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As May Nears, Chicago's Outdoor Farmers Market Season Warms Up
- Bob Benenson
- 20 hours ago
- 4 min read
April's Early Markets Set the Stage for the Boom Soon to Come
A shoutout to the region's four traditional farmers markets and four French markets that dared to challenge Chicago's quirky April weather. Now brace yourself as the outdoor market season quickly spreads across Chicagoland as the calendar turns to May on Friday.
Those eight April markets will be exactly matched by eight new openings in just the first weekend in May. For the record, the newbies are Green City Market's West Loop satellite, 95th Street Farmers Market and Wicker Park Farmers Market in Chicago; and in the suburbs, markets in Evanston, Kankakee, Lisle (French Market), Palatine and Woodstock.
On Saturday, I managed to stop by Green City Market in Lincoln Park, the season opener for The Lincoln Park Farmers Market nearby, the Nettlehorst French Market in my Lakeview neighborhood, and for good measure, The Fresh Market grocery store on the Lakeview/Lincoln Park border.
Really, I'm not obsessed with food shopping. I'm just... efficient.
New crops slowly but surely are coming in each week. The photo above shows rhubarb next to the now-ubiquitous asparagus at the stand of Iron Creek Organic Farm (La Porte, Indiana).
They also had lots of Persian cucumbers.
I was happy to see that my friends at Chicago's Verzênay Patisserie are drawing lines of customers at the stand that they have had at Green City for years.
My Green City haul: chicken wings (party cut) from Jake's Country Meats (Cassopolis, Michigan); potatoes from Nichols Farm and Orchard (Marengo, Illinois); hakurei turnips from Kajers Greens (North Judson, Indiana); green and purple asparagus from Mick Klug Farm (St. Joseph, Michigan); and one big, beautiful head of organic lettuce from Wholesome Harvest (Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin).
As Local Food Forum has reported, The Lincoln Park Farmers Market (located about 3/4 mile west of Green City's flagship location) is celebrating its 45th year, still on the campus of Lincoln Park High School but in a different place.
If you had been to this market before but hadn't gotten the memo that the market had moved out the school's parking lot, you would have been confused by this sight.
But all you had to do was look down and follow the chalked directions...
... leading to the path along the west side of the school. It ends in Oz Park, a tribute to L. Frank Baum — the author of the Wizard of Oz books — that has statues of Dorothy, Toto, Scarecrow, Tim Man and Cowardly Lion. (I'll have a photo tour for you soon.)
This current iteration of this long-running market is the handiwork of manager Elsa Jacobson, a friend and supporter of Local Food Forum. The market had been in a long slump and was at risk of shutting down about a decade ago when Elsa engaged in a rescue. Today, the market, once down to five or six vendors, again has dozens when the season hits full stride and is among the most popular of the Chicago region's neighborhood markets.
Vendors and customers are quickly settling into the modified location. The open spaces on the walkway on opening day will soon be filled by more vendors, including the produce growers who wait until May to join the market season when they have more product to sell.
I did buy a bottle of truly outstanding bottle of sauerkraut from Chicago's Pickeled Prince and two bialys from Zeitlin's Delicatessen (also in the city).
While it would be hard to find anyone today who hasn't heard of a bagel, bialys are also in the Jewish baked goods hall of fame. As a Jewish kid who grew up in the New York City area, I have loved bialys for most of my life. They are much harder to find around Chicago, and I have been a regular customer for Zeitlin's since they started a few years ago to sell them — along with bagels, breads and sweet treats —at local farmers markets.
The bialy — which takes it name from the Polish city of Bialystock, where the rolls were invented — is often referred to as a bagel without a hole, but that's not really true. It has a crispier crust than a bagel and has an indentation in the middle (instead of a hole) that often has a filling (this one I got on Saturday was a traditional onion and poppy seed).
Speaking of baked goods, on my way home I stopped at the Nettlehorst French Market in the courtyard of a school a few blocks from my apartment.
As we've reported, the French Markets are hybrid combos of food and crafts sellers. There will be farmer representation eventually, but right now the food is mostly breads and pastry.
Not that this is a bad thing. A week earlier, I saw some English-style scones at the stand of Chicago's Harriet's Cookies, and Barb and I really enjoyed them as they were less dense, more crunch and less sweet (our preference) then many other scones. When I finally got there around noon on Saturday, the blueberry scones we tried last week were already sold out, but the Cranberry-Orange and Sour Cherry-Vanilla scones worked out just fine.
So, this is pretty much my life for the next 6+ months. Hope it's part of yours too, because it's a special time of the year.
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