What is the best part about travelling? The food. You can argue that beautiful views or art is a good reason to travel, but let’s do the math. You can see (1 point), maybe hear (0.5 points), and maybe feel (0.5 points) beautiful views or art. Now lets look at food. You taste it (duh, 1 point). You smell it (1 point).You feel it (1 point). You see it (1 point). And in madison, when you have squeaky cheese curds, you’ll hear it (1 point). Tally it up: Food Wins!
Anyhow, enough about that silliness. I was in Madison to check out what I hear is an amazing farmer’s market, which was at it’s peak on the Saturday of July 4th’s weekend. And my sources were correct. The farmer’s market here is definitely awesome. It’s a weekly farmers market that circles around the capitol. There must be over 200 venders, mostly selling veggies, plants, flowers, cheese, honey, and other farm products. I even got some popcorn kernels to pop later!
Their website says that they are the largest producer-only farmer’s market in the country. That means that you won’t see any resale, cutting out the middle man. The money you spend goes straight to the people who made the food or grew the produce.
So I took out my wallet and bought a chocolate bismark from Oakhouse Bakery. It was a thing of beauty that could kill someone with diabetes in one bite. A whole wheat donut with a cholate glaze on top and a butter cream icing filling. Let’s just say I found out that I didn’t have diabetes (pheww).
As I walked around, I came across a community garden, right on the capitol’s block. Usually you will find nice foliage or flowers in a spot like this, but that wasn’t enough for one of the top 5 largest agriculture counties in the country. They had to grow stuff at their own capitol building.
That’s just way too cool. Anyhow. I continued my journey around the square and purchased some Gentle Breeze honey sticks, a sourdough baquette from the Madison Sourdough Company, a beef stick, popcorn kernels on the cob, and a blueberry banana smoothie. I also ate alot of cheese samples. They were delicious.
Anyhow, the farmer’s market in Madison was great. In New Orleans, we only have 20-25 vendors at our farmer’s market on a good day. Come on New Orleans, pick it up!