Monday, September 7, 2009

Nice Way To Spend A Sunday Morning

Noah and I were up north this weekend - visiting my family, attending a wedding, hanging with Noah's mom who was in from Baltimore and celebrating my birthday a few days early. As you can imagine, the schedule was fairly packed. But Sunday morning we got to do one of my favorite things - take a trip to the Marin Farmer's Market at the Civic Center. And this isn't some skimpy market. There are rows and rows of farm stalls, food stalls, petting zoos and even a bouncy castle or two. Heaven.
There's no better time to check out the bounty at the market than early September. Fruit like crazy, the beginnings of fall veggies and all kinds of meats, fishes and cheeses. Well, sadly not as much cheese this weekend as I had hoped for, as both the Andante guy and the Pug's Leap folks were MIA for the holiday. Damn. Still, there was plenty of other good stuff to enjoy.
Like these gorgeous berries. We brought a box of the fiery orange raspberries to our picnic in Golden Gate Park. They were sooo good. And I'm not at all a raspberry person. Usually they're too mushy and slightly fermented tasting for me (yes, even the really great, fancy, expensive ones), but these were great. They had an almost citrusy tang to them.
Brian picked up some fantastic tuna from the fish folks at Santa Rosa Seafood, which he whipped up for us at my birthday dinner at Insalata's. I must say, it's pretty nice having a chef in the family. I meant to get a few of the SRS oysters, but was rushed out of the market before I had a chance. Next time.
Of course, we had to grab some stone fruits as well - flavor king plums, flavor grenade pluots and some O'Henry peaches. We cut them up and had them along with dates (also acquired at the market) for our picnic dessert.
Stacy getting fresh with a plum.
Stone fruit free samples. I had to take this one three or four times because people kept popping in and blocking the shot as they reached for their taste.
I just liked this sign. Doesn't it make you smile?
One of the food stalls at the market is a wood-fire pizza oven. We always get their fresh mozzarella, prosciutto and egg breakfast pizza. Apparently you can hire them to do parties in Marin. If I lived there, they would be catering my birthday party. I guess dinner at Church & State is an acceptable substitute.
It was a nice time at the market - not too crowded, not too hot and lots and lots of deliciousness. Stay tuned for details of the picnic in GGP and the trip to the Academy of Sciences. I've got two words to tease it... duck rillettes.

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