Ithaca Farmers Market: A Seasonal Guide and Cookbook Celebrating the Market's First 50 Years

Nearly every Saturday and Sunday morning at Steamboat Landing, you will see the faithful browsing the nationally renowned Ithaca Farmer’s Market in search of the freshest and most beautiful produce, filling bags and baskets with fixings for the week’s home meals, encouraging farmers and growers to extend their culinary reach. Celebrating a historic milestone at the Market’s current Pavilion location, Ithaca Farmers Market captures the energy and history of the market through colorful narratives, vivid historical and contemporary photos, detailed recipes, and helpful shopping and prep guides. A far cry from the rag-tag brigade selling off the backs of pick-up trucks in 1973, today’s bustling pavilion hosts an array of social enterprises, meeting the demand for fresh, locally grown vegetables and fruits, meat from pastured animals, and handcrafted wines. Farmers and growers engage in sustainable practices to produce healthy food for those of us who are concerned with not just what we eat, but how and where it is produced. Ithaca food activist Michael Turback showcases the delicious possibilities of cooking with local produce at the height of flavor and freshness throughout the growing seasons, taking readers on a year-round culinary tour from spring to early and midsummer to the bursting harvest of late summer, then ebbing into winter. Practical, valuable advice on shopping for fruits and vegetables in accordance with peak growing seasons reconnects marketgoers with the cycles of nature in our region, offering recipes for fresh and delicious dishes made with ingredients that reflect their truest flavors. Natives and new visitors to the Market alike will discover why the Ithaca venue has been cited as one of the country’s most influential farmers markets.