Farmers Market

From the windows of her fourth-floor office at City Hall, redevelopment director Sandy Forosisky can see the front of 99 Cent Dreams, the 38,000-square-foot value store at the center of what has long been a languishing downtown. Starting in March, that view will change. The Landis Avenue dollar store is slated to be converted into a year-round public market, selling local produce, meat, seafood, specialty items, and prepared food. With it, Forosisky is hoping the city's center will change, too. The $5.62 million project, which Forosisky calls a "mini Reading Terminal," is the foundation for a $59 million city makeover.

For almost 20 years the building was a supermarket, one of the anchor stores in the Great Valley Shopping Center in Malvern. But in November, Thomas Morelli, owner of the center, decided to do something adventurous with the building. Last month, the Great Valley Lancaster County Farmers Market opened with the first of more than 30 vendors expected to occupy the old supermarket location. "My middle name is adventure," Morelli said. "You have to be tuned into the changing times.

Many thanks to Craig LaBan for his fantastic review of the Farm and Fisherman ("This BYOB exemplifies the best of the farm-to-table movement," June 19). Chef Josh Lawler is indeed the real deal. I work for the Farmers' Market program for the Food Trust, helping to manage more than 25 farmers' markets in Philadelphia. I work with about 70 farmers and growers. Every Saturday morning, Lawlor is at Clark Park, every Sunday morning at Headhouse, every Thursday at the Fairmount market. He calls me for farmers' cell-phone numbers to place orders.

In Voorhees, a suburb once defined by agriculture, a weekly farmers market may help put a new downtown on the map. A dozen area vendors began selling fresh fruit, produce, and other products outside the Voorhees Town Center on May 19 and will continue every Saturday, from 8 a.m. until noon, through Oct. 27. "Cities really came about because farmers needed to come to a place where they could barter or trade their goods," said Joseph F....

When he first came to Chester, Daniel King drew crowds to a church parking lot with the sweet, smoky smell of barbecue. Now, the Amish farmer hopes to help fill another void in the impoverished city: fruits and vegetables, deli goods, and homemade pies. King, who operated Dan's Barbecue out of a trailer at Ninth and Kerlin Streets for the last four years, plans to open an indoor farmers market this week downtown. Along with his barbecued chicken and ribs, he said, the market will feature deli meats, freshly prepared hot meals, homemade baked goods, and produce, much of it from small farms in Lancaster County.

The Farmers Market, a small retail-business center that has been embroiled in controversy since opening last fall, has been ordered to shut its doors again. Edward Brown, a Chester building official, said yesterday that Barbara DeNero, the market's owner, was informed in a Feb. 2 letter that because the facility has no smoke-detecting system, all business must cease at the 75,000-square-foot structure at 10th Street and Morton Avenue. The market, which was shut down for several weeks last year after being cited for building-code violations, has been open under terms of an agreement that expired Jan. 8, under which a smoke-alarm system was to have been installed, Brown said.

The Farmers Market, a 40-shop small-business mall in Chester that opened in October after getting $250,000 in city loans and has been ordered twice by city officials to close, has won a reprieve in Delaware County Court. Linda Ann Cartisano, Chester's city solicitor, asked Judge Joseph F. Battle Jr. on Friday to temporarily close the market, which has been embroiled in a months-long dispute over its operating permits and twice has defied orders to cease operations. Cartisano wanted Battle to tell Barbara DeNero, the market's owner, to stop doing business until she installed a smoke-detection system and obtained a certificate of occupancy from the city.

At the Mill at Anselma in Chester Springs, a 16-foot waterwheel gently splashed visitors while generating enough power to grind fresh-off-the-mill, stone-ground cornmeal and wheat flour. Last Saturday, the historic grain mill opened its doors for a milling demonstration, a preview of its weekly farmers market and the introduction of organic grains milled on site. The organic cornmeal and wheat flour can be used to make bread, polenta, pizza dough, pie crusts and pancakes. Two-pound bags of the organic goods sell for $6 in the mill's gift shop, while nonorganic versions were selling for $4. The mill decided to offer organic grains because people kept asking for them, explained Heather Reiffer, executive director at the mill.

If a group of farmers and researchers have their way, stalls of vegetables and fruits grown in Chester County will spring up in a West Chester parking lot on Saturday mornings this summer. A "growers market" - as yet unnamed - at the corner of Chestnut and Church Streets two blocks from the Chester County Court House will provide local farmers with a retail market and local residents with farm-fresh produce. But the long-term goal is to help farmers stay in business by keeping them in touch with what consumers want and giving them a bigger share of the profits from food they grow.

In Voorhees, a suburb once defined by agriculture, a weekly farmers market may help put a new downtown on the map. A dozen area vendors began selling fresh fruit, produce, and other products outside the Voorhees Town Center on May 19 and will continue every Saturday, from 8 a.m. until noon, through Oct. 27. "Cities really came about because farmers needed to come to a place where they could barter or trade their goods," said Joseph F....

2 medium garlic cloves, sliced thin 2 teaspoons extra virgin olive oil 1/4 teaspoon of salt or more to taste 1 pound green beans, cleaned and trimmed   1. Put olive oil, garlic, and salt into shallow serving dish and mix. 2. Put beans into boiling water for 6 minutes (important to time this). 3. Drain well and put into serving dish. Turn the beans in the olive oil mix until they are well coated. Taste for salt and adjust if needed. From kitchen of Giuliana and Bob Pierson Per serving (based on 8)

It's farmer's market season once again, and Bob Pierson is zipping around the edges of Rittenhouse Square this Saturday morning long before any customers arrive, helping farmers hoist their white tents, moving folding tables and heavy coolers, counting heads, and ticking off the minutes till the eight-year-old market reopens, like it's the Kentucky Derby or something. On the dot of 9, Pierson shouts, "OK, we're ready to sell! We're open!" Within a half-hour, the sidewalks around the square are bustling with walkers, runners, and shoppers loaded up with babies, dogs, and canvas bags, many stopping to sample teeny squares of goat cheese or dabs of homemade hummus from the very farmers and artisans who made it. As head of Farm to City, which runs this and 15 other farmer's markets in Philadelphia and the suburbs, Pierson is in his element, which is to say smack dab in the forefront — and middle — of the local food movement in Philadelphia.

2 apples 2 pears 1 pint blueberries 2 nectarines 2 peaches 1/4 to 1/3 cantaloupe or honeydew melon Juice and zest from one lemon   1. Wash tree fruit and berries; peel peaches and pears. 2. Cut fruit (except berries) into small pieces about ½ to ¾ inch long and combine in a bowl. 3. Add lemon zest and mix thoroughly. Add lemon juice so its acidity is balanced with the natural sweetness of the fruit. From the kitchen of Giuliana and Bob Pierson Per serving: 110 calories, 1 grams protein, 28 grams carbohydrates, 20 grams sugar, trace fat, no cholesterol, 2 milligrams sodium, 5 grams dietary fiber.

1 quart ripe strawberries 2 tablespoons maple syrup or other sweetener 1 tablespoon lemon juice 1. Wash, hull, and cut strawberries into 3 or 4 pieces each. 2. Add lemon juice and maple syrup. Mix gently. From the kitchen of Giuliana and Bob Pierson Per serving (based on 6): 49 calories, 1 gram protein, 12 grams carbohydrates, 9 grams sugar, trace fat, no cholesterol, 2 milligrams sodium, 2 grams dietary fiber.

WASHINGTON - Farmers markets are a popular source of reasonably priced fresh produce, but across the country many accept only cash or checks - a big problem for low-income shoppers using food stamps. The U.S. Department of Agriculture is trying to change that. Agriculture Deputy Secretary Kathleen Merrigan this week announced a $4 million grant for states to help implement wireless technology that will allow more farmers markets to accept Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits, or food stamps.

Kristian Holbrook's been trying to perfect Hummingbird for nine years. "And I'm still trying," says the cheesemaker at Doe Run, the Chester County dairy on Urban Outfitters founder Dick Hayne's estate. Holbrook's modesty is really admiration for Robiola Bosina, the luscious Italian that was his inspiration. But creamy Hummingbird, which flows with the fresh tang of both sheep and cow's milk, was good enough for a coveted first prize in 2011 from the American Cheese Society. Holbrook makes several other fine cheeses, including an aged, gouda-like Seven Sisters.

When he drives up and down Lancaster Avenue, Steve Bajus sees banks and drugstores, restaurants and retail shops, gas stations, and car dealers. What he doesn't see is fresh food. "There's a void," said Bajus, who owns commercial properties all along the Main Line. So he got the idea to put a farmer's market in the space that used to be Borders Books in the Rosemont Square shopping center until it went out of business last year. "They did a great job there. . . . It's unfortunate," he said of the company's collapse.