ITS IMPORTANT at farmer's markets to know whether you’re dealing with an actual organic farmer, who will have grown the crop, or with a purveyor, who buys the crop wholesale and sells it retail. Not only does this guarantee that the food is organic, and that the profit will go directly to the farmers; it also means you can talk with the farmer about the food, how it’s grown, and how to best prepare it. A farmer can tell you much about the food you’re buying. A purveyor may be selling organic food but will probably not be able to tell you exactly why the food is organic and what makes it special.
The farmer will have produce that looks homegrown: Sizes and shapes will vary. You’ll find some runty beets and some oversized ones because they aren’t standardized for sale to supermarkets. Some tomatoes will have protuberances. You may spy the odd bug on the rib of a chard stalk. There may be several varieties of the same food. The name of the farm may be displayed. Farmers who sell their own products will often feature their oddball varieties—like the long, cylindrical Formanova beets, their grandma’s heirloom tomato, or a box of Hansen’s Bush Cherries. These aren’t items that supermarkets are much interested in, but the farmer may like to grow them for better flavor, as well as other practical and sentimental reasons.
What Farmers Can Tell you
When I grow my own food, I know everything about its growing conditions. These are the key factors:
- I know what varieties I have planted.
- I know how I fertilized and cultivated them.
- I know what problems I encountered growing them.
- I know how this year’s crop reacted to the weather and climate.
- I know whether this year’s crop is superior, ordinary, or inferior.
- I know when I harvested them.
- I know what the yield was this year.
What to ask the farmer
Any farmer will know this information about his or her crops, and this knowledge forms the basis for questions you can ask the seller to determine the following:
- Did the seller actually grow the crop?
- Has the crop been grown organically?
- What cultural (growing) techniques have been used?
- Has anything been done to counteract climatic difficulties?
- Was this a good, ordinary, or poor year for the crop—and why?
- How was the crop handled after harvest?
- Is this a crop to be dried, frozen, or canned, or eaten fresh?
- What’s a fair price for this crop?
The real farmer will be glad to talk with you about the different varieties he or she cultivates and how the crop was grown. As you read through the entry chapters in this book, you’ll discover some interesting organic agricultural techniques that farmers use to make sure the crop is of the highest quality. You can use this information to start up a discussion with the seller
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