This Market’s Made for Strolling
There were three reasons why I took a short field trip Wednesday (July 19) to the Uptown Farmers Market in Chicago’s Sheridan Park neighborhood. Mission accomplished.
1) ENJOYING THE MARKET’S LAID-BACK AMBIANCE
I first visited the Uptown Farmers Market at its new location in May, and I was so struck by its pleasant vibe that I included it in an article about our area’s neighborhood markets that I wrote for Natural Awakenings Chicago magazine’s July issue.
The market is open from 2:30 p.m. to 7 p.m. every Wednesday into November in Sunnyside Mall, a four-block, pedestrian-friendly stretch of a residential neighborhood on Sunnyside Avenue between Magnolia and Beacon. If you’re walking down Sunnyside from Clark St. on the west (as I did), the street becomes permanently blocked off at Beacon; there is a canopy of trees shading the market along with other plantings.
It is quite a contrast from the location that the market had for its first two years. Chicago Market, a community co-op store project, started the weekly Uptown Farmers Market to serve the community while the long process of raising money to build out the co-op in the historic Gerber Building ground on. The Uptown market took place in the parking lot of the building — directly underneath the tracks of the CTA’s elevated Red Line.
The market is relatively small in terms of numbers of vendors, but you can buy produce, meat, cheese, baked goods and more in an unhurried environment.
2) VISITING WITH THE FOLKS FROM VARGO BROTHER FERMENTS
Vargo Brother Ferments is a startup company that makes pickles, mustard, hot sauce and other fermented products here in Chicago. Sebastian Vargo was a rising star chef when the pandemic hit and he ended up with too much time on his hands at home. This led him to exercise his appreciation for food fermentation and preservation, which turned into Vargo Brother Ferments, the company he co-owns with his wife, Taylor Hanna (that’s them in the above photo).
I’d met the couple at an event this spring at , where I bought a big jar of their excellent sour pickles. I also got to watch them present to the students at Impact Culinary Training, a school (started by Chef Rick Bayless) based in The Hatchery providing restaurant skills to aspiring chefs, ages 16-24 (and not high school students), from under-resourced communities on Chicago’s West Side. I’ll be publishing an article about that visit very soon.
I stopped by to say hello to Sebastian and Taylor — and, oh yes, to buy a new big jar of those pickles, since I just polished off the first jar.
3) RESTOCK MY TREE FRUITS (GIANT BEETS ALSO INVOLVED)
Sometimes the first tree fruit of a year can be just okay, but the first batch of peaches I bought last week (at the South Loop Market Grant Park) from Los Rodriguez Farm (Eau Claire, Michigan) were juice-running-down-your-chin-and fingers perfection. For quality control, I invited Barb to sample one, knowing she has very high standards, having experienced the fruit from the peach tree on her family’s farm when she was growing up, so know that these peaches have her seal of approval.
I bought new batches of peaches and apricots, yellow squash and a couple of truly enormous beets that you’ll see in the market haul photo below. I noticed that Los Rodriguez had its first cantaloupes of the season, but with a heavy jar of pickles, beets clocking in at 2-1/2 pounds, and a lot of steps to get home, I decided to put that off until this weekend.
Beet steaks, anyone?
Here’s the weekend farmers market schedule for you to plan your own farmers market adventures.