As summer slowly leaves us and fall approaches, the best thing to do during this interim period is to spend a day at the local farmer’s market. Hoping to enjoy today’s sun (although here in California it is perpetually sunny, yes, even during Christmas) I meandered about the small, unpretentious farmer’s market located across the street from UCI.

The first thing that greeted me was the beloved hummus stand. With a dozen or so different flavored hummus dips (my favorite is the roasted garlic), the Babba foods stand actually lets you try each hummus dip with pita bread samples. You can literally stand there and eat your way through the row of roasted tomato, pesto, and eggplant (plus more) hummus dips. Yum.

The other great thing about farmer’s markets is the appearance of local bakeries. There is nothing I love more than a bakery, and with items such as chocolate poundcake with a ganache center, chocolate almond brioche, and passionfruit marshmallows, I can barely restrain myself from 1) salivating all over the place, thereby ruining the goods and 2) buying enough pastries to feed a small brood of children. This is why the buddy system comes in handy when going to these places: your friend, boy/girl friend or whatever, can kindly and ever-so-gently smack some sense back into your head.

And lastly nothing beats homegrown fruits and vegetables. Pliots- (what you get when a plum and apricot mate) are a dream, possibly my favorite "fake" fruit, not to mention the non-wax cucumbers (I didn’t even know those existed) and bright red tomatoes. The added bonus is that you don’t have to be afraid of what you’re eating.

So go outside with your pasty self and enjoy the sun, fruits, veggies and the local community before the weekend ends. I’ll guarantee you’ll be glad you did.

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The best way to look farmers' market events in your area is through the local newspaper or word of mouth. The one near UCI is located along Campus in the In-N-Out plaza, held every Saturday, 8 am to noon.

Labels: Food, ShoutsOfAdoration, weekend