Hi- I just wanted to let people know that the winter market at Emmanuel Lutheran church at Lake and Sherman is taking place this morning until 1:00. Last time Nichols had the first of their spinach which they had overwintered in the greenhouse. I am sure they are going to have more today. I paid $5 for a bag last time. It is more than I usually pay, but I would rather buy it there than at Jewel.

Also in case anybody is interested the church has a table set up at every winter market with post cards that you can sent to your elected representatives. The one last time was about a clean energy bill in Springfield. The post cards are all ready filled out. You just enter in your zip code on the bottom of the post card, and sign it. They then send it to the elected representative in your district. The church supplies the postage.

The next market is taking place on 3/21, and the last market for the season is taking place in April. There are growers in both the basement and main floor of the church. Hope this helps, Nancy

NFriday wrote:Last time Nichols had the first of their spinach which they had overwintered in the greenhouse. I am sure they are going to have more today. I paid $5 for a bag last time. It is more than I usually pay, but I would rather buy it there than at Jewel.

If you got spinach, you beat me to it. They were all out by noon. I too am willing to overpay some to avoid getting it at WF/Jewel. It didn't look good last time 2 weeks ago (the market alternates between the church and ecology center each Sat), but was good 4 or 6 weeks ago.

Hi- I did not make it there until 12:30, and they were out. I got a bag two weeks ago, and it was okay, but just expensive for what you get. I got three salads out of it. There were some bags of greens the organic people from Michigan were selling in the basement, but there was even less in their bags, and they were asking $6 a bag or 2/$10. I decided that was too much money. I only ended up getting a bag of crimini for $5. The farmers market at the ecology center is open every Saturday morning. I bought some potatoes and some garlic from an organic grower there when I stopped in to pay for my community garden. That woman says she shows up there every other Saturday. Her organic potatoes were only $1.50 a pound.

A few of the farmers that came to the winter market at the ecology center, did not like the set up. It was too crowded, and so they approached the church about having a winter market. There is a lot more room there, but they have to load everything on the elevator to get it upstairs.

NFriday wrote:I only ended up getting a bag of crimini for $5. The farmers market at the ecology center is open every Saturday morning. I bought some potatoes and some garlic from an organic grower there when I stopped in to pay for my community garden. That woman says she shows up there every other Saturday.

Ha, our purchases were identical! Just 1 pound of crimini's for me too.

As for the ecology center having a market every week, I was of the understanding that changed this year, making it an either/or. If you bought stuff on the same day the church was happening, there's a breakdown in communications.
http://evanstonfarmersmarkets.org/when-where/

Hi- Thanks for the info. It makes sense that they would alternate the markets. I was at the ecology center on a Saturday the market at Emmanuel did not take place. They had a fair amount of people there the day I was there. I can walk to the one at Emmanuel, and so I have been going there a lot more. The one at the ecology center worked out a lot better the winter they were able to get a heated tent to supplement the ecology center. That year they had plenty of space, but I think they lost funding for the tent.

There were only two true farmers selling there when I went to the one at the ecology center last month, and the rest of the people were selling already prepared food. Thanks, Nancy

Indoor Evanston Farmers Markets cancelled through April 11th.

I went over to the ecology center thinking it was a coin-flip's chances of being open. There were virtually no cars, but I went up to the door to see if any more information was provided, but it just said "today's market" was cancelled. The website I previously provided had no updates, which is why I headed over. I apologize to anybody who relied on it. Evanston Now didn't list it among cancellations yesterday. I refuse to use Facebook, it's likely groups on there provided information. The best information I could find upon coming home was this post from what I believe to be a chai tea vendor at the market. This source has no reason to lie. I believe it's a credible statement about the near-term future of the market. More detail will likely follow from those responsible for the market. https://www.instagram.com/p/B9s1TI5l0ji/

It does not surprise me they are shutting down for a month. There was supposed to be a farmer's market in Arlington Heights this weekend, and the church decided to cancel it. I sing with a group that rehearses in Evanston on Tuesdays, and we decided to cancel our next rehearsal. We will take this on a week by week basis. Our next concert is in May. We just had one three weeks ago, and some people stayed home because of the coronavirus.

Hopefully by May things will improve. This will be a big hit for the farmers if the market does not open for asparagus season the beginning of May. Thanks, Nancy

Hi- I just got a long email from Henry Brockman who comes to the Evanston farmer's market. In his email he says that the city of Evanston has not decided yet whether the outdoor market will open in May. If they don't he is encouraging people to join his CSA, and then he will provide an alternate place such as a church parking lot to pick up your produce. He also asks people to email their city to encourage it to keep the farmer's market open this summer. He points out that you are outside and it is a lot safer than going to your local Jewel, and plus there are a lot less people handling your produce, and especially if you sign up for his CSA. With his CSA everything is already bagged up, and so you don't have 20 people touching that tomato. Hope this helps, Nancy

Henry's Farm and Nichol's Farm & Orchard are both promoting their CSAs. Nichol's is also offering home delivery.

Hi- Kinnikinnick Farms is doing a drop off at Immanuel Lutheran church in Evanston on 4/4 from 8:00-10:00am in the parking lot of the church. You have to go to their website and order and pay in advance, and then pick it up on 4/4. They have bacon, chicken, eggs, and a few other things. Here is a link to their website.
https://kinnikinnickfarm.com/kinnikinnick-direct

Hi- I just visited the Facebook page for the Evanston farmers market, and the manager of the market reports that the director of Parks and Recreation for the city has decided to have the outdoor market open starting May 2nd. There are going to be a few changes. Every vendor is going to be getting a hand sanitizing station, and there are going to be hand sanitizing stations positioned around the market for customers. They are also going to have signs to encourage social distancing, and they are going to encourage farmer's to switch to a cashless payment system. There was a good chance that the farmer's market was not going to open up this summer, and so I am glad they are.

If anybody is interested in signing up for Henry Brockman's CSA, he is going to have a separate line for the CSA. You pay for the CSA when you sign up for it, and then you go to his stall every Saturday, and he gives you a limited choice on what you get, and then you give him your bag and he bags it for you. That means that only Henry or one of his employees has touched the produce before you get it.

I am actually surprised that they decided to go ahead with the farmer's market. So far 124 people had been diagnosed with the virus in Evanston.

My Sister in New Orleans just emailed me tonight, and things are starting to level off there, but at Tulane's Hospital they have the new 15 minute tests, and they are testing every one that gets admitted to the hospital. She said two pregnant woman showed up at the hospital ready to give birth, and they were found to have the virus. Hope this helps, Nancy

Hi- I just received an email from Henry's sister Teresa. The Evanston health department has asked her to have people preorder their plants and pay for them when they order so people don't spend lots of time looking over the plants and asking Teresa what plants she would recommend. She still might bring up some plants to purchase that day, but if she does there won't be a really good selection of plants. Because you are ordering your plants ahead of time she is only going to charge people $4.50 per plant. She will still charge $6 per plant if you purchase the plants at the market. Plant sales are booming where she lives, and so there will not be as many to choose from because of sales at her farm, but if she is out of your favorite tomato plant, there is a good chance that she will have another plant that will be a good substitute. She is also going to be at the market only on 5/9, and 5/23, and if you place an order with her and can not make it to the market you have to ask somebody else to pick it up for you. She will not refund your money if you don't pick up your plants. On 5/23 she will be bringing all of her warm weather plants such as tomatoes, peppers and eggplants.

Apparently gardening is as hot as bread making this year because people are home all day and can go out to their back yard to garden, and it gets them out of the house. When I tried to place a seed order with Johnny's, which is my favorite place to by seeds, I found out that they are only taking orders from commercial accounts right now. More people are ordering seeds, and plus they have to practice social distancing, and so they are way behind in filling orders for homeowners. They will start filling additional orders on 4/26. I cannot garden in my community garden until at least 5/1 anyway. I hope the city of Evanston does not extend that date. Hope that helps, Nancy

Hi- I just visited the Evanston farmer's market Facebook page, and they are going to have a separate entrance and exit, and everything is going to be in a square. They are going to limit the number of people they allow at any one time. They are going to have some people selling prepared food as you enter the line to get into the market, but they are not going to have any tables set up for you to eat your purchases. None of the farmers are going to be allowed to give out samples, and they bag the stuff for you. You are not allowed to touch the stuff before you buy it. They are asking everybody to charge everything or bring exact cash. They are asking everybody to wear a mask and gloves. They have some volunteers who are making masks for the vendors, and they have asked them if they would be interested in selling them at the market for the customers. They are also going to have a list of vendors that are going to allow preorder. They are not allowing any musicians this year. The market absolutely will not open up until 7:30. It are not encouraging whole families to show up every week. Just try to have one family member show up, and they are discouraging people from socializing at the market. Just get your stuff and leave. That is going to be hard for me to do. Here is their Facebook page.
https://www.facebook.com/EvanstonMarket ... __tn__=K-R

In a few days they are going to have a list of the vendors at the market on the city of Evanston website. The market starts on 5/2.

Hi- There is a new post on the Evanston farmer's market Facebook page about the market. They are going to be selling masks at the city of Evanston table for $2. You have to wear a mask at the market. They also have a list of the vendors that are going to allow you to prepurchase online. There are going to be 60 vendors this year, but only 39 are scheduled to show up on 5/2.

They also mention in their post that Drexel University considers the farmers markets the safest place to buy produce right now because you are outside, and way fewer hands touch the produce before you get it. Imagine how many hands touch an avocado before you buy it in the grocery store.

Hi- I have bad news to report. I have a garden in one of the community gardens in Evanston, and currently the gardens are closed, and the gardening coordinator is not sure when they are going to reopen, and so I was hesitant about ordering plants from Teresa. When I sent the gardening coordinator a link to Teresa's ordering form, I said I wanted to order plants from her, but I wanted to make sure the gardens were going to be open this summer. Mary said they are, but she does not know when. They are trying to work out the details.

I decided to then order plants from Teresa, and I have been looking over her plants, and I told myself that I was definitely going to fill out an order with her today. When I went back to her website a few minutes ago, I got the message that her plant orders have (temporarily?) been suspended. I was afraid of this. I hope she opens them up again.

As far as I know the Evanston market is the only market opening up for sure. The city of Chicago is trying to work out the logistics to keep the markets safe, and the Wilmette market might open up the middle of May. I highly suspect that the crowds for the 5/2 market in Evanston are going to be larger than usual since Wilmette and Green City are not going to be open. I might try to get there before 9:00 before they run out of asparagus. Hope this helps, Nancy

I just checked the Evanston farmers market Facebook page, and Seedlings will not be there this summer. I did not buy a lot from them, but I used to like their melons, and I would occasionally buy strawberries and asparagus from them. I will miss them.

BTW- I just talked to my sister Annette who has the farm in Michigan, and she does not anticipate asparagus to be available for the 5/2 market. She has a full crop of peaches this year, but her sweet cherries and apricots got hurt a little bit by frost a few weeks ago. She says though she has more of those than most of the growers do. Last year she only had a quarter of a peach crop, and she had more than anybody else in SW Michigan. It sounds like things are going to be late this year. None of her stuff is in bloom yet.

I just hope that she has lots of upick customers this year. I am worried that people will not want to travel this summer. Hope this helps, Nancy

NFriday wrote:I just hope that she has lots of upick customers this year. I am worried that people will not want to travel this summer. Hope this helps, Nancy

Perhaps you advised this long ago, how far from Chicago is your sister's orchard?

Regards,
Cathy2

My Sister is located in Coloma, Michigan at exit 39 right off of I-94. She is 10 miles E of Benton Harbor. Her farm is Fruit Acres, and yes she has a Facebook page.

NFriday wrote:As far as I know the Evanston market is the only market opening up for sure. The city of Chicago is trying to work out the logistics to keep the markets safe, and the Wilmette market might open up the middle of May. I highly suspect that the crowds for the 5/2 market in Evanston are going to be larger than usual since Wilmette and Green City are not going to be open. I might try to get there before 9:00 before they run out of asparagus. Hope this helps, Nancy

The Skokie Farmers Market, which operates on Sundays, is tentatively eyeing a June 7 opening date. The Park Ridge Farmers Market will open Saturday, June 6. The weekly Morton Grove French Market will also open June 6

https://www.chicagotribune.com/suburbs/ ... story.html

Thanks for the article. There still is no word about what Chicago is going to do. I know the farmers are desperate to come, and most of them will make concessions to attend. The grocery store chains only want to buy produce from mega farmers, and that is why the farmers have been forced to sell at the farmers markets. It is too much work to buy peaches from ten different farmers. There used to be some brokers at the Benton Harbor wholesale market that used to deal with some of the Detroit chains, but they have not been around for 30 years.

The only people that are going to be hurt if the markets do not open up until June are the asparagus, and the people that sell lots of bedding plants.

More details here = https://www.chicagotribune.com/coronavi ... story.html

Hi- I just received an email from Henry and Teresa. Teresa is not taking any more plant orders. If she has any plants left she will bring them to the market when she comes on 5/9 and 5/23. I am sure she will charge more money for those plants though. ,I unfortunately did not get my order in before she ran out, and Talking Farm does not have a lot of seedlings left either. I might end up driving up to Wisconsin to visit Anton's right across the state line.

Henry is currently not accepting any more people for his CSA. He currently has 500 people in his CSA, including downstate people. This is twice as many as he had last year. This year the CSA is going to comprise 2/3rds of his business and the farmer's market 1/3rd. Once he sees how many people come to the market, he might be able to add more people to his CSA. He will be at the 5/16 market, but his CSA will not start until 5/30. Henry just had to order more seeds so he has enough for his CSA customers. Everybody is gardening this year though. It is hot like bread baking, and seeds are harder to come by. I order most of my seeds from Johnny's, and they finally started accepting orders again from home gardeners, but the wait for orders is 14 business days.

There are supposed to be 39 vendors at the 5/2 market. There are going to be 60 vendors in total this year. I looked at the list of vendors though, and none of the new vendors are selling produce unfortunately. Hope this helps, Nancy

Has anybody been there yet today? I am going to wait until about 11:00 to show up. I was just wondering how long the lines are to get in? I suspect due to the fact that they are encouraging people to come solo, the crowds will be lower. Also there are a lot of people that don't buy much from the farmers, but come to get already prepared food, and to socialize with their friends. Since they won't be able to stay and eat with their friends, a lot of those people are going to stay home. I suspect that it is the food trucks that are going to be hurting there this year.

NFriday wrote:Has anybody been there yet today?

Update: Not crowded at all, no groups larger than husband+wife. Entrance and exit on the southeast point closest to garage exit. Plants also sold along Railroad Ave to the west outside the enclosed section. Ramps $3 or 2 for $5 at Stover's.

About to leave in 5-10 min. All I really want/expect to buy are a pound of criminis and ramps. I've got the $5 bill for the mushrooms, but need enough singles to be ready for ramps at an unknown price.

I'll update this post with info (eg. line, crowd) once I get there.

Hi- I just came back from the first farmer's market. I got there around 11:30, and there was a line to get in, but it only took me 5 minutes to get in. They give you a squirt of hand sanitizer when you enter the market, There were supposed to be masks for sale for $2, but I did not see any. There were lots of groups of people unfortunately, and those people did not social distance. The largest group I saw was four people, but I also saw a lot of couples. Only one person is supposed to come per family.

Some people were not social distancing, and I saw some city employees there who were supposed to warn people about that, but they did not. I bought a bag of spinach from Nichols, a bag of crimini from River Valley, and two bunches of scape onions from Stovers. River Valley had the safest set up, but they also had the longest line. I laid down my $5, and then I went over to get my bag of mushrooms. He put the bag in a bowl, and then he slid the bowl over to me. I thanked him for doing it correctly.

When I went to Stover's they were not very organized, and they did not have a set line that you got in. I asked for my two bunches of ramps, and I laid down my card, and he picked it up and processed it, and then handed it back to me. He then asked me if I needed a bag, which he was not supposed to do. I said I know you are not supposed to do this, but you can put them in the same bag as the spinach. I also saw them giving somebody back some change which you are not supposed to do.

Nichols did okay. Todd put the spinach in a bag and laid the bag on the table so I could pick it up. I then went to the end of the table to pay with my card. I laid my card down, and they laid it down again when they were done with it.

I am going to email the market manager with some comments about how things can be improved. The people at River Valley told me that she was at the market, but I don't know where she was. I don't know how things are going to work out when there is a lot of veggies by the pound such as tomatoes, zucchini and beans, unless they are already bagged up. That is what Nichols did with their parsnips and potatoes. There was no asparagus today, but I was told next week there will be some. Hope this helps, Nancy
Hope this helps, Nancy

NFriday wrote:I am going to email the market manager with some comments about how things can be improved.

You obviously have the right to provide input. It was getting more crowded past 10.30am as I was leaving, so you saw the setup when it was more challenged. I don't think the form of non-contact payment used by River Valley was at all mandated by the market. Their stand is unique in how little display they need relative to sales.

If there is one thing I would suggest, it's to get the message of specific rules out through social and traditional media more throughly beforehand. The 1 person/household was completely ignored. It could obviously result in attendance and sales falling off a cliff, so they need to think about it, but if it's a rule, that's how you put it into practice. Expecting not-highly-paid staff to be able to stand-up to individuals over and over is a recipe for disaster. The community has to police itself on this. Given this was the first trial, I can't fault the staff, organizers or vendors much. If they don't emphasize this is a different form of market than years past, and unfortunately not a family activity, that will be on them.

First Chicago-area farmers market opens under new coronavirus rules with two-block long lines

https://www.chicagotribune.com/coronavi ... story.html

I don't know what viewpoint this article is being written from, because what it describes absolutely doesn't square with my experience at 10.30am, pretty much right in the heart of open hours.

The part about forgetting something and "there's no circling back" couldn't be further from the truth. It's not part of a quote from the manager Gorman, so I have no idea who told Louisa that. The center of the market was wide open, nothing at all to prevent people from walking from one side to the other. Even if you could make that an enforceable way of running the market, it would result in a windfall for the markets at the front (how can somebody pass on something with no guarantee what later vendors will have?). They'd have to do a rotation of vendor positions with added complexity because they're not all the same size. The only thing that was one-way was the interaction with each vendor.

The part about Soul & Smoke's owners at the end was so sad. I'll look to place an order through them this month, if possible.

Hi-Louisa was wrong about not being able to go back to one of the stalls. I like to see what everybody has before I decide what to buy, and I was able to do that. I know the Mexican restaurant is not scheduled to appear at the market until sometime in June. If they won't be able to cook there, will they be able to have stuff to sell? Are they going to have steaming tables to keep things warm? The line was not 2 blocks long when I got there, but I did not get there until 11:15. Maybe it was when they first opened up. Next month when the fruit growers come in, the lines might be longer. I don't know how they would be able to handle 7,000 customers under the current set up. Maybe we will get lucky in Illinois though, and they will be able to relax the rules later in the summer. The peak is supposed to to place around the middle of May.

Seedlings is not coming to the market this summer, and Mr. Elko that I believe was one of the original sellers when they first opened, has semi retired and will not be coming to the market either. He is the guy that brings the goat cheese from Wisconsin. He is actually much closer to the Madison market than he is to this one. Next week there should be asparagus. It sounds like Nichols had a lot more stuff at the beginning of the market than they did when I got there. When I got there all they had was sweet potatoes, potatoes, parsnips and spinach. Henry won't show up at the market until 5/16, although Teresa will be there next week so people can pick up their preordered plants.

bweiny wrote:The part about Soul & Smoke's owners at the end was so sad. I'll look to place an order through them this month, if possible.

Note that Heather used to be an active LTHer as Heather22 ... but she's been too busy with family and catering biz to post in the last 4 - 5 years.