Farmer's Market Magic and Madness

I first came to California in the winter of 2004, and have only a few jet-lagged memories of my first few days here. There was meeting Christine for the very first time, the bigness of American roads and shopping malls, and then the Davis Farmer's Market. Christine (in the photo, left) helped one of the vendors, Jim Eldon of Fiddler's Green Farm. Of course I went with her on my first big outing in Davis, hence my first Saturday in the US was spent serving customers at the market stand.

I quickly came to realise that this marketplace was magical. Here was a social space, not just a place to buy veggies. People would stop and chat, swap recipes, admire babies, compare notes on the past week and generally support and encourage one another. The magic is in the people, you see.

Since then I have continue to go down to spend a little time with Jim and his customers, some of whom have become my friends and supporters during the long months of Christine's cancer treatment. When I started working at the Davis Food Co-op, I'd still go down on my days off, to schmooze with people, learn about my new country and its ways, and occasionally baffle people with my British English.

My accent came in handy sometimes (though Christine points out that I'm frequently chatted up!) in starting conversations, though occasionally there were moments of confusion. For example, I had to learn that what I'd known in England as a courgette was in fact a zucchini, the French loan word swapped for an Italian. Coriander herb was suddenly cilantro, and even basil was different - not the word this time, rather the pronunciation (we say ba-sil, Americans say bay-sil). Of course, this soon became part of my lexicon, though while I am quite happy to use a different word, I tend to stick to my British English pronunciations. You may say tomay-to, I still say tomah-to.

Then over time, as the seasons changed, I watched the progression of vegetables. Winter squash gave way to melons, the huge variety of summer squashes and a profusion of greens from the plain cabbage to the exotic mizuna. There was far more than just the plain courgette, of course - here were crookneck, Romanesco, Zephyr and their kin. There were peppers of all shapes, sizes and heats; likewise heirloom tomatoes with real old-fashioned flavour and a bewildering palette of colours.

Oh, and the people. They fascinated me. I'd talk and learn about America in general, California in particular. I learned about the history of the West, about farming in different parts of the country, about a dozen family histories, about their holidays and customs. In turn, they'd learn from me. I told people about the three-cent piece, about why the US pint was a different size from the Imperial pint, about British ways and language. It was a wonderful time, and you know, it still is.

Here's a piece of real America, the social marketplace, the gossip fence, the cultural exchange built on what colonised America in the first place - a place to farm and live in peace. Long may it last.


I wrote this after reading a customer's blog. She stopped by on Saturday as I was having a bit of a laugh with Jim. There are good words, and a good picture too, here.

Autumn, Fall, whatever. Still my favourite season

Going into Autumn is complex for me. It always was - the "season of mists and mellow fruitfulness" used to fill me with a desire to flee England's dismal shortening days for milder weather and above all, daylight. Living in California now means that I don't have to fear the coming winter, miss the light, bright days or plod around in wet-weather gear just in case it rains.

Now, it means the season of abundance at the Farmer's Market. We're just out of the best bit, with the piles of tomatoes and peppers, but apples are beginning, so just as I start to miss one crop, another comes along to excite and delight me. How can anyone not shop at the Market? All those Safeway shoppers don't know what they are missing by buying their "fresh" produce in bags and boxes, shipped from God-knows-where and treated in dreadful ways that a man ought not wot of.

Now, of course, it saddens me because my Mum died last year, in late October. This year I'm also dealing with Christine's cancer and the grief that's attached to that. But it's not about to drag me South with the autumnal emigre birds.

A final note on autumn, for my many English or British friends who enquire after my dealings with "American English". "Fall", they say, "is an Americanism best done without. Use 'autumn'".

Sorry to tell you this, but the words fall and autumn are relatively new words, dating from the 17th century. Before that, the season was known as "Harvest", and both words were used alike in America and Britain (or at least, England), though in time, each country had its own preferences. In fairness though, most Americans know what "autumn" means, and few Brits fail to understand the "fall" season. Of the two, once again, the Brits are the ones who gripe most.

I still love you, Harvest season, by any name.

But it's a dry heat...

Well, I came to Northern California to live, in March 2005. Straight to Davis from chilly Nottingham, I fell in love with the lovely sunny 60°F days (that's 15°C). Compare that with 50°C/10°C maxima, following frosty March mornings, that I was used to. I was in Paradise...

Summers were another matter, however. As soon as the temperature started to climb much above 75°F (23°C) I started to sweat a little. "Hot out", I'd say. The locals would just smile and nod and pat me on the head. "Oh, You think it's hot now...wait 'till it gets HOT." That was in April. By June I was certain that it couldn't get hotter, temperatures starting to get into the mid-80s (30-ish) and I repeated my little "...hot out..." speech. Only to get the same response.

I would sweat my way to the Food Co-op and sweat back again, laden with goodies, to an amused but not entirely sympathetic wife. "Oh, it can hit 100", she'd remind me. And I'd groan. You see, the all-time UK temperature was (still is, I think) just 101° (a sweltering 38.5°C), and if it even approached 90°F there would be "Phew, What A Scorcher!" headlines in the papers.

Finally, however, my day came - a red letter day for me, when a Davis resident finally agreed that it was hot. It was 90-odd that day, but I was satisfied for a moment. "At least it's a dry heat...", he said, and I gritted my teeth. As I reluctantly turn on the air conditioning, I groan (and not always just inwardly) at the certainty of an inflated electricity bill and the knowledge that my cooler home interior means a hotter exterior.

Of course, I'm something of a veteran now, and I barely flinch until it hits ninety. But I still worry. You see, Davis' typical weather is pretty bad in the summer - we managed to escape the worst excesses last year by running off to Canada the week it climbed to 110, but that won't always be the case. Each year more people drive away or jet off to avoid the gnarliest of the heat, but that must soon start to change.

What happens if climate change means that it gets hotter? Maybe not just hotter, but drier too. California grows a good deal of America's food, and farmers rely on (would you believe) water - without irrigation, there would be no agriculture. Without the runoff from the surrounding mountains, water levels in the Central Valley would fall, and sooner or later we'd have to look elsewhere for our water.

Rather like the residents of Southern California, we'd have to pump water hundreds, thousands of miles to irrigate our fields, water our lawns and golf courses, wash our cars.

Yep, that would be a dry heat.