Sweet tangerines and tangelos from Orange Blossom Farm

Looking to stock your holiday pantry and to pick up last-minute gifts? The Pearl Farmers Market will be expanded this Saturday into a full-fledged holiday festival with extended hours and extensive offerings.

Come early for a tamalada with chef Johnny Hernandez. Don’t worry if you aren’t an early riser and can’t be there by 9:30 a.m.; the tamales will be available throughout the day with varieties including chicken with tomatillo; veggie bean and cheese; and a special dessert tamal- strawberry, cherry and raisin.  True Flavors will also be selling tamales as well as breakfast tacos to curb your hunger while shopping.  The Pearl’s restaurants will be open for business and one of them, Il Sogno, will have a booth selling Italian meatball sandwiches.

The shiny new Saweet Cupcake truck.

For those who can’t conceive of Christmas without chocolate, check out Melissa Guerra’s kitchen demo at 10:30 p.m.  She will be cooking with Aztecan chocolate.

Other activities include gingerbread house workshops for families who want to make their own or perhaps even a whole village.  The class will be held at the Center for Architecture.  Synergy Studio’s students will perform; last week, the dancers and drummers were in the covered area at the Full Goods Building.  The Twig Bookshop, which recently moved into the Pearl complex, will have a reading at 3 p.m. of “Tamales, Comadres, and the History of Civilization” by UTSA professor Ellen Riojas Clark and Carmen Tafolla.  Not to be forgotten, Santa Claus himself will be putting in an appearance during the festivities.

Seasoned Feta from CKC Farms is shelf stable for 6 months.

On the other side of the Full Goods Building, an artisans market will feature items for anyone’s stocking.  Items include holiday food items, arts, jewelry, and more.  The usual vendors of the Farmers Market will be bringing great items for gifts as well.  Watson Farm will have an extensive selection of small batch jams and sauces perfect for stocking stuffers; some notables include Roseberry Jam (strawberry & rosemary) and Basilberry Jam (blackberry and basil).  Sandy Oaks will have both this year’s vintage of olive oil, as well as last year’s, in addition to gift items like soaps, olive trees, hand creams, and salt scrub.

Instead of buying all of your holiday meal’s produce and ingredients from the grocery store, check out the offerings of the Farmers Market.  Oak Hill Farms will be offering a variety of vegetables including root vegetables (carrots, beets, and turnips), as well as leafy greens (red and green kale).  Finca Pura Vida will have many items such as Daikon radish, arugula, winter squash, and snow peas.  They will also be selling Germain Porcelain garlic; Gayla Lyons of the farm said that the variety has more flavor due to its higher oil content and it won the New York garlic show two years in a row.  Braune Farms will have kohlrabi, red green onions, and possibly tomatoes and bell peppers.  Hartman Farm of Stockdale will have cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, and swiss chard, as well as fresh eggs.  Orange Blossom Farms from Carrizo Springs will have certified organic Bower tangerines and tangelos.

Giant turnips from Braune Farms

For the main course of your holiday table, L & M from Floresville will have steaks (rib-eye, club, sirloin, T-bone), roasts, and stew meat.  Linda Perez says many of her customers are planning to make Boeuf Bourguignon for their Christmas celebration and she has recipes on hand to help.  She also says that her booth will be transformed for the day into a Bull and China Shop – in addition to the cuts of meat, she will be selling some of her own ceramics.

Thunderheart Bison will also have a variety of meats available to take home, and My Big Bib will be taking orders for holiday turkeys and hams.  If you can’t wait until then, they are selling BBQ plates from their smoker.

Local cheeses for gift giving and your own table will be available.  CKC Farms from Blanco will have a variety of fresh goat cheeses, including seasoned feta in jars decorated with raffia.  Humble House Foods offers Camembert, Camberti (a dried Camembert similar to Parmesan), mascarpone, and others.  If you consider serving a holiday cheese plate, Guajillo (White Brush) honey from Spalten Honey Co. would complement it.  They sell small bears and containers up to 96 ounces – perfect for making mead.  Want some nuts to grace that plate?  Some of the vendors offering them are Al’s Homemade Nuts, Ocker Pecan Company, and Rhew Orchards.

Gift ideas from Rhew Orchards

Desserts and other baked goods will be available from several of the vendors.  Sol y Luna will have Cranberry Apple Coffee Cake and Cranberry Walnut Lavain, in addition to their Christstöllen, made from almonds, cardamom, and dried fruits including golden raisins and citron.  Biga will have a large variety of breads. Gluten-free fresh baked goods by HGD Foods will be available, as well as mixes for pancakes on Christmas morning.   Rhew Orchards will not only have pecans; they are offering baked treats including breads like banana pecan and pumpkin pecan, as well as pies: chocolate pecan, lemon pecan, and buttermilk pecan.

Vendors that are normally not part of the Farmers Market will also be selling treats.  The Culinary Institute of America-San Antonio students will be selling homemade buñuelos throughout the day; whether or not you can wait to get them home for gifts is another matter.  Gourmet desserts and peanut brittle will be available from MS Chocolatier and Violet Talk will have their fudge.  The Saweet Cupcake truck will have cupcakes and hot chocolate to keep your sugar fix for all the shopping.

Your last-minute holiday solution awaits!

Pearl Holiday Festival
200 E. Grayson St.
San Antonio, TX 78215
9a.m. – 4 p.m.
www.eventsatpearl.com

(Photos: Kristina Mistry)

This morning a new produce vendor joins the Pearl Farmers Market – Finca Pura Vida from Fayetteville.  For its  debut, its owners will offer a variety of produce including basil, sweet peppers (orange, red and yellow), okra (green and burgundy), eggplant, and Asian pears.  In addition, they will be selling pipian, an heirloom variety of Costa Rican squash that is shaped similar to a zucchini and is very pale with a green tinge and green stripes.

The husband and wife pair, Gayla Lyons and Edgar Chaves, have been farming in Texas for nine years.  Chaves began his farming career in Costa Rica at the age of 2.

The farm exceeds organic standards and it is certified, Lyons says, adding that the couple do not use DNA-modified seeds nor do they use any of the 247 non-organic chemicals that are acceptable in the government’s standards.  She further explained that 98 percent of their seeds are heirlooms, with the exception of a few hybrid tomatoes.

In addition to vegetables and fruits, the farmers hope to bring some of their other products to Pearl soon.  They plan to have pork, beef and Thanksgiving turkeys.  They also raise chickens and are currently yielding six dozen eggs per day.  In a season where many farmers are complaining that it is too hot for chickens to lay, Finca Pura Vida has found success by feeding their chickens a mix of Amish grain.  In the spring, the couple also anticipate having goose and turkey eggs.

Pearl Farmers Market
Saturdays, 9 a.m. – 1 p.m. (rain or shine)
200 E. Grayson St.
San Antonio, TX 78215

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Boricua Food Market
110 Corinne Drive (at the intersection of Harry Wurzbach and Rittiman)
(210) 824-5759
Hours: Monday – Saturday 9 a.m. to 7:30 p.m.
Specialties: Moderate-sized market with Puerto Rican, Panamanian, Caribbean, and South American selections.

This casual market is now 15 years old and supplies the ingredients to make many Caribbean favorites.  Fresh produce includes  culantro, the long, sword-like herb leaf that tastes much like cilantro, but more powerful.

There are many more usual vegetables and then there are gems like cachucha peppers.  I was told that means “hat,” and they do look like a beret, but so do scotch bonnet peppers.  Still, I was assured that these are not the hot peppers, these are very mild.  Well, after taking the advice of the proprietor, I ground the culantro, the cachucha peppers, a couple of cloves of garlic, salt, and the juice of half a lime.  It was delicious, but not what I would call mild!  Maybe a scotch bonnet was accidentally in the batch.  Still, it was a great fresh salsa.
The store also sells a few herb plants like the brujo oregano.  It looks much like what I know as Cuban oregano, but I was again assured that this one is slightly different.
There were fresh and frozen staples like yucca, meats, fruits, and then there were some enticing coffees, jams, sauces, spices, and flours.  Plenty to keep you experimenting in the kitchen for the rest of the summer.

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Last Saturday morning, I took a cruise up I-10 to Boerne Stage Road and dropped by the farmers market at the Leon Springs Baptist Church parking lot. On a sunny morning it was easy to park and not yet steamy hot, so I could enjoy making the rounds of vendors.

Even at a distance, the plants and flowers displayed were a welcome eyeful of color in our currently dusty landscape. There were two tents with beautiful, healthy looking herbs, Hibiscus, and an intriguing flowering plant named a Rangoon Creeper.

I met Mario Obledo as I photographed some of the produce. He is the vice president of the Hill Country Farmers Market Association, the organization that promotes this market and three other markets in the area (see below for details). I learned that the Leon Springs market is year-round, 2 1/2 years into its growth and development, still with room for new additions and new ideas.

Every day you hear about “going green,” and at The Green Brownie company they are doing green in brownies! No, this isn’t a St. Patrick’s Day gimmick; these are delicious treats made with all-organic ingredients so you can feel good about indulging. Owner Tracy Carlson told me that they even used packaging that is eco-friendly. If you are in a more playful mood, the stand also has Brownies-on-a-stick (they are cute) as well as gluten-free brownies.

But the vision that most of us hold about a farmers market includes lots of fresh vegetables and fruit. As it should be, there were three well-stocked displays of bright, fresh, produce. I saw some good looking squash that were named Sunburst and White Scalloped, very much like a pattypan squash, at Bob Mishler’s Uncertain Farms. Lots of people were buying peaches and tomatoes, cucumbers and okra, potatoes and green beans, plums, bell peppers, jam, wow!

But there were baked breads, pecans (even pecan oils at Circle H Orchards), and some super yummy granola at Cowgirl Granola. Heather Hunter, the Head Cowgirl, has been making her toasty, oaty, nutty, tasty, amazing granola for about 8 years. She is out at Leon Springs every week, as well as the other three markets in the association. You can also contact her at cowgirlenterprises@gmail.com.

There is usually a grass-fed beef dealer, but he was out-of-town that morning. He’s expected back soon; meanwhile, there are other vendors with free-range eggs and various goodies to keep you busy until then.

I have been to a few farmers markets in our area and in other states — and even other countries. Leon Springs is not the biggest, but it has a good variety, easy to get service, and just a friendly, can-do, attitude. Go see for yourself and try something new!

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Saturdays, 8:30 a.m. – 1 p.m.
Leon Springs Baptist Church
24133 Boerne Stage Road (behind the H-E-B)

The other markets affiliated are:

• Boerne, Kendall County Fairgrounds, 1307 River Road, Boerne TX  Wednesdays 2-6 p.m., now through Nov. 18
• Bulverde-Spring Branch, The Branches Church, 4594 Highway 281 North, Bulverde, TX  Saturdays, 2:30-5:30 p.m., year-round.
• Helotes-Grey Forest, Helotes Hills United Methodist Church, 13222 Bandera Road, Helotes, TX  2nd & 4th Fridays, 3-6 p.m., now through Nov. 13

As I walked onto the grounds at the Pearl Brewery farmers market last Saturday, I was amazed at the huge crowds.  I started coming to this market since its inception and even attended the one that coincided with the opening of the River Walk extension, which forced drivers to park as far away as Sam’s Burger Joint.  This Saturday’s crowds were not quite as large, but trust me, San Antonio has found the Pearl.

An abundance of variety, though not necessarily of quantity, was available from Oak Hill Farms.  The booth had tomatoes, corn, cucumbers (both slicing and pickling), dill, potatoes, peppers (jalapeños, anaheims and bell), leeks, basil and peas.  To decorate your table, they also had small bunches of flowers at $3 each.  Business was brisk and the lines were long for this market favorite, but they were already out of a few items by 9:30 a.m.

At the first tasting tent, Melissa Guerra was serving up vegetarian tamales filled with Swiss chard.  I sampled the moist masa surrounding a flavorful center.  Although I know there is a staunch camp that believes tamales must be made with lard, or at least have been made in the vicinity of a pork product, I can assure you that these tamales had great flavor. They also are a nice change from the heavier tamales.  And Guerra shared her recipe here.

HGB Foods from Converse had a diverse selection of gluten-free mixes, including some for pizza crust, bread, brownies and pancakes.  I sampled a prepared pancake, slightly sweet and still fluffy.  According to Sarah Dauphinais, the $4 mix is enough to make three breakfasts for a family of five.  To top the pancakes, I would suggest their sweet apple butter. Give the mix and apple butter together for a great hostess gift.

JDsquared Ranch, a grower who specializes in cut flowers, irises and day lilies, offered naturally red Florenza sunflowers as well as colorful zinnias.  Next week, this grower, located on 137 acres southeast of San Antonio, promises to have Sunrich Lemon Sunflowers, with vivid yellow petals.

After passing Watson Farms’ booth of jams and jellies — and tasting a few — I first smelled, then saw the La Feliciana freestone peaches from Rhew Orchards of Floresville.  Was that giddiness sweeping over me?  Peaches always remind me of trekking out to Marburger Orchards with my family and spending a hot morning in their peach grove, picking bushels of peaches to eat on the spot and make into jam later.  Although I have a distinct fondness for freestone peaches for the ease of removing the flesh from the pit, I have always been partial to the semi-freestone variety June Gold. Fortunately, these were  available from Casket Orchards of San Marcos, which also offered some freestone Harvester peaches that were perfectly sweet and juicy.

Alligator Creek Farms offered green beans, cherry tomatoes, sunflowers and tomatillos.  It was the first time that I have seen tomatillos at the Pearl market and they looked like they would make a great roasted tomatillo salsa.

I waited in line to sample corn-dusted shrimp with a salsa made from market ingredients, but the tray was empty by the time the line reached about four people in front of me.  Chef Johnny Hernandez said that he used ingredients from three of the farmer’s market vendors, including cornmeal from HGD and NaturalShrimp from outside LaCoste.  As it would take about 15 minutes until the next cooking demonstration and since the sun was very strong, I decided to continue my rounds.

Braune Farms of Geronimo brought a variety of produce including watermelons, cantaloupe and sweet corn.  In retrospect, I should have gotten a huge watermelon and topped it with lime, cayenne pepper and salt like I had last month from a roadside vendor in L.A.  It would have been a great appetizer for Father’s Day.

I managed to find some shade while waiting in line for gazpacho from Brian Montgomery of Texas Farm to Table.  The cool soup was garnished with a slice of banana pepper, which made this sample extra special.  It was just the pick-me-up I needed to combat the crowds by Toyota’s give-away tent where free herbs were being offered.

Lori McLain, the daughter of Kitchen Pride’s owner, offered white, baby bello (crimini), portobello and oyster mushrooms — all picked the previous day.  I selected a perfect ¾-pound oyster mushroom, which smelled faintly of oysters from the sea.  Others in line asked what I planned to do with such a beauty.  I replied that I actually had no plan, but was going to straight to their Web site for recipe ideas.  The workers at the booth were very pleased with their Pearl debut and commented that they were definitely going to sell out.  They reassured me that this coming Saturday they would bring even more of their scrumptious mushrooms.

While waiting in line for mushrooms, I struck up a conversation with a gentleman who lamented the fact that there were no good Jewish delis in San Antonio.  Any of you have suggestions?  I told him that unfortunately, I was unaware of the presence in San Antonio of a Jewish deli like those I have found in New York or Brookline, Mass.  In his bag, he had challah from Sol y Luna Baking Co. and hoped it would be similar to the version that he missed.  I sought out the booth and also found other bread selections, including olive and caraway rye.  I bought the latter as a small Father’s Day gift. Upon sampling it, my father commented that it tasted like an authentic German rye, but it would have to be consumed quickly to avoid becoming stale.  In his household, bread does not last long; I am sure that it was finished at the next breakfast.

Finally exhausted by the sun, I made my way to cover.  At the back of Melissa Guerra’s store was a table set up with “cash and carry” lead-free pottery.  I lamented the fact that I generally carry very little cash and was unprepared to purchase the beautiful dishes and candelabras.  Next week, I’ll be sure to pad my wallet a little heavier.

Sauteed vegetables.

This year our garden took on an extra dimension of usefulness. Usually, it is composed of herbs, flowers and xeriscape shrubs, surrounded by grass that is lush or less-than-lush, depending upon the rainfall.

This year we put in vegetables. Maybe it was a reaction to being suddenly underemployed, like many others around the country. Or, maybe it was because we had more time to enjoy  in the garden. I like to think it was the latter.

As for the results, so far, let’s just say we’re still in ramp-up phase (kind of like our fab new Web site).

Saturday night, though, we went outside and picked tomatoes, squash and fresh herbs, which we added to some heirloom tomatoes and more squash a friend donated from her garden. The resulting dish was colorful, very healthful and served magnificently as a side to seared burgers and pasta tossed in olive oil and garlic.

There isn’t a recipe here, as such. Just follow these simple tips for a great vegetable saute – even if the garden is just producing odds and ends at the moment.

• Vegetables you can slice, dice, and just throw into a sauté pan with olive oil include any kind of tomato (even a green tomato, and especially grape or cherry tomatoes).
• Garlic. Onions. These may not be growing in the garden but they’re always inexpensive at the store. Keep them handy.
• Some vegetables might need to be blanched, or even par-boiled before being tossed into the saute pan. Green beans are one example — unless you are one of those who really like crisp, not-too-cooked green beans.  You know who you are.
• Back to the olive oil. I generally don’t put in just a spoonful or so of olive oil. The flavor is beautiful and a little more fat, even a tablespoon or two, won’t hurt. It’s a good fat.
• How to season: salt and pepper are always good. Try some fresh or crumbled dry oregano, savory, a small pinch of marjoram and an even smaller pinch of rosemary. With these latter herbs, a subtle hint is far better than an overwhelming dose. Chopped parsley adds a fresh dash of green. Sautééed mushrooms are never a bad thing.

Finally, don’t overcook these ingredients, fresh off the plant. Some things, like cherry or grape tomatoes, need only to be tossed around the pan over a medium-high heat until some of the skins burst. Perfect as a side, perfect as the “sauce” for grilled salmon or pan-fried trout. What could be easier, or speak more eloquently of summer?