Yellow morels: who wouldn’t want to cook that?
With farmers markets, bigger isn’t always better. The People’s Farmers Market has shown me that. So this year I made an effort to get to one of the most recommended of the smaller markets, The Hollywood Farmers Market.
It’s not tiny like the one at the People’s Coop, but it’s probably smaller than the Hillsdale Market. Despite its size, there were several unique and interesting vendors with a solid balance of choices overall. Following are the highlights.
Poc choi from Winter Green Farms
Some very good produce options from vendors I haven’t seen elsewhere. A huge painted morel immediately caught my eye and I knocked over women and children and hurdled dogs in the midst of a death match to get there. Peak Forest Fruit was selling both black and yellow morels. The yellows were quite large (see photo at top), some larger than my fist. Both looked fresh and ready to be cooked. They were selling other mushrooms in dried forms.
Both Winter Green Farm, from a town I lived in for several years, Noti, Oregon, and Sweet Leaf Farms were new to me. Winter Green had mostly greens and herbs, with some very fresh looking choi (see photo above), root vegetables, and artichokes. Spring Leaf had potatoes and an emphasis on other root vegetables, such as carrots and radishes, plus some herbs and greens, such as kale. Both held their own very well against Deep Roots, which can be found at nearly every farmers market in Portland metro, I think.
The homey pastries from Kate’s kitchen.
There were several nurseries and stands with plants and starters for sale, but few preapared foods. A nice exception was Kate’s Specialty Baking. Most of the baked goods were bars and brownies, with slices of spice cake and dainty mini pound cakes as other options. (See above.)
Livin’ Spoonful makes raw food snack products, such as pesto pumpkin seed crackers. Question: Why do such items, developed by those who wage war against processed foods, taste so processed? Doritos taste more natural. Bless their hearts for trying to stick to their ideals, but that ain’t food.
I cleared my palate with some lamb pepperoni stick from Perendale, the folks who supplied LOW with their lamb when they were at the Portland Farmer’s Market. It was nice to see they were still making their product available since they stopped going to the PSU market.
The food choices were rounded out with two seafood vendors, Gilson Marine Farms and Briney Sea Delicaseas.
Face-painting from Wiggles the Clown
It is a small market, but it has a nice character. Parents pull their produce and their children around in wagons. They have live music and on the day I was there, Wiggles the Clown painting kiddies’ faces. Parking was easy to find less than a block away and no stalls ever got overwhelmed like they do at the Portland Farmers Market and the Beaverton Farmers Market (even the Hillsdale Market at times), making the shopping comfortable and relaxed. I will be back. The mushrooms alone are worth the trip.
Hollywood Farmers Market
Saturdays, 8:00 – 1:00
May 7 – October 29
NE Hancock between 44th & 45th
One block South of Sandy
503.233.3313
