The Durham Farmers' Market  proudly accepts SNAP benefits. To use your EBT
card at the Market, please visit the Market info table
at the center of the Pavilion.

The Double Bucks Program allows SNAP customers to receive double the amount of money they spend on tokens for purchases up to $10. 

The Market is working
closely with RAFI as our fiscal sponsor. Read more about
the program and our partnership  HERE

Thank you to everyone who donated to the Double Bucks program! We couldn't do it without you!
Farmer Foodshare Donation Station 
    
The Donation Station
Program collects donations
of fresh food and cash from customers at the Durham Farmers' Market.  The
money is used directly 
at the Market to purchase food from farmers for
those who are hungry
in our community.
Farmer Foodshare's mission
is to connect our local
farmers with those
who need food! Please visit
or volunteer at our Durham Farmers' Market
Donation Station!

And don't forget to participate in the Donor Rewards Program. Give a suggested donation of $3-$5 and
receive a stamp on your card. Once you've collected enough stamps, you will proudly earn your Farmer Foodshare
T-shirt! Swing by the Donation Station for
more information!
 

SUPPORT YOUR FARMERS!
NOW AVAILABLE
AT THE MARKET

PEPPERS

MELONS













TOMATOES

CORN

OKRA

POTATOES

FLOWERS

CHERRY TOMATOES

PASTURED MEATS
 
EGGS

LUNCHBOX PEPPERS

ARTISAN BREAD

CHEESE

PLANTS

ONIONS

HOMEMADE PASTA

EDAMAME
10% Campaign

Quick Links
Happy National Farmers' Market Week! Did you know that farmers' markets:
  1. Preserve farmland
  2. Stimulate local economies
  3. Increase access to nutritious food
  4. Support healthy communities
  5. Promote sustainability
Why do you support the Durham Farmers' Market? Share your story on social media this week using the hashtags: #FarmersMarketWeek #LoveMyMarket #DFMLove

Also, be sure to swing by the Info Table for an awesome temporary tattoo so you can proudly show your farmers' market pride around Durham.  Thank you for your support this week and every other week of the year. We couldn't do it without you!

Finally, we hope you'll join us for a special Sprouts Kid's Club tomorrow with Compost Now! With only two weeks remaining in the club, you don't want to miss this fun, educational kid's activity. 

See you tomorrow!

Mary Yost
Market Manager
Follow Durham Farmers' Market:

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Missives from a Market Farmer: 
Okra from the Malvaceae Family 
Missives is a series of short articles by Judy Lessler, a DFM farmer, on the history, cultivation, and preparation of the items sold at market.

Okra grows tall and straight in the field. The plants look like a sturdy soldier standing at attention. Okra's official name is Abelmoschus esculentus. It is a member of the Malvaceae family and was once called Hibiscus esculentus because of its beautiful hibiscus type flowers, flowers that do not last long enough to be transported to Raleigh and served in a martini the next evening (a chef and I once tried this). Okra is prickly and farmers typically wear gloves and protective clothing to harvest it. Its prickliness and apparent sturdiness are a mere mask. Okra is helpless unless farmers tend it, easily succumbing to weed pressure and subject to being pulled down by vining plants. However, careful care in its early life results in it forming a canopy of huge, palmate leaves that shade out grass and weeds later in the season.

The fragility of okra lies in the fact that it does not appear to have been cultivated from a natural wild-type. So called "wild-varieties" of okra are thought to be escaped cultivars, called cultigens. The cultivars of other vegetables, such as, tomatoes, went through hundreds of thousands of years of evolutionary struggle in which only the fittest of each generation survived. Thus, the commercial cultivars of these vegetables, which we have selected to have better taste, larger fruits, and more nutrients, are all undergirded by this long successful history. Okra does not have such a history, but movements of the cultivars can be traced-between India and Ethiopia, the Mediterranean and Northern Africa, the Balkans and Turkey. It thrives in Turkey where farmers have developed 55 landraces, which are cultivars developed in the field by farmers.

Okra is both hated and loved. Haters object to its mucilage content, curl their lips, and disparage it as too slimy to eat. This scorn engenders passionate defenders. One scientist writing in a 2006 Consensus Study Report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine-reports that are authored by a committee of experts who have reached an evidence-based consensus-wrote of okra: 

In the Botanical Kingdom it may actually be a Cinderella, though still living on the hearth of neglect amid the ashes of scorn.

Wow! Before I was a farmer, I worked as a statistician on collaborative research projects. Long meetings, many analyses, and serious discussions were required to arrive at conclusions. We wrote multiple drafts aiming to describe our results in clear, concise, unadorned language - just the facts ma'am. I can hardly imagine the meeting in which the National Academy approved describing okra as a Cinderella living on the hearth of neglect amid the ashes of scorn. But I think it is true.

Okra was brought to the New World during the African Slave trade. Food history author, Jessica Harris discounts the legend that enslaved African-Americans brought okra and sesame seeds with them to the New World hidden in their hair or their clothing. She points out a more "brutal reality;" namely that, foodstuffs from Africa were brought by the slavers to feed their property. Okra was initially grown on Caribbean and Brazilian sugar plantations and then spread to the American colonies with the advent of cotton plantations the concomitant huge increases in slavery during the 19th century. 

Two popular African-American dishes are Hopping John and Limping Susan. Virginia Willis in her book Okra says that according to legend, Susan and John were husband and wife.  Below is my recipe for Limping Susan:

Limping Susan ( 4-6 servings)
Ingredients
  • 4 thick strips of bacon or turkey bacon, diced
  • 12 oz okra, cut into 1/4 inch-thick rounds
  • 1 cup long-grain rice
  • 2 cups water or chicken stock
  • 1 teaspoon minced jalapeno or dash of hot pepper sauce
  • ½ teaspoon salt
  • ¼ teaspoon black pepper
  • 1 tablespoon chopped basil or dill (optional)
Directions
  1. Sauté bacon in a medium sauce pan over medium heat until crisp.
  2. Stir in okra; cook one minute.
  3. Add rice, water or stock, jalapeno or pepper sauce, salt and pepper, and optional herbs. Cover and cook until rice is tender and all the liquid is absorbed.
  4. Adjust seasoning to taste.
Upcoming Market Events
Wednesday, August 9
  • Join us for the Sprouts Kid's Club and learn about compost with Compost Now!
  • Don't forget to get your Customer Loyalty Card stamped at the Info Table. After 10 visits, you'll receive a prize!
Saturday, August 12
  • Celebrate National Farmers' Market Week with us and join us for a special children's activity.
Saturday, August 19
  • Join chefs Jeff Crane and Meredith Antunez for the final Homefries Kid's Cooking Class of the season. Register today!
  • Chat with the Master Gardeners from 8 am-Noon.
Fresh this Week
VEGETABLES:  Beans, Carrots, Cherry Tomatoes, Corn, Cucumbers, Dried & Fresh Herbs and Spices, Eggplant, Garlic, Green Beans, Lettuce, New Potatoes, Onions, Pea Shoots, Peppers,  Squash, Tomatoes, Zucchini, and much more!

FRUIT:  Blackberries, Cantaloupe, Melons, and Raspberries

MEATS AND EGGS:  Pork, Beef, Lamb, Mutton, Chicken, Veal, Duck Eggs, Chicken Eggs

FLOWERS:  Zinnias, L isianthus , Celosia, Sunflowers, and more!

CHEESES:  Fresh and Aged Cow Milk Cheeses
 
PLANTS: 
Vegetable, Flower and Herb Starts, Bedding Plants

SPECIALTY ITEMS:  Granola, Nut Butter,  Pasta, Flour, Cornmeal, Baked Goods including Pies, Breads, Cookies, Pastries, Empanadas, Jams, Jellies, Pickles, Preserves, and more!

Produce availability depends on weather conditions.
Fickle Creek Farm
Please  pre-order here  by **11 AM** and we will hold your order at market until 5:30.

Lots of YUM YUM peppers, SUN SUGARs, OKRA, and HEIRLOOM TOMATOES...Don't forget the BACON for the BTs with cucumber on the side (lettuce not seasonally available)!!

SUMMER SPECIALS!!
  • 100% GRASS FED & FINISHED GROUND BEEF - $6/lb (save $2/lb); Buy 20+ pounds at only $5.60/lb (30% off)
  • PASTURE RAISED FREEDOM RANGER CHICKEN -$5.40/lb (Whole Bird) or $6.30/lb (Half Bird) (10% savings)
  • PASTURE & WOODLAND RAISED, FREE RANGE PORK - $9/lb Smoked Polish AND Smoked Green Pepper & Onion Sausage (10% savings)
  • TOMATOES - $2/lb for 10 or more pounds Bulk Red Tomatoes; $3/lb for 3 or more pounds Sun Sugar Cherry Tomatoes
Let us know if you have any special requests for cuts we don't usually offer... we can get what the PORK and BEEF you want within a few weeks!

Click here to see everything we have: 
  • Free Range, Pasture Raised ** CHICKEN ** fed only USDA Certified Organic Feed 
  • 100% Grass Fed and Grass Finished, Pasture Raised ** BEEF ** (never fed any grain!)
  • Pasture & Woodland Raised, Free Range ** PORK  **
  • Deli Meats: Salami, Bologna, & Hot Dogs
  • Free Range and Pastured Hen & Duck Eggs
  • No Nitrate Beef Snack Sticks, Bites, & Jerky
  • Soup, Stew, & Stock Ingredients
  • Never Sprayed Produce
Sign up for our 11 week FALL CSA begins in August, with first pickup September 9. Save 10% on MEAT!

10% off purchases of $100 or more!

Hurtgen Meadows Farm
PRODUCE
On our tables you will find lots of delicious field-grown sun-ripened tomatoes (slicers, cherries, heirlooms, and hybrids). We will also have beans, okra, summer squash, carrots, beets, bell peppers, cabbage, eggplant (classic and fairytale), sweet onions, potatoes, leeks and garlic.
 
PLANTS
Did your basil plant give up too early? We have more new basil plant starts so you can enjoy the combo of tomatoes and basil again!
 
EGGS
Happy eggs from our happy hens
 
FROM OUR KITCHEN
Jams and Jellies!  We have our apple jelly and sweet onion jam.

All of Hurtgen Meadows produce, plants, fruits and flowers are naturally grown using sustainable practices - no synthetic pesticides, herbicides, or fertilizers are ever used on our farm.  

We'll see you at the market!
Flat River Nursery & Farm
We will be at market with Greenhouse Tomatoes, Sungolds, a few field tomatoes, squash, cukes, Bedding Plants, Vegetable Plants, Hanging Baskets, Herbs, Potted Flowers, Ferns, and a few g reens. Green Tomatoes to make your favorite Fried Green Tomato recipe dish. 

Charles & Joan Holeman
336-364-2460
Boxcarr Handmade Cheese 
We are a small, family-operated creamery in Cedar Grove making Italian-inspired Cow and Goat-milk cheeses. We hand craft all our artisan cheeses, packing each with love. We bring the whole family to the market so get ready to meet the kids and our cheese-makers!

Come taste all of our delicious cheeses including our Freshen (cow milk)  Pimento, Herb Garlic, and Chive flavored; our bloomy-rind cheese,  Cottonbell  ( cow milk) ; our lightly smoked, meltable fan favorite,  Campo   (cow milk) ; our decadent ash ripened and award winning,  Rocket's Robiola   (cow milk) ; our milder take on a beer washed Taleggio,  Lissome   (cow milk) Nimble ,   beer washed  (cow & goat milk) ; and our aged, bees wax dipped, Winsome (cow  & goat milk) .

For more about our cheeses, creamery, and us, please visit our 
website  and join our newsletter mailing list. E-mail questions and special orders  or call 919-732-9079.

Austin, Dani, Samantha, Alessandra, & Lily
Parking & Street Information
The Market is located at 501 Foster Street in the Pavilion at Durham Central Park.  Parking can be found along the street around the pavilion. There are also public parking lots along Foster Street and on Morgan Street near the Carolina Theatre.  

Handicap parking is available on Foster Street, right next to the south entrance of the pavilion.
Durham Farmers' Market Animal Policy
Please note that the Durham Farmers' Market does not allow dogs or other pets in the Market area during Market hours.  Service animals are exempt from this rule.

Leashed pets are welcome elsewhere throughout Durham Central Park.