home

O

riental’s Farmers’ Market happens every Saturday on Hodges Street between South Water Street and the Oriental harbor. Now that warmer weather and earlier sunrises are here, the market returns to its 8-11a schedule.

This Saturday, May 25, you can learn about bees during a free workshop starting at 9a. Bees are much in the news lately, as greater numbers of honeybees are dying off. Daniel Simpson from Pamlico’s Agricultural Extension Office will be talking about bees’ importance in pollination and he’ll have a hive to show bees in action.

What You’ll Find at The Market This Week, May 25.

(Check back – list is ever-updated.)

Sandie of Academy Street Gardens will have speckled butterhead lettuce, new red fire lettuce, Swiss chard, NC sweet potatoes, beets, cabbage, sugar snap and snow peas, brown eggs, spinach, red giant mustard, fun gin pad tsai(mild Asian greens), suehaling 2 (sweet and sharp Asian mustard), misomi (sweet asian green), nero di Toscano, dinosaur, and red Russian kales, beautiful collards, and maybe squash. All naturally grown here in Oriental (except the sweet potatoes). without harmful pesticides or fertilizers, only OMRI (Organic Materials Research Institute) approved materials- sea weed, fish emulsion, etc.

Sandie will also have have freshly-baked bagels and 9-grain English muffins, pecan raisin bread, zucchini bread, fresh apple muffins, and more. Also, both hot and sweet pepper jellies, pickled beets. And for the garden: perennials that grow well in the coastal South including gaura, hostas, ornamental sage, variegated solomons seal, ginger lilies, lilies, cone flowers, rudbeckia, etc. All plants are grown here in Oriental.

George and Judy Smith are back at the market this week, selling sugar snap peas, spinach, collards, Swiss chard, zucchini and summer squash and ruby red lettuce. All grown at The Barn on Janiero Rd.

Bob from Old Cypress Farm in Bayboro will be selling fresh pastured eggs.

Joe and Kim Spruill of J&K Farms will be selling fresh free range eggs.

BeeBee’s Best will be at market selling assorted fresh baked breads along with croutons and pretzel rolls. she will also be selling assorted cookies, sliced lemon pound cake, homemade sugar peanuts, and perhaps a surprise or two.

Kip’s Kitchen will have 6 types biscotti, chocolate zucchini and banana spice breads, small and large quiche Lorraine, small and large spinach quiche, pecan pies and tarts, pumpkin rolls.

Mary Kathryn with Red Robin Soaps will be at Saturday’s market with a full line of homemade scented soaps, hand cream and lip balm (both made with organic beeswax) and lots of fun, lovely crocheted items. Come check out my new crocheted market bags…

Rolayne of Neuse River Winery will be there with information about the winery here in town and to display Rolayne’s quilted table linens.

Phyllis will have dog biscotti for sale.

Events Coming Up At The Oriental Farmers’ Market

Daniel Simpson of the Agricultural Extension Service will present workshops at our market to help you grow your garden, from now through the fall.

• Growing Vegetables – June 15
• The Fall/Winter/Spring Garden – August 17 and
• Native and Wildlife Plantings – September 21.

A Preview of What Vendors Are Growing & Prepping for Market Soon

Mel of Blue Bottle Gardens will have hardneck garlic in late June-early July.

Christine of Enchanted Gardens Farm has a lot growing at her farm in Alliance right now: yellow squash, zucchini, spaghetti squash, acorn squash, a variety of heirloom tomatoes, heirloom peppers, as well as hybrid tomatoes and peppers. Cantaloupe, watermelon, okra, cabbage, some corn, leeks and garlic, red, white and yellow onions, cucumber, sweet potatoes, pole beans. All are naturally grown with no chemical pesticides or herbicides. She says that when her chickens start laying in late summer, she will bring eggs of the blue and brown variety to the market. She’s also in the process of having my kitchen certified (as is required by the NC Dept of Agriculture of anyone selling baked goods at the market.) Once that comes through, Christine will be selling baked goods as well.

And just a teensy request or two…..

1) Small bills — ones and fives — make life easier for the vendors, especially in the early moments of the market. (Tens and twenties welcomed too, of course, but the smaller bills are better first thing..)

2) There should be plenty of parking available on Hodges – from the harbor to Academy Street and on South Water Street. Unless you’re planning to be shopping inside the Provision Company, though, please don’t park in the spaces directly in front of or beside that building. Those spaces are needed for their customers and everyone wants to be a good neighbor.

The Mid-Week Oriental Farmers’ Market

This is where you can reprovision with fresh vegetables. The Mid-week Market happens Wednesdays from 4-6p on Hodges Street on weeks when produce sellers have abundant crops.

A Different Way To Cook?

If you’re looking for a new way to cook the produce you buy at the Oriental Farmers’ Market, check out our Recipe page.

Five Years Old And Counting

Our first market on Hodges started with just 3 vendors on July 14, 2007. To celebrate our 5th birthday the Oriental Farmers’ Marketraffled off two Baskets of Plenty made up of goods from the vendors — fresh produce, bouquets, jam, herbs, jewelry, soap, baked goods, pottery and iron works.

The winners were Wally Umbach of Oriental — who’s rarely missed a market since our start 5 years ago — and Bette Hooten of Florida who was visiting family in the area.

Congratulations to the winners.

A Sampling Of The Oriental Farmers’ Market In Those Baskets of Plenty…

Basket One:

Fresh bread and jar of jam from Sandie’s Academy Street Gardens – Eggs from Bob Lyons’ Old Cypress Farm – Jar of Bay Leaves and garlic from Blue Bottle Gardens – Fresh produce and cut flowers from Kim’s KD Gardens – Baked goodies from Pat’s BeeBee’s Best Kitchens – A loaf of Kip’s Kitchen bread – Soap from Mary Kathryn’s Red Robin Soaps – Quilled art ornament from Jan O’Leary – Booklet, “Oriental: Jewel By The River’s Edge” from the Oriental History Museum- – A baby pitcher from Candace Young’s Bay River Pottery – Earrings by Pat Elliott – Fused glass pendant from Dottie Miller – Shrub from John Hawes

Basket Two:

Fresh produce and cut flowers from Kim’s KD Gardens – Jam and baked goods from Sandie’s Academy Street Gardens – Eggs from Bob Lyons’ Old Cypress Farm – Baked goodies from Pat’s BeeBee’s Best Kitchens – A loaf of Kip’s Kitchen bread – A felted Dragon Egg soap from Nancy’s Soaps and Such – Quilled art ornament from Jan O’Leary – Fused glass pendant from Dottie Miller – Earrings made by Anni Frohlich of EcoPlanetArt – 50 Biodegradable garbage bags from Jayne Stasser of Pamlico Green – Old-fashioned fireplace metal hook for planters or bird feeders, from Oriental Ironworks – Shrub from John Hawes

Meanwhile, the raffle raised more than $225, and those proceeds are going to the Oriental History Museum. (Look for an upcoming exhibit there about Food in Oriental.)

Looking for Organically Raised Chicken and Meat in Oriental?

One more note: organically raised meats and poultry are easier to get in Oriental now. You can have your organic meats and get them delivered, too.

Genell Pridgen and her husband and her parents raise chickens, cows, pigs and lambs at their Rainbow Meadow Farms in Snow Hill. They also make bacon and sausage from the organically raised animals and all of it is in great demand from here to the Triangle. (And for good reason: the meats really do taste better than the mass-produced ones.)

What’s good for us is that Genell and her family come to Oriental every other weekend for some R&R from the hard work on their farm. Genell says that if Oriental Farmers’ Market customers want to order Rainbow Meadow meats on line, she can deliver them when she comes to Oriental. The Rainbow Meadow Farm website is http://www.rmfpasturepuremeats.com

A big “Thank You” for nurturing our grassroots….

The Oriental Market has been a truly grassroots effort since its start in July 2007 and we remain a grassroots effort. We get no funding from any source other than you when you come to the market. Now in to our fifth year, we send a big thanks to you for your support….

If you’re new to us, and if you are looking for locally grown, locally made food, some introductions are in order. Namely, we are as local as you are going to get, unless you grow it yourself. Throughout the year — all 12 months — you’ll find produce grown in gardens in Oriental and Pamlico County. Eggs laid by Pamlico County hens. Breads and other baked goods coming from local ovens. As well as plants and artisans’ work….

Most of our growers raise their produce without chemicals. Find out for yourself. Come on down and talk to the people who grow the food and ask them how they grew it. That’s the beauty of the Oriental Farmers’ Market. You can also ask about the chickens that lay the eggs and the baked goods that come from Oriental and Pamlico County kitchens and the artisans’ work and the plants….

Our Earth Day Celebration

We had a great turnout on Saturday April 21 for the Oriental Farmers’ Market Earth Day Celebration. Lots of customers took part in the Environmental Trivia Quiz and drawing offered by PamlicoGreen. For the record, the answers to the questions were that: 500 billion to 1 trillion plastic bags are consumed yearly, that 1-3% of them are recycled and that 25-30% of plastic bottles are recycled.

Congratulations to: D Wogaman who won a Chico Sling reusable shopping bag, Claire Pittman, winner of a roll of biodegradable garbage bags and Judy O’Brien, who won two sets of bamboo (reusable) utensils.

Thanks to Jayne Stasser of PamlicoGreen who provided the winning gifts and organized the Earth Day Celebration.

The Oriental Farmers’ Market sign floated away in Hurricane Irene from its usual position outside the Wits’ End on Hodges Street. During the storm surge, it floated away and away and away and came to rest in a backyard in the SailLoft subdivision on the other side of the bridge. It’s since been returned to its home.

Our other Oriental Farmers’ Market sign came back home in late September, thanks to Bill Manger who found it while clearing trees near a friend’s home at Otter Creek. After floating 8/10ths of a mile away in Irene, the sign is a little heavier — with all the absorbed water — and needed a wash, but it’s back on Hodges Street to again let passersby know about the market.

Got A Recipe?

Want to share a recipe with the Oriental Farmers’ Market? We’re open to recipes for any thing that’s in season or sold at the market. Drop us a line here and we’ll post your recipe on the recipes page (To send the recipe, just click reply on this email.)

Come On Down And Sell At The Market

We welcome you to sell at the market if you have something that is locally made or locally grown. Basically, if it’s locally made or locally grown, bring it to the market to sell. There are a few more guidelines for selling at the market which you can read here. As guidelines go, these are pretty simple, so come on down and join us as a vendor. (But please, contact us first so we can let our customers know you’re coming.)

We also welcome your ideas of food-plant-craft related demonstrations to happen at the Farmers’ Market. For more info, call Melinda at 675-0180.

email this page | back to top