The Tuesday Market: Support Our Local Farmers

Hey, city folks.  The Sylvania "Tuesday Market" has come to town!  That means we can support our local farmers by buying locally produced food. Fresh, healthy, tasty, from the farm to our tables.

The Tuesday Market is held right on Main Street in front of  the Sylvania Historic Village. Come north. on Holland-Sylvania or west on Monroe and you're there. Nearby farmers come every Tuesday to sell their fresh vegetables, fruits, flowers, and herbs. Whatever is in season.  Friends, neighbors and people from around the town and city come out to do their shopping. Local artisans set up booths, selling everything from honey, fresh bread and home-baked cookies to candles, jewelry and popcorn. The shops around the market like Limelight and Heaven's Gate Soy Candles bring out their wares.  It's a win-win for everyone. It's like being at those joyous, colorful markets you've visited in Mexico, Europe, and other places around the world.

"Nana, look," my grandson shouts to me across the pretty green luttuce and yellow squash I'm buying. "Gust Farms is here!"

Ah yes, our pumpkin farm!  Up the road just over the Michigan line. It's where we go every fall to celebrate the harvest and the colors of the season and to get our pumpkins. There's something special about Gust Farms, Keil and Sons, and other local farmers--the  sources of our food supply--coming to town and bringing what they grow to our urban market.  Healthy produce for low cost, grown organically or with minimum spray, fresh from the soil, with all the flavor and vitamin benefits.  It's what I like about one of Main Street Sylvania's newest restaurants, Element 112: the chef there buys all his produce locally, and the meals are truly delicious.

I also learned about the Gust Brothers' CSA," or Community Supported Agriculture.  My daughter Elissa, who is the graphic designer for the Sylvania Advantage, reminds me that a cousin who is farming outside of Boston is doing something similar.  "It's not new but it's a growing trend," she tells me.  How does it work? People sign up in advance to get fresh produce weekly that is grown by our rural neighbors.  Elissa and I are splitting a $200 membership (shares they call it) so we can get a big basket of  vegetables and fruits every week right through October.  For more information about this CSA opportunity, contact Jake Gust at jakcogust@gmail.com or call 517-605-2209.

And if you come to get your produce at the Tuesday Market you can talk to the farmers directly, ask questions, and get tips about growing, harvesting and cooking. Buy local. Support our farmers. Eat healthy!

For more information on Community Supported Agriculture go to www.localharvest.org or  http://www.nal.usda.gov/afsic/pubs/csa/csa.shtml.