When the Farmers Hand You Icelandic Poppies and Inspiration for the Market...
The Farmer's Market isn't just for food, you can also find fabulous florists featuring fantastic flowers in seasonal varieties and vibrant colors. With my budget leaning strongly towards food, these beautiful bouquets are only bought on special occasions. Not only do the florists sell flowers, a few of my favorite Farmers grow flowers on their farms and from time to time they will sell bunches of unique, rustic flowers at their stands with their regular produce. They are usually simple and small but come at a lower cost and make a fresh vase of flowers for the table accessible not just for special occasions. My most recent flower purchase was Icelandic Poppies. The wife of the farmer that I got the Arugula from last week grows flowers, including these poppies. They are fairly fragile and look like tissue paper flowers but their vibrant colors brighten up the home.
Inspiration for the Market
I grew up watching re-runs of Julia Child on TV, and even as I kid I loved her sense of humor and fun. I was recently given her book My Life in France (written with her nephew Alec Prud'homme) and reading it gave me an even deeper understanding of the origins behind The French Chef. The book highlights her time living in France and going to French cooking school. She tells so many wonderful stories of the years she spent learning the culture, meeting the people, and experiencing how to cook in the traditional French style. When she first come to France, Julia didn't know anything about French food, which is amazing considering nowadays she is responsible for millions of people learning how to cook it. If you want to be inspired to try new cooking techniques and read about Julia's witty tales of an American in France you should pick up this book. Once you finish and want to do some French cooking on your own you, you should get Mastering the Art of French Cooking complied by Julia Child, Louisette Bertholle, and Simone Beck.
"Les Human Relations"
Outlined in the book is one of the essential themes to her cooking experience. The French phrase "Les Human Relations." She learns that the more she invested in the people who grow and sell the food, the better the food really was. Here is a quote from the book explaining as only Julia could put it:
"Indeed shopping for food in Paris was a life-changing experience for me. It was through daily excursions to my local marketplace on la Rue de Bourgogne, or to the bigger one on la Rue Cler, or, best of all, into the organized chaos of Les Halles- the famous marketplace in central Paris- that I learned on of the most important lessons of my life: the value of les human relations. The French are very sensitive to personal dynamics, and they believe that you must earn your rewards. If a tourist enters a food stall thinking he's going to be cheated, the salesman will sense this and obligingly cheat him. But if a Frenchman senses that a visitor is delighted to be in his store, and takes genuine interest in what is for sale, then he'll just open up like a flower. The Parisian grocers insisted that I interact with them personally: if I wasn't willing to take the time to get to know them and their wares, then I would not go home with the freshest legumes or cuts of meat in my basket. They certainly made me work for my suppers- but oh, what suppers!"(pp.75)
These days you can go to the store and never talk to a human being, everything is prepackage and prepared and with the convenience of self-checkout, you don't even have to make small talk with a cashier. Truly one of my favorite parts of the Farmers Market is talking to the people who grow and sell my food. Asking them how their day is going, what's in season this week, what's the best way to store the produce, what they love to cook, etc. There is value to living like a local and investing in people, in turn you will also be reaping the rewards of delicious meals!
The Pairing
Like Julia Child, Audrey Hepburn's titular character in 1954's Sabrina, goes to culinary school in France, though in this case it is in an effort to mend a broken heart. Sabrina is a classic Hollywood romance full of humor and heart featuring stars like Hepburn, Humphrey Bogart, and William Holden, it is essential viewing for any movie fan. - Z
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