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Chilly Drizzle on Daley Plaza Market Opener? The Picasso Don't Care
- Bob Benenson
- 21 hours ago
- 2 min read
A Surprisingly Fruitful First-of-the-Season Crop Brightened the Visit
It was opening day Thursday (May 22) for the Daley Plaza Farmers Market: located in the heart of The Loop, it is the flagship of the public Chicago City Markets. The massive Picasso sculpture and City Hall (left in the photo) give this market and air of distinction, but at ground level, the drizzly and very unseasonably cool weather could have been any market in the Chicago region so far this week.
Dear Weather Gods: The forecast continues to show below-average temperatures for the next week or so. But could you at least turn the sun back on for this weekend's farmers markets, so it at least looks reasonably like late May?
But even on a relatively crummy day, you never know when you're going to stumble on some exciting first-of-the-season crop. Witness...
... Strawberries, at the stand of Parra's Farm (Benton Harbor, Michigan). The start and length of this region's strawberry crops varies from year to year. So, welcome back and please stick around for a while.
The rest of Parra's produce was pretty representative of what you'd expect for any late May.
The Daley Plaza fountain and pool. Water, water everywhere.
My Daley Plaza market haul was modest: lettuce, strawberries and asparagus from Parra's Farm; cherry tomatoes and baby spinach from Nichols Farm and Orchard (Marengo, Illinois); and Wisconsin buttermilk blue cheese from Stamper Cheese (Chicago).