Celebrating 260 Years of Farm to Table Eating

After you’ve enjoyed the festivities at the 260^th Birthday Celebration, visit the Main Library to view our display of photographs and the ledger for “Market Stands Sold” from 1905-1939. The ledger lists names of vendors, the number of feet sold, the price per foot, and the total. The ledger also includes market stands sold at 12^th Street beginning in 1936.

While at the Library, you may also want to pick up a cookbook with recipes and techniques for using the wonderful, fresh fruits and vegetables you bought at the market.

A useful selection is Williams-Sonoma’s Cooking From the Farm Market. Divided into sections like beans, crucifers, and berries, you’ll get descriptions and photos of the varieties; details about what to look for when buying and how to clean and store; and recipes like grilled salmon with spicy melon salsa. The Better Homes and Gardens Farmer’s Market Cook Book has recipes for asparagus to zucchini. Both cookbooks emphasize using produce in season.

Then there are cookbooks devoted to a single vegetable or fruit. These usually provide an historical background for each (Tomatoes were first referred to as golden apples or pomi d’oro because the first tomatoes  taken to Europe were yellow.) along with information about varieties, growing tips, and recipes.  

You Say Tomato tells you how to roast, sun-dry, oven-dry, can, and freeze your tomatoes as well as how to make your own tomato paste and ketchup. Among the 250 recipes is one for Love Apple Chocolate Cake. (In the 16^th century, some herbalists suggested that tomatoes might be an aphrodisiac – hence, the French pomme d’amour or love apple.) The Tomato Festival Cookbook offers 150 recipes with an emphasis on heirloom tomatoes.

Fast, Fresh, and Green is divided into two parts: “Prep” and “Cook.” A section on “The Pantry” in “Prep” gives tips on items to have on hand to make flavored broths, marinades, and butters. “Cook” offers nine ways to prepare veggies.  How about a Summer Vegetable and Tomato Gratin with Parmesan Bread Crumbs?

For 225 recipes for all kinds of squash, pick The Classic Zucchini Cookbook. In it you’ll find recipes for Zapple Pie, Zingerbread, and Chocolate Zucchini Cake. (Apparently, if you cook zucchini in lemon juice with sugar and spice, you’ll get an apple pie like filling.) And you can play Zucchini Bingo, using a chart to create an endless variety of casseroles.

It’s hard to believe that Americans resisted garlic as long as they did. In Garlic, Garlic, Garlic, you learn that in an early American cookbook, Amelia Simmons noted: “Garlicks, tho’ used by the French, are better adapted to the uses of medicine than cookery.” Even when Julia Child started teaching us about French cuisine, she would make garlic optional in those recipes calling for lots of it. The book has more than 200 recipes – including Oven-Baked Garlic Potato Chips. Yum!

We have cookbooks for corn, peppers, potatoes, onions, berries, etc. Take advantage of the freshness and flavor of local produce from your garden or the Farmer’s Market and the satisfaction of knowing where your food comes from.

Note: The Easton Farmers’ Market display will continue at the Library through July.

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