Eat fresh, eat local

As the summer sun comes up on Saturday morning, a flurry of activity begins in parks and town squares all across America. Banners are unfurled, tables and pavilions are set up, trucks are backed up and wares are laid out, ready for the whole community to come and buy, It's farmers market day!

Nobody knows exactly how many farmers markets there are in the United States, but the Department of Agriculture places the number at over 8,100.  159 of those are in Washington alone.

There's an indefinable air of community in every farmers market that calls to mind the open agorae of ancient Greece, the Burgs of medieval Europe, the timeless bazaars of the Middle East. It's part county fair, part school bake sale and part free-for-all. And entirely local.

That local character goes a long way toward explaining the appeal of the farmers market. Every community does their market a little differently. Prosser's, unsurprisingly gives prominence to wine and wineries. Walla Walla has as many hot food vendors as produce sellers. The non-food items for sale reflect the craftsmanship of the local community as well.

There's one thing they all have in common, though, and that's food. Fresh-grown produce is the staple of the farmers market. When you buy at a supermarket, you're getting whatever the large conglomerates want to pass of as their best product. But at a farmers market, you can look the grower in the eye and know exactly what you're getting and where it came from.

Alan Schrieber, of Schrieber and Sons Farms, has been coming to the Pasco Farmers Market  for six years. He's seen the appeal it has for consumers first-hand.

"People want a connection with their food and want to know who grew it," he said. "These are people who care about their food."

It certainly is of benefit to the farmer. Some small farmers use the market as not only a point of sale, but also to generate larger-scale business.

Marlene Castaldi and her niece Samantha staff the Castaldi Farms booth at the Walla Walla Farmers Market. Their booth features cold crops at the beginning of the season, and then moves exclusively to their specialty, onions, as the summer wears on. Their booth might or might not make a profit in itself, but the dividends it pays in getting their wares out in front of consumers more than makes it worthwhile. The Castaldis supply local restaurants through connections they've made at the market.

"We've been coming to the market for 17 years, since it started," Marlene Castaldi said. "There was nothing there then.  We just sold out of the back end of the car."

At the Prosser Farmers Market, Rudy Peña sells salsa. Well, everything but the tomatoes. The rest of the ingredients - onions, garlic, peppers, seasonings - is dehydrated and packaged for instant salsa. Mix a packet with a bowl of diced tomatoes (the truly lazy can use a can of them) and they make a salsa as good as anything you'll find in a jar. It was good enough to net Peña a prize at the Pasco Fiery Foods Festival in 2008.

At the Pasco market, Alan Hembree has taken a different approach. Hembree came to the Tri-Cities a year ago in search of work, and when it didn't materialize, he created his own. Calling himself "Fat Daddy" (a name he says his son bestowed on him), Hembree roasts peppers that marketgoers bring him. As a sideline, he also offers fire pits made from old washing machines.

Besides the farmers and craftsmen, many farmers markets also give local organizations a chance to fund-raise. At Prosser, the teens of Young Life cook up pancakes on Saturday mornings. The tradition was started by the Kiwanis, who passed the torch (or rather, the spatula) to Young Life three or four years ago.

One benefit of the farmers market to the community is the cost to the consumer. Alan Schrieber pointed out that, contrary to the popular image of food, the prices at a farmers market are "pretty comparable" to those at a supermarket. In fact, because many grocery stores charge extra for food labeled "organic," a farmers market may even be a savings.

Fresh fruits and vegetables are one thing that many people in the lower economic brackets find hard to come by, even in farm country, because it's hard to buy in bulk and keep it fresh. In many states, Washington included, the Women, Infants and Children program (WIC) offers vouchers to low-income families.

According to the USDA's website,"The WIC Farmers' Market Nutrition Program (FMNP) is associated with the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children, popularly known as WIC. The WIC Program provides supplemental foods, health care referrals and nutrition education at no cost to low-income pregnant, breastfeeding and non-breastfeeding post-partum women, and to infants and children up to 5 years of age, who are found to be at nutritional risk."

Some communities have taken the concept even farther. At Leavenworth, for instance, an anonymous benefactor has set up a fund to provide fresh produce to people who otherwise might go without.

"It's called 'veggie vouchers,'" said Marco Aurilio, president of the Leavenworth Farmers Market board. "People can apply for the vouchers locally rather than filling out a lot of government paperwork. They spend the vouchers at the market, and the farmers cash them in at the end of the day. It's locals helping locals."

If there's a single word to describe the farmers market, that's it: Local. In smaller communities, chances are the farmer and the buyer know each other. Even larger venues have a community feel to them. While the grown-ups man the booths, the children alternate between watching and learning, and going off to play with other market kids, as their attention spans allow.  Small towns often hold their markets on weekdays to allow the vendors to go to the larger towns on Saturdays, but it's still the same people.

Says Aurilio, "You're shaking the hand of the person who grows the food. That makes a difference."