Athens Farmers Market: Whoa Mama!

Here's a little snapshot of what I see towards the beginning of a market day. Our table is laden with baked goods and salsas that people will gobble up in no time. Spring market has really been blessing us this year! In fact, this weekend was Ohio University's Mom's Weekend, and we were too busy to even take photos (the ones here are from last Saturday)! Thanks to all you mamas for making our day busy and special! And thanks to all of our regulars for buying our salsas and brownies (and letting us take pics of you eating them).

Today was another enormously successful market day.

I wanted to pay a little homage to rhubarb. I love this spring delight! It's so interesting to me that the stalk of the plant is the tasty, edible part. And the rhubarb from Sassafrass Farm is some of the most gorgeous rhubarb I've ever seen! Their long, plump stalks of bright pink and green sourness is just begging to be paired with some of the ripe, sweet strawberries coming from the greenhouse of Larry Cowdery's grandfather. I'm definitely drooling. And I wanted to share another recipe with y'all from the Casa. For spring family gatherings!

POACHED RHUBARB COBBLER (vegan!)
Set your oven to 350 degrees (F)

For the poached rhubarb filling:

Juice of 1 Lemon
2# beautiful Rhubarb stalks from Sassafrass Farm or Dutch Creek Community Farm
1 1/2 C Sugar

Place all of these ingredients in a saucepan over medium-low heat and cook until syrupy. Pour the rhubarb into a deep dish pie plate.

To make the crust:

1 1/2 C Unbleached White Flour
2 tsp Baking Powder
1/4 tsp Sea Salt
2 Tbs Sugar
6 Tbs Soy Margarine (ok, you can use butter if you don't care if it's vegan!)
1/2 C Soy Milk (yeah, you could use regular delicious milk from the Snowville Creamery here)

Mix the dry ingredients together in a bowl. Crumble very cold soy margarine/butter into the mix and blend with a pastry blender until the mixture resembles fine crumbs. Gradually add soy/regular milk, mixing thoroughly until dough is silky (not dry OR wet!). Drop that deliciousness on top of the poached rhubarb in fat, round dollops! Bake 20-25 minutes until crust is golden brown and rhubarb is bubbly. Serve with sliced fresh strawberries from Cowdery Farm! OMG. So good.

And *NEWSFLASH*! You can be at the Athens Farmers Market on Wednesdays, too! We'll be there from 10am-1pm. I'll have a Wednesday update after this week (which will be our third for the year). So far, there's been asparagus, strawberries, zucchini, beautiful flowering plants, honey, edibles, chevre, jams and jellies, bacon, eggs and much more!