Vote for an Edible Garden at the White House

The Change.org vote ends on January 15th, but you can still support the effort to bring an edible garden to more household yards, including the national lawn at the White Houes, at: 

• www.eattheview.org, 
  
• www.thewhofarm.org - at this site you can also send them an email and ask them to bring the amazing WHO Farm Mobile to Indianapolis, perhaps even to our happy winter market.
  

Kitchen Gardeners International has been waging a web campaign--called Eat The View--to turn a portion of the White House grounds into an organic, edible garden. In fact, they have turned it into an even larger initiative called Victory Gardens 2.0 (asking the Obamas to lead the nation by example), and it's in the running on the Ideas for Change in America contest on Change.org. The top 10 ideas will be presented to the Obama administration just before inauguration day and form the basis of a nationwide advocacy campaign to turn each idea into actual policy. You can view and vote for Victory Gardens 2.0 at http://www.change.org/ideas/view/green_the_white_house before January 15. 

We'd like to hear about your home gardens as well. As delightful as fresh food from the market in winter is, nothing beats fresh produce straight from your own garden during the warmer months. Home gardens also help us all to understand the care and effort taken by those who grow, raise and produce our food as their livelihood. Not to mention, kneeling on the ground and digging your hands down into the earth is a brilliant way to truly connect to the earth, to deeper awareness of the natural ways and rhythms of the world in which we live, and to soften, open and soothe the soul. In March, Slow Food Indy will be holding an heirloom seed sale during market. Keep posted for more information!

Braving Winter!

In case you are wondering, we will be open this Saturday, January 10th, so put on your snow boots if need be, and come on over for some warming winter goodness at the market!

This week there will be some great new and returning products to check out. Traders Point Creamery will be back with their array of milk, yogurts, cheeses and spreads. Market favorites including Capriole Goat Cheese, BlackBird Pies, Endangered Species Chocolate, Flower Child Aromatherapy, Daina's Petite Pies, and Valentine Hill Farm will all be back this week after a week or two away. Rumor has it that Heartland Family Farm will be bringing frozen strawberries and blueberries this week - yes, frozen fresh from their fields this summer! Don't miss out. They are sure to go fast!

The following wonderful new producers will be joining us as well.

Wildflower Ridge Honey - You have been asking for honey, and we have been working hard to find another Master Beekeeper to bring true Indiana honey to market. Many thanks to New Day Meadery for suggesting Wildflower Ridge Honey. Wildflower Ridge provides the fabulous honey used to make New Day Meadery's magnificent mead. With hives in Madison and Hamilton counties, this honey comes from close enough to home to give you all the wonderful health benefits that local honey has to offer. Stop by Saturday to find out more!

Joseph Decuis - www.josephdecuis.com - The restaurant, inn and heritage farm in Roanoke, IN will be bringing the restaurants signature soups and gumbos to market. The product is sold frozen for you enjoy at home.

BW Bags, Paper or Plastic - www.paperorplastic.org - Neither paper or plastic are an option from BW. BW makes his bags himself, and he designs the funny, sometimes provocative quips that he stiches onto each bag. You have got to stop by and meet BW this week. You have never met a bag maker like him! He will also do customized bags and group orders. Check out BW's Top Ten reasons to buy one of his canvas shopping bag (this is your introduction to BW's sharp humor!):
1. You're being forced to by the city or state, or your pretentious friends

2. That hottie you see at the store carries one and you want a date (same reason you bought the puppy)

3. You want that nickel the grocery store refunds when you bring it in

4. You're tired of the 'green' thing being crammed down your throat, and you've decided to give in

5. You want your bag to be better than your neighbor's

6. You're not 'green', you just have class

7. You don't know what to do with all those plastic bags. (check out our 'Bag Management' products)

8. You forgot someone's birthday, and you need a gift FAST

9. You're a closet bag collector

10. You really are 'green', and your other bag is worn out

Remember, this week starts the Frequent Shopper Challenge. Stop in to pick up your card and get your first hole punched! We are also still accepting IWFM logo designs for the competition. More information on both below in last week's post.

We look forward to seeing you at market this week!

New Years Resolution

Happy New Year!

From all of us at the Indy Winter Farmers Market, we hope 2009 will be a year of happiness, passion for local food and inspiring community, and a year full of positive change and growth. We also hope it is among your new year's resolutions to make it to the Indy Winter Farmers Market every week to support the fabulous growers and producers offering great choices for positive change in the ways we think about where our food comes from, how we shop, and what/how we eat. Without a loyal patron base, we have no market, so please continue to support yourself, your community and the local economy by making the Indy Winter Farmers Market a primary stop for your weekly grocery and personal care products. I personally hope you will also add to the resolution list to find out more about Slow Food Indy, attend one of their fantastic events, and maybe even become a member!

Frequent Shopper Challenge:
In case all the great products available at market each week are not quite enough to get you there every week, we are starting a frequent shopper challenge! How do you win the challege?

1. Starting January 10th, we will have Frequent Shopper Cards available for you to pick up at market.
   
2. Get your card punched at the Market Info Table each week that you attend.
3. Attend at least 12 weeks between Jan. 10th - April 18th.
4. Turn in your card on or before April 18th at the Market Info Table (there will be a box).
5. We will draw one winner from the box at the end of market on April 18th.
6. The winner will be notified and will pick up a Market Goods Basket worth $50 featuring items from their favorite vendors on April 24th!

Indy Winter Farmers Market Logo Design Competition:
Now that we have successfully made it through a month and a half "trial opening" and are extending through April, we think it's about time we got a proper logo. This logo will appear on our upcoming proper web site, and in future ads, posters, and other promotional information. Since a big part of our market mission is developing a community - rather than just a place to come and shop - we thought it would be fun to invite YOU to help create our new logo. And thus, we are announcing....

The Indianapolis Winter Farmers Market (a.k.a. Indy Winter Farmers Market or IWFM) Logo Design Competition! Here's what you need to know to submit a design:

1. We will accept logo designs from Saturday, January 3rd through Wednesday, January 14th.
2. Logo designs must be submitted via email to: laura@indywinterfarmersmarket.org. You are welcome to bring a printed copy to market on January 3rd or 10th in addition to your email.
3. The Market Advisory Committee will select 4-6 finalist from all designs submitted.
4. Finalist designs will be posted AT MARKET for the IWFM community to cast their votes on January 17th!
5. The winning design will be posted at market on January 24th.
6. The winning designer will receive a market gift basket valued at $100! As well as recognition on the IWFM official web site (coming soon), in the e-newsletter and on the blog, and unending gratitude from market organizers.
   

Tips:
Finalist market designs will likely be simple yet engaging and eye-catching, as well as easy to reproduce on a variety of promotional materials of varying sizes and medium.

Dive in to the creative energies of the new year and send us your logo design ideas - laura@indywinterfarmersmarket.org.

Market this week:
There will be a few new vendors this week. Namely, Harvest Cafe Coffee will now be attending weekly with fresh brewed coffee, a selection of whole beans, and a coffee grinder for on-site grinding to your brewing needs. Harvest Cafe Coffee empowers patrons to create personalized blends from the beans on offer each week, or ask the Harvest Cafe staff to create a blend based on your taste preferences and brewing needs!

Also new to market this week is Circle City Sweets. Be sure to find Cindy's table of delights and treat yourself to a new indulgence in the first market of 2009. :)

Some Changes:
Sunset Acres, producer of the fabulous raw milk cow cheeses will be attending market on a bi-weekly basis through April. They will be at market this week, but not on January 10th. Once we get the web site up, we will post a calendar to help you keep track.

Capriole, producer of the fabulous goat milk cheeses will also be attending market on alternating weeks, beginning January 10th, not this week.

Last week was a small week for vendors and patrons a like. Most vendors will be back this week, and we hope you will too. Next week we'll be welcoming more new vendors! Stay tuned!

Be well and we look forward to seeing you at market this week!

Home for the Holidays

All of us from the Indy Winter Farmers Market hope you have had very happy holidays thus far, including the sharing of good food with great friends and family. Traveling out of Indianapolis to my childhood home for the holidays has already made me grateful for my Indianapolis home. We have shared some lovely meals with both family and friends, but I have really been astonished with the realizations of all the wonderful food items that have been brought to my daily meals through the farmers market. Observing the difference of grocery store reliant food shopping and the tastes of subsequent meals at home makes me very aware and very thankful, again, for this market - including all the many volunteers, growers, producers and patrons that make it possible.

The market is open tomorrow, though it will be a little smaller in vendor numbers. Nonetheless, we encourage you to make it out and make the most of the broad variety of options that will be available tomorrow. Sweet potatoes are back with Heartland Family Farm, Capriole Cheese, onions and greens from Stout's Melody Acres, the wonderful pasta sauces and mushroom patties of local folks foods, and plenty of delightful baked goodness from Valentine Hill and Rene's, and of course chicken, eggs, and so much more! Take you visiting friends and family and share with them Indy's new winter delight!

Also, the new Indy Food Coop will be back with information and taking memberships. Find out how you can be one of the founding 150 members!

We'll be back in full swing with some fun new additions on January 3rd. Gradually the days will be getting longer again, and before we know it spring will be blooming. Personally, I'm going to enjoy winter while it is hear, and continue to delight in the wonders of winter bounty that fill the tables of our growers and producers each week.

Best wishes and we look forward to seeing you Saturday!

A little holiday in life

I realized last Saturday that spending the morning at the Indy Winter Market make every Saturday feel like a holiday. That is not to say that organizing a farmers market is not a lot of work, should you be considering it. It is. But the pleasure of spending Saturday morning in a room filled with loving grown and produced food, and people who are passionate about growing and producing it bringing their passion to people who are immensely excited and grateful to be taking that food home to share with their families and friends is nearly indescribable. Watching friends - be they 4 or 40 or 80 years old - meet and chat and share life while buying good food nourishes my soul in a way I could not have imagined. 

A friend of mine put it well I thought, when she told me that going to the market was like walking into summer. Yes, it has been a summer-like treat to buy produce from Seldom Seen Farms, but she meant something more. To her, the gathering of friends felt like summertime when everyone is outside and about more, and you just run into friends in your neighborhood. In the winter we all tend, quite naturally, toward hibernation - staying in more and consequently missing those unplanned moments with friends. At the market, she feels she gets some of those summer-like moments in the midst of winter. 

Another friend was telling me that her two boys (aged around 4 & 6 years) REQUEST to go to the market now. Just like my friend who enjoys the summer-like feel of the market, these boys know they will get to see friends, and enjoy special treats. Much to my surprise, the desired treats are not cookies or chocolate, but rather APPLES & CIDER! My friend said before they even got in the door, one of the boys was begging for apples, which he wanted to select and eat one immediately, and cider for later. That gives me hope for a future with lower rates of childhood diabetes and obesity, and a future that believes in, buys and otherwise supports sustainable local food production.

With 4 more months ahead of us, I am looking forward to my Saturday morning holidays with you. Please continue to share your stories, as this is about so much more than a farmers market. It's about community and the future we hope to create.

New this week:

Heartland Family Farm - sweet potatoes, multiple potato varieties, multiple winter squash varieties

Also returning in their second week are:

Alan's Catered Events - canned fruits & vegetables, preserves, sweet treats, salsas, chutneys & more

BlackBird Pies - specialty dessert pies

Stout's Melody Acres - onions, mustard greens, winter squash

Ragamuffin Diapers - great holiday gifts for parents looking for ways to reduce, reuse and recycle with and for their children

Returning this week after a week away:

Capriole Goat Cheese - fresh, ripened and aged goat cheeses

This is the week to make all of your pre-holiday purchases - last minute gifts, items for holiday meals. The market WILL BE OPEN DEC. 27 & JAN. 3, but buy those critical items this week, and then enjoy no-stress post holiday marketing with visiting family next week.

See you tomorrow!

Always something new!

Or so it has been thus far, each week there is another great new vendor to find at market. This week you'll find the following new growers and producers:

• BlackBird Pies - decadent dessert pies for your delight
  
• Melody Acres - Randy Stout will be joining us from Franklin, Indiana with his red and yellow onions, as well as remaining winter squash, and mustard greens.
  
• Ragamuffin Diapers - Kendra will be joining us from right around the corner, as she says, offering the many market moms the cloth diaper & baby wipe alternative!
• The Indy Food Co-op - Some folks on the near east side of downtown Indianapolis have been working very hard for over a year to open a food co-op on E. 10th St. They have now purchased a building and are looking for founding members. Stop by their table (next to the Englewood book co-op table) to find out more about Indy's aspiring alternative grocer.

If you missed them last week, but sure to check out a HOT tamale from Koy at Harvest Lodge Catering. Notice Koy also has cookies, cakes and granola that will have you back next week begging for more. Don't miss Brandon at Feel Good Foods either. Brandon is milling Indiana grown, chemical-free whole wheat. We used it in for our first bread loaf this week and it's one of the best loaves we've made in a while! Make sure to get your favorite Endangered Species Chocolate this week or next. Excellent for your afternoon chocolate cravings, or in holiday goodie bags.

Capriole is home on the farm, working hard to fill all the holiday goat cheese demands, but they will be back at market on December 20th.

As always, drop an email to Market Master Laura Henderson if you have questions, suggestions, or ideas for the Indy Winter Farmers Market! We want to continue to make a place where community gathers and grows. Thanks to all who came out last week. It was an especially festive feeling week with the snow falling outside, hot tamales inside, and folks standing around to visit for a while.

See you tomorrow!

Rembering, Celebrating & Thanking Bob Landman

Bob Landman, owner of Good Earth Natural Foods in Broad Ripple, passed away unexpectedly on Saturday night, December 6th. The news hit hard in our household, as I know it will in households across Indianapolis, the state, and even the nation as the online store services customers all over the United States. 

I never saw Bob without receiving a boisterously friendly greeting, usually accompanied by a funny quip or spontaneous serenade. As a customer, he (and the staff) made me feel welcome and made me want to come back. I'll admit that I've sought out the Good Earth on a "bad day," knowing the warmth and coziness of the store always makes me feel happy. If Bob was there, he would be sure to make me laugh, and I could top the whole experience with an indulgent Mocha Pie or oatmeal cake! Who could ask for more?

While I know people for whom the maze-like, filled-to-the-gills store and "everybody knows your name" atmosphere is at first intimidating, I am sure that those Bob-like qualities of quirkiness, warmth, welcoming, (and slight uncertainty of what might happen next when you're there) have been to the key to keeping the Good Earth open for nearly 40 years. Yes, the shoes are great, the inventory is vast, the staff are patiently helpful, and the prices are great. But I believe the greatest success of the Good Earth has been building a community of customers that make it more than just a place to shop. Bob gave this city an alternative to the big box grocery when there were no other options, and even as other options have come and gone, the Good Earth has remained - locally owned and operated, supported by a community of local customers. 

Bob will be dearly and deeply missed. The presence and energy he gave the store are irreplaceable, and yet I believe the heart he gave the store will continue to beat strongly in the community he helped create. And so, a thousand thanks to Bob for being himself, and for believing in his little store with big heart! His greetings, jokes, songs and musings will echo within the walls of the Good Earth, and leave smiling ripples in the community for years to come.