Salsa Hangover

I spent much of this weekend dashing between places. From home to work; work to Folk Fest; Folk Fest home and then back again 11 hours later; back home and then Sun & Salsa Festival.

I ate so much salsa today, folks. There were purportedly over 40 salsas at the Salsa Fest, which we, the eaters, are supposed to vote on. I've been to the festival at least 4 times, but have never formally voted. I haven't even seen the opportunity to vote in recent years. Ah well.

Some of it was cheap or bland or salty. Some of it was so, so good. I didn't take notes; as you may know, it is hard enough to balance a platter of multigrain Tostitos and a teetering tower of teeny salsa samples, but add in a pen and notepad? Nuh uh.

Standouts included the Naked Leaf with a peach-mango salsa (c/o Una Pizza+Wine) that was beautifully complemented by organic ginger-peach tea leaves (that's assuming memory serves me right after a conversation with owner Jonathan; he tells me the tea is reminiscent of chai, but isn't quite there. A seriously cool tea shop, my friends. I wrote a little story about it in my early days as a journalist).

Farmerless Market (Updated)

Aw dang.

I got to the Hillhurst Sunnyside Farmers' Market around 6:45 this evening. I knew it was running 3:30 to 7:30 and that my late arrival might decrease my chances of finding my coveted local asparagus, but I actually had a pretty busy early evening.

My plan was to find a bunch of lovely – if expensive – local veggies, steam or roast them and pour vegan gravy on top. But there were no vegetables to be found.

OK, I think I saw some hydroponic bio-dynamic scallions sticking out of a basket, but I certainly didn't see any of the B.C. fruit or local veg that was touted by the HSFM website.

We went and bought the fixin's for tacos instead at Safeway. Walking back through the farmer's market with a plastic Safeway bag (I somehow dropped my reusable on the floor of my closet instead of putting it in my purse. Can't tell ya how I managed that) almost felt like it should be shameful. But, irked as we were that there were no vegetables to be seen, the shame was gone almost immediately (also the thought of tacos helped).

I couldn't help but tweet my disappointment when I got home.

Though nobody from the Market has been available to give me the scoop yet, at least I wasn't alone:

Oh well. My assumption is that the vendors sold out and headed out once their wares were gone. I only bought things a few times there last year – I think it was either because they didn't have the vegetables I was interested in, or because we were taking regular trips to Crossroads. However, I would really like to be able to pick up some fresher, more local items there this year, seeing as it's so very close to my apartment.

Stuff I did see? Mead, some frozen pizzas, bison meat, a bouncy castle, kids playing soccer, Thai food, and some surprisingly entertaining music (although I don't think that will be a regular feature).

I will do my best to hit up earlier next time and find something delightful to report back!

(P.S.: My buddy Kelsey wrote up an article for Beatroute about Farmers' Markets in Calgary!)

An update!