Honest2Goodness Farmer's Market Newsletter 11th March 2010

Welcome to this week’s Market Newsletter!

Springclean your bookshelves!

Our Charity Bookstall shelves are looking a bit bare! So, why not do a quick spring-clean of your bookshelves and other book hiding places and bring them along to the market on Saturday? You’ll be clearing out clutter, so you’ll feel good about that, and knowing that your books will end up turning into cash for charities, will make you feel even better! If you are involved in a local charity or voluntary group or club and want to take-over the bookstall for a couple of weeks to raise money, then talk to us at the market about it.

Jim Ryan, the market farmer & butcher has started an online farm diary, and here is the link to it: http://ryansfarm.com/diary/. You’ll be able to follow the farm news and stories over the coming months.

Dublin-Meath Growers asked me to let you know that as unfortunately Irish carrots are now out of season, their carrots this weekend will be of English origin.

As an extension of our cookery demonstrations, we are pleased to announce that Brid will be running a bread-making workshop on 27^th March 2010. The workshop will take place in the afternoon in our Market kitchen and numbers are limited to 6. Participants will be hands on and will be guided through the making of focaccia bread (we will have tastings of this available at the pantry on Saturday) and our healthy spelt bread, which we already sell through the café/pantry. You can reserve a spot by emailing us.

Manuka Honey will not be at the market this Saturday, and Trevor sends his apologies to all his regular customers.

However, Mico of Kingfisher Teas will be there with her wonderful array of teas, herbal tisanes and other interesting concoctions. My own favourite is her peppermint tea, but you’ll discover your own by trying out any of her dozens of options at the market.

At the café, we will have a small supply of carrot cake, chocolate cup-cakes & Tunisian orange cake – if you would like us to put some aside for you, let us know by return email and we’ll reserve some for you. We have started using Moonshine Farm’s organic milk for our hot chocolate, cappucini and lattes, so they taste even better! Our soup of the day on Saturday will be carrot and cumin and our hot dish of the day will be Thai Chicken. Both our soups and hot dish are available to take home with you so that you can have market produce already prepared for you.

At the pantry, the Carrigaline cheese which went down really well when we had it on tasting, is due to be delivered to us before the market starts on Saturday. Its taste profile is very mild, with a nice texture and nutty flavours. Anybody who tasted the Moonshine Farm cheese (an Emmental-style cheese) also loved it!

The Wine Stall specials on Saturday will be Burgundy delights, the white being a Saint Veran from the Cave des Grands Cru (2007). A full-bodied, rounded and buttery wine, it is usually priced at €14 – it will be on offer on Saturday for €11.90 (15% discount) when you buy one bottle, or an even better value of €10.50 a bottle when you buy six. On the red wine front, we have our Chateau de Bois, AC Bourgogne 2007. Tastes of red-currents, liquorice, cherry and pepper, in a medium-bodied wine. The usual price is €15, and it will be available at €12.75 for one bottle, or again with a 25% discount on purchases of six bottles – bringing the price down to €11.25 per bottle.

New recipes on the website this week – carrot cake is here and celeriac and garlic soup is here. Talk to Brid on Sat if you want any detail of the recipes explained!

Looking forward to seeing you on Saturday,

Brid & Colm