I went to the new location of the Santa Rosa farmers’ market on Saturday, because I was one of the SAVOR volunteers. The new location is lovely and pastoral. To the east of the market are Sonoma County’s rolling golden hills, dotted with oak trees, while to the south is a lush vineyard.
SAVOR was providing a new kale salad recipe, and bike-blended strawberry smoothies. Elizabeth Eichold, who worked at the satellite market last summer (held in front of the clinic that houses the Women, Infants and Children (WIC) Nutritional program), brought a delicious kale and quinoa salad, festooned with pumpkin seeds and grated carabiner cheese (from Weirauch Creamery.) It was eight-thirty in the morning, and I wasn’t sure kale is everyone’s idea of a morning treat. In fact, we couldn’t keep the portion cups on the trays. We also had copies of the recipe, and when I left at noon, two farmers had said they were sold out of kale.
Quinoa is a South American grain with a mild nutty taste. Anything you can use rice for, you can use quinoa. Elizabeth says that the salad, with the grain and the kale, is a complete carbohydrate.
Nancy Sumida, who managed the WIC satellite market and helped several local farmers market get the equipment that lets them accept CalFresh benefits, stopped by to lend her support.
We ran out of recipes shortly before ten, so I made a run to the Windsor Office Depot and got two hundred fifty more copies. About seventy-five of them went away as well.
Just before eleven, the blender bike showed up, and we segued into silky strawberry smoothies. The young folks from VOICES joined us and took over the smoothie operation seamlessly. We didn’t have the bike athletes we saw in May, and I think our gearing was off, so smoothies were coming off the bike a little more slowly than before. They tasted just as good, though.
Lata, who has the Indian food booth, gave us samples of her summer fruit lasses. While mango is the classic and still my favorite, her apricot lasse was ambrosial.
I stopped at Foggy River farm to visit my co-worker’s daughter who is working for them during the summer. On the way back I bought two bottles of olive oil from Stonehouse Olive Oil.
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