Bathurst Farmer's Markets

So, it was out of bed nice and early yesterday to get to the monthly Bathurst farmer's markets. It was something of a contrast to the Oberon offerings a couple of weeks ago, but possibly not in the way you'd expect. Yes, we were greeted by mountains of produce and many many stalls, but I couldn't help noticing on the 'reconnaisance' round, that some of the stallholders were being quite naughty with what they were promoting as 'fresh'...particularly one elderly Italian couple who kept assuring me every 30 seconds as I perused their stall that 'everything fresh this morning!'...I harumphed internally and walked firmly away from the yellowing tops of their spring onions, shrivelled zucchini and other sub-standard offerings.

 I am incredibly annoyed by this particular phenomenon. I object to people trying to hoodwink me into buying unseasonal, non-local and aging produce (and charging a pretty penny for the privelege!). I go to markets to buy seasonal fresh produce from the grower. I don't expect strawberries in winter or even a vast variety on offer from each stall. Each display that looks suspiciously like a greengrocer should usually be avoided. They didn't grow all that, and chances are, they don't know who did. Kudos then to the lady and her son selling only tomatoes and various capsicum varieties, the cackleberry man, the lovely oferings from the berry farm and stone-fruits stalls, and the small but delightful organic veg and jams/pickles stall.

Despite my disappointment in the rapidly disappearing virtue of honesty in humanity, we did come away with a great haul this week! Free range organic eggs, blueberries, sweetcorn, kale, carrots, patty-pan squash, green beans, cauliflower, cabbage, onions, broccoli and banana capsicum.

Due to a certain foetal person causing me some discomfort, the meal derived from the above was pretty simple, but absolutely delicious! With actual fresh produce, the flavours are so zingy and intense that simplicity in preparation is always the best way to go.

So, corn fritters it was (Stephanie Alexander's recipe). The really special thing about these chaps is their fluffy consistency and crunchy golden outsides...due to frying them in clarified butter..eek! I decided to serve them with a simple fresh vegetable medley of carrots, zucchini, squash and broccoli simply drizzled in a white sauce. Honestly the simplest meal I've cooked in ages, but from Brett's various appreciative noises...a success:-)

The other adventure of the day was to make a spicy rich plum sauce from the mountain of Satsuma plums given to me by our neighbour, Betty. They're under-ripe but she's determined to get them all off the tree before the impressively large flock of cockatoos decimates the lot. Of course, no sooner had I put the sauce on than another bag of Betty-plums arrived courtesy of her son (our Landlord!)...yep, it's all a bit scary :-)
This is a very simple recipe but creates such a gorgeous rich sauce, it's worth the effort. Plums, cloves, allspice, peppercorns, brown sugar, salt, fresh ginger, chilli and white wine vinegar. You tie the spices in muslin bags (or in my case...Chux...don't worry, they do the same job), smash a few plum stones into another bag and boil for 2 hrs before a quick whiz in the food processor and then carefully

 funnel into cleaned and sterilized jars...carefully! This stuff is lava-hot! So, I now have plum sauce that I have no idea what to do with. Usually plum sauce is a great buddy to red meat dishes, especially as a glaze for a roast or a marinade for a BBQ...Hmm, maybe my best option is to just give them away to my friends and family? Any vegetarian plum-sauce suggestions gratefully received, I would like to try at least one jar ourselves:-). Oh, and before some bright-spark suggests selling them at my own Farmer's market stall,-this place is crawling with plum trees. Plums are bloody everywhere and I rather suspect that most women out here make their own plum sauce/jam and that a stall venture might be rather akin to selling ice to eskimos:-)