The Farmers' Market Cookbook

Book excerpt: From the founder of London’s first farmer’s market, a guide to fresh produce—with recipes included—to make the most of your delicious fruits and veggies! Nina Planck grew up in Virginia, picking tomatoes, corn, beans, melons, and more on the family farm, and selling the fresh produce at farmers’ markets. As an adult, she found herself living in London and—homesick for local food—she started London’s first farmers’ market in 1999. In The Farmers’ Market Cookbook, Nina explains what the farmer knows about every vegetable from asparagus to zucchini—and what the cook needs to know. In more than thirty chapters, each dedicated to cooking with the freshest fruits and vegetables, Nina offers simple and delicious recipes for beef, pork, chicken, and fish, as well as a passel of ideas for perfect side dishes, soups, and desserts—all with produce in the lead role. Try roasted pork chops with apple and horseradish stuffing, blueberry almond crisp, and risotto with oyster mushrooms. Nina also offers tips only farmers would know, kitchen strategies, options for a surplus, advice on what to buy at the market and when, what to look for in an eggplant or a blueberry, and how to keep it all fresh. The Farmers’ Market Cookbook is perfect for any cook who has stared helplessly at fresh produce, praying for inspiration. Includes a foreword by Nigel Slater Note: Some recipe information in this book appears in metric versions