Savoy Cabbage & Bacon

Savoy Cabbage & Bacon as prepared by Chef Daniel Newell of Zoë on July 29, 2010. Photo copyright 2010 by Zachary D. Lyons.

As prepared by Chef Daniel Newell of Restaurant Zoë on July 29, 2010 at the Olympic Sculpture Park Farmers Market, using market fresh ingredients.

Ingredients:

• 2 medium size savory cababge heads, quartered, cored & cut into 1/4″ slices
• 1 medium onion, small to medium dice
• 8-12 slices pasture raised bacon
• 1 cup verjus (substitute apple cider — hard or sweet)
• 1 each lemon, zested
• 2 T butter
• salt to taste

Preparation:

Render out bacon, add onion and sweat until tender. Add cabbage and sweat for 3-5 minutes. Add verjus and reduce. When almost dry add butter and stir in. Finish with lemon zest and adjust seasoning with salt.

Grill Roasted Loki Seafood’s Keta Salmon

The ingredients for Jeff's Grill Roasted Salmon. Photo copyright 2010 by Zachary D. Lyons.

As prepared by Chef Jeff Maxfield of SkyCity at the Needle for his demonstration at Olympic Sculpture Park Farmers Market on July 22, 2010.

Ingredients:

• 1 side skin on Keta salmon (approx 3lb)
• 1 cup fresh raspberries
• ½ ea small sweet onion, thinly sliced
• 3 ea garlic cloves, chopped
• 1 ea lemon, sliced into rounds
• 4 oz cold butter, cut into slabs
• Salt and pepper
• 4 sprig fresh thyme

Preparation:

Fold heavy duty aluminum foil to form a boat around the salmon.  Season with salt and pepper, layer on garlic, onion, raspberries and lemon, place butter over the top with thyme on last, roast in a medium high grill with the lid closed for 15 minutes or until fish is lightly cooked through.

Salmon ready to grill roast. Photo copyright 2010 by Zachary D. Lyons.

Raspberry Beurre Rouge

Ingredients:

• 1 cup red wine vinegar (preferably raspberry infused)
• 1 ea shallot, sliced
• 2 Tbl whole peppercorns
• ¼ cup heavy cream
• 1 lb cold unsalted butter, cut into cubes
• ¼ cup fresh raspberries

Making Beurre Rouge. Photo copyright 2010 by Zachary D. Lyons.

Preparation:

In a non reactive sauce pan, add all ingredients except butter and reduce over medium high heat until mixture is ¼ of its original volume.  Reduce heat to medium low and slowly whisk in butter to form an emulsion. Season and strain through a fine mesh sieve.

Salmon fresh off the grill. Photo copyright 2010 by Zachary D. Lyons.

Thursday, July 22nd: Space Needle Chef Jeff Maxfield, Sweet Corn, Wild Alaskan Salmon, Artisan Bread, Tomatoes & More!

Chef Jeff Maxfield (on right) of SkyCity at the Needle. Photo copyright 2010 by Zachary D. Lyons.

Chef Jeff Maxfield of SkyCity at the Needle will help us launch Week 2 of your Olympic Sculpture Park Farmers Market. Jeff will perform a cooking demonstration at 5:30 p.m. under the red demo tent at the north end of the Market, next to The Eagle. Come learn great ideas for cooking up local deliciousness from the chef who’s office has the best view in Seattle.

Just a sampling of what Loki Fish has to offer. Photo copyright 2009 by Zachary D. Lyons.

We welcome Loki Fish to your Olympic Sculpture Park Farmers Market this week. Loki is based at Ballard’s Fishermen’s Terminal, and they fish in the cold waters of Alaska and Puget Sound for some the best salmon you will find. They catch all five major species of Pacific salmon, and they offer it up in all sorts of ways, from fresh-frozen fillets to smoked to jerky to spreads, patties and sausages, and even Ikura, or Keta Salmon Roe, the Northwest’s own native caviar.

Sweet corn from Alvarez Organic Farms. Photo copyright 2010 by Zachary D. Lyons.

Alvarez Organic Farms is located in Mabton, near Sunnyside, in the Yakima Valley. It is the hottest area in Washington in the summer, and the result is great, hot-weather crops, like this first-of-the-season sweet corn. They also have some of the first eggplant of the year this week, too, and don’t forget that they offer Washington’s only fresh, local peanuts — the best you’ve ever tasted.

Chef Lucy Damkoehler cooks for an attentive crowd, with Elliott Bay in the background. Photo copyright 2010 by Zachary D. Lyons.

If you missed opening day festivities last Thursday, you missed scenes like this, and I don’t just mean the stellar cooking demonstration by Pastry Chef Lucy Damkoehler from TASTE Restaurant. I mean the scene in the background — Elliott Bay! Yes, your Olympic Sculpture Park Farmers Market is surrounded by spectacular views, and it is filled with brilliant art. And now we’ve added a fantastic Thursday Market to the mix. And the best part is, if you did miss opening day, we’re going to repeat it all again today, and every Thursday! How sweet is that?

Beautiful artisan bread from Grateful Bread Bakery. Photo copyright 2010 by Zachary D. Lyons.

Grateful Bread offers up wonderful artisan breads, like these above, as well as delicious pastries, cookies, bagels, scones and more. But last week, they sold out fast, so make sure you get there early to pickup your loaf for dinner, and a bagel or scone for breakfast tomorrow, too!

Belltown's own farmers market. Photo copyright 2010 by Zachary D. Lyons.

Yes, this is Belltown’s own farmers market. And just look at this incredible scene, with all the farmer tents in the foreground, lining the Park’s Z-Path, and all the high-rise residential buildings of North Belltown in the background. If you go back and  look at the very first post to this blog in February, you will see a photo taken from this same vantage point, just sans Market. Wow, isn’t it amazing how much the Market adds to this seen?

Sungold cherry tomatoes from Stoney Plains. Photo copyright 2010 by Zachary D. Lyons.

Tomatoes are coming into season all over Washington now. Like these incredibly sweet Sungold cherry tomatoes from Stoney Plains. One of the quickest tomatoes to bear fruit, Sungolds are one of my favorite tomatoes. I can eat them like candy. Very sweet, low acid, they will never last long enough for you to get them into a salad, unless you buy a second pint, and even then I bet you’ll eat them all right out of the container.

A mix of six different berries from Jessie's Berries. Photo copyright 2010 by Zachary D. Lyons.

Berry season is just plain off the hook right now. And the proof is in this basket of berries from Jessie’s Berries. Currently, they are harvesting blackberries, blueberries, boysenberries, loganberries, marionberries and strawberries. Wow! Pickup a pint of cream from Golden Glen Creamery, and you’ve got dessert. Put in a little more effort with some flour from Finnriver Farm, some eggs from Skagit River Ranch and some butter from Golden Glen, and I can see a pie or a crisp in your future!

Certified organic chickens from Skagit River Ranch. Photo copyright 2010 by Zachary D. Lyons.

Speaking of Skagit River Ranch, they’ve got plenty of certified organic, pasture raised beef, pork and chicken (above) for your dining pleasure. Can’t you just smell it cooking of your grill on your deck right now? Of course, when your neighbors all ask you where you got that amazing smelling meat or chicken, you tell them, “at our Olympic Sculpture Park Farmers Market, every Thursday from 3:30-7:30 p.m.!”

And remember, this blog is your source for all things Olympic Sculpture Park Farmers Market. You will learn about what’s in season; the people and businesses that produce it; what chefs will be performing cooking demonstrations from week-to-week; recipes from those demos and our vendors; and so much more. Each week during the Market season, one or more articles will be posted here, and each week the What’s Fresh Now! pages in the upper right-hand margin will be updated to let you know what all you can expect to find this week at the Market. So check back often, subscribe to the RSS feed, and then come visit us at your new Olympic Sculpture Park Farmers Market!

Thursday, July 15th: Grand Opening Day!

Adam from Oxbow Farm smiling over his beautiful chard. Photo copyright 2009 by Zachary D. Lyons.

We’ve all been talking about this for months, wondering if the day would ever arrive: opening day of your new Olympic Sculpture Park Farmers Market. Well, that day is today! And we are excited. We have a whole lot in store for everyone, from great farmers, food artisans and artists to live music and dancing to TASTE’s Liquid Lounge and wine tastings to an incredible lineup of chefs doing cooking demonstrations every week. But first and foremost, what we have lined up for you is a grocery store, once a week for four hours, featuring the finest local food Washington has to offer. Yes, Belltown, one very densely populated grocery store desert, finally has a grocery store, and Olympic Sculpture Park Farmers Market is its name.

Anthony Estrella of Estrella Family Creamery. Photo copyright 2009 by Zachary D. Lyons.

By the way, this new, weekly grocery store of yours takes food stamps, just like any other grocery store. You just have to check in at the black tent that says “information” on it and ask to get Market tokens with your Quest card, and you are good to go. Of course, the difference here is that you can get high-quality food with your food stamps instead of the cheap, unhealthy, processed foods you are stuck with at Big Box grocers and corner convenience stores. Most of our farmers also accept WIC and Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Program checks (a.k.a., FMNP or “farmers market checks”).

Carrie from Alm Hill Gardens. Photo copyright 2009 by Zachary D. Lyons.

The Market debuts today at 3:30 p.m., with the first cooking demonstration of the season at 5:30 p.m. But I suppose you wanna know what vendors we are going to have today, don’t you? Okay, here is just a sampling:

• Alm Hill Gardens (a.k.a., Growing Washington), from Everson, will bring an incredible variety of vegetables, berries, flowers, shelling beans, and all manner of goodness over the coming weeks.
• Colinwood Farms, out of Port Townsend, has amazing greens, new potatoes, sweet peppers, summer squash, lettuce as big as your head, and so much more. Their soil is the blackest, richest earth I have ever seen.
• Skagit River Ranch, based in Sedro-Woolley produces some of the best, healthiest beef, pork, chicken and eggs from happy animals raised on the kind of farm those folks from California want you to think their dairy cows are raised on. I’ve been to Skagit River Ranch and seen how they care for their animals right to the end. A USDA inspector told me there is no more humane operation that he has ever seen.
• Estrella Family Creamery, in Montesano, is at the forefront of an artisan cheese revolution in Washington. In its short history, it has won multiple awards for its cheeses at national and international competitions.

Saffron from Phocas Farms. Photo copyright 2009 by Zachary D. Lyons.

You will be amazed at the locally produced food products you will find at your Olympic Sculpture Park Farmers Market — products you may not have known were being produced around here, and products that might have been difficult for you to find elsewhere. These product include:

• Saffron, grown and cured with care by Phocas Farms in Port Angeles. This saffron is being used in the kitchens of many of the finest restaurants in Seattle, as it is of a quality and freshness hard to find in imported saffron. And given that over 70% of the world’s saffron is produced in Iran, think of the reduction in your carbon footprint you will achieve just by using this local saffron.
• Gluten-free bread from Ballard’s Platypus Breads. Gluten-free bread is hard enough to find locally, but really good gluten-free bread is almost impossible to find, until now.
• Local milk, bottled in returnable glass bottles, direct from Golden Glen Creamery in Bow. This may be the best milk I’ve ever tasted, and once you’ve had milk bottled in glass, you will never go back to plastic bottles again. Plus, Golden Glen bottles incredible heavy cream and half-n-half, and they make the only farmstead butter in Washington you can buy.

The Dante behind Dante's Inferno Dogs. Photo copyright 2010 by Zachary D. Lyons.

You will be able to pick up a snack while you shop at your Olympic Sculpture Park Farmers Market, from such local originals as:

• Dante’s Inferno Dogs from Ballard, slinging great dogs and sausages that happily fill any stomach’s void.
• Patty Pan Grill makes delicious vegetarian quesadillas and tamales from local ingredients, many of which are sourced from our Market farmers.
• Whidbey Island Ice Cream offers up a tremendous selection of ice cream flavors by the bar and the pint.
• And TASTE Restaurant & Events, one of the Market’s partners, which has set the standard in Seattle for using local ingredients to make world-class cuisine. TASTE will be creating delectable concoctions using ingredients from Market farmers.

Keith from Finnriver Farm in Chimacum, which produces hard ciders and fine grain products. Photo copyright 2010 by Zachary D. Lyons.

And remember, this blog is your source for all things Olympic Sculpture Park Farmers Market. You will learn about what’s in season; the people and businesses that produce it; what chefs will be performing cooking demonstrations from week-to-week; recipes from those demos and our vendors; and so much more. Each week during the Market season, one or more articles will be posted here, and each week the What’s Fresh Now! pages in the upper right-hand margin will be updated to let you know what all you can expect to find that week at the Market. So check back often, subscribe to the RSS feed, and then come visit us at your new Olympic Sculpture Park Farmers Market!