Columbus Foodie

Today was one of those days, if you know what I mean. Not only is it the Ohio Food & Wine Festival at the North Market (thus my normal parking space at the meter was being blocked off), but they were doing construction on the freeway I take to get to the Worthington market. Either way, it meant a detour, and since we had to change up our route, we decided to change up our routine as well.

We got to the North Market a little later than usual because I forgot the memory card in my camera and we had to go back for it. Still, I wasn’t planning on getting that much this week anyway, as I don’t want to cook every night. So, we get there and I got half a pound of shiitakes this time (because I can’t forego them all together), and a few ears of corn from Mrs. Rhoads to try. Not to say that there wasn’t plenty of beautiful produce out there this morning. There definitely was. For example, this variety of plum (“Methley”) that I’m not familiar with. I don’t often see plums at the farmer’s markets.

Or these cute tiny eggplant from Wayward Seed Farm.

We got to Worthington a little later than usual, and it was packed. I only picked up a couple of things here – some blueberries, pie cherries, and Rainier cherries from Gillogly Orchards (pictured below are some pie cherries from Pop and Judy’s), some fry pies and baby squash from 2 Crows, and Lavender Honey from Dawn at Mockingbird Meadows.

As usual, lots of pretty flowers everywhere you look. Can I just say how much I love the look of these? Screams summer to me.

So here’s where things get a little different. Paul and I wanted to hit Creole Kitchen for breakfast (they stop serving it at 10am), and we didn’t especially need any dairy or eggs, so we decided to skip out on Clintonville completely. We got our breakfast (more details later, I promise!), got home and ate it, and it was still only 10:45ish. So we decided to shake things up a bit by going to a new to us farmer’s market in Grove City.

I’ve got to say, I’m impressed by the size and selection there. While there are a ton of prepared/preserved foods there, there was also tons of vendors selling produce (although pickin’s were slim at 11am) and a bison farmer as well. It was the only place I saw Ohio peaches at this week – these are from Circle S Farms, I believe.

And from Lund Fruit Farm, interesting take on cider. Didn’t get any today, but plan to in the future.

Definitely shows promise, and since that market starts at 8, I may make a quick stop there next week early before going to the North Market. So where did you all go and what did you get? Any other hidden gem farmer’s markets I should know about?