Markets: A Love Story

When I was a child there was one day I week I absolutely dreaded: Friday Grocery Shopping Day. Every Friday my mother would drag me to the supermarket to do the weekly grocery shopping. I was a very well-behaved child, so I didn’t bother her or make it more difficult for her; if anything, I helped her by watching the cart while she went and got things. All I remember were aisles and aisles of supposed food products in boxes and bags that held zero appeal to me. Occasionally in the cookie aisle I would perk up and see things like Oreos and Keebler cookies and beg her to get some. She would sometimes get one package of Keebler Pecan Sandies or sometimes a really exciting thing like chocolate chip, but more often than not it was something “healthy” and store brand, like oatmeal raisin or molasses cookies. Then it was on to the next aisle, where I would stare at bottles of detergent or toilet paper and wish I were anywhere else. I liked the produce aisle because it felt more alive to me and I liked fresh fruit, but we didn’t spend much time there. Then, we would wait in a huge line for what seemed like hours waiting to check out, my mother checking her coupons and getting her checkbook out, watching the clerk like a hawk as she checked us out. We left with maybe 7 bags of groceries, lugged them to the car and went home where my dad would be waiting to help us unload all those bags, which we then had to put away for the next hour. And that was that. A chore that was exhausting and boring beyond belief. My mother was an excellent cook, but her attitude toward the shopping was very negative: she was always worried about money and felt frustrated that she had to count every penny, so she turned the whole experience into an extension of that negativity.

Years later I was living in Boston and independent for the first time. Suddenly, I had to feed myself, and that meant going to the grocery store. I was very poor, and would fill my cart with things I needed to cook healthy meals, and then remove what I didn’t absolutely need, keeping my weekly budget to under $20. I didn’t buy junk food because I already liked cooking and good food, and also it was not affordable. I came home with vegetables, fruit, meat, rice, etc., and learned how to make things like “Chicken Legs Puttanesca” from The Silver Palate Cookbook. I remember being surprised how differently I viewed the supermarket when I was shopping for myself. Suddenly, it became fun and a way to think creatively. There was also a sense of power: I could buy whatever I wanted that was in my budget! I found this very liberating.

Shortly thereafter, I found myself living in Seoul, South Korea. There, shopping became an adventure. Was it sugar or was it salt? Who knew?? All I saw was a bag of white crystals with some Korean writing on it. There were cuts of meat that I had never seen before and had no idea what to do with, vegetables that looked like they were from another planet, and olive oil was only sold in “black market” stores for skin care. For one week straight I ate only spaghetti that I found in one of those black market stores with olive oil and garlic, because I had absolutely no idea what anything else was.

What Korea did have was traditional markets. They were loud, bright, crowded and full of sights and smells that were both appetizing and… let’s just say not: fish and seafood, both fresh and dried; vegetables and fruits in incredible quantities in every possible preparation from fresh to dried to pickled; the hot pepper paste and powder that is indispensable in Korean cuisine; stall after stall with all kinds of meat and animal parts, which terrified me. I did see a skinned dog carcass once being carried through the market near where I lived, and I went home in hysterics. In another city, Pusan, there was a very famous, huge fish market that I briefly visited. In every market there was the pervading aroma of kimchi, the pungent Korean pickled and fermented vegetable that is the staple food along with rice. It’s full of garlic, spring onions, hot peppers and, while delicious and nutritious, can make your eyes water. All in all, the markets were fascinating, but rather overwhelming. I didn’t really appreciate them at the time; I was too young and the sensory overload was too much for me.

I spent 4 years living in Asia, and I visited markets in Thailand, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Japan, Singapore, and Bali. In Chiang Mai, Thailand I took a Thai cooking course and we visited markets where we learned how to choose a good quality fish sauce and how coconut milk is produced. I remember trying fruits like mangosteen and rambutan, which were so delicious I still dream about them. I ate coconuts from the tree on Koh Samui, and little yellow mangoes on Boracay Island in the Philippines, back when there were no roads or cars or resorts. In Asia, markets were just a part of everyday life.

By the time I returned to New York City in the late 1990’s the Union Square Farmer’s Market had become renowned for the best and freshest seasonal produce, meat, cheese, wine, breads, and dairy products. There was also a smaller but wonderful market near where I lived. I loved wandering through it, looking at the beautiful displays of food, flowers and plants. I loved the interaction with the people who actually produced the food I was eating. I started my own weekly shopping ritual that was the complete opposite of what my mother’s had been: I would get up on Saturday morning, take a leisurely walk over to the Farmers’ Market, and examine what was on offer before choosing what I would bring home. I would chat to the farmers about what they had that week, how it might be prepared, or about their latest baby goat. I started to only eat produce, eggs, cheese, meat and fish that I bought at the market. Wandering around on a sunny Saturday morning with my purchases as I sipped a little cup of hot apple cider or nibbled on a fresh pastry was one of my favorite weekend rituals.

In Spain I have had the pleasure of visiting several different markets. La Boqueria in Barcelona was a revelation the first time I went, with its stunning stained glass façade and stalls of some of the most tempting food I have ever seen. El Mercado de San Miguel in Madrid is touristy but still fun to visit with its bodegas and delicious food. One of my favorites is the Mercado Central de Atarazanas in Malaga, where I bought incredible fresh produce, fish and meat, including merguez, the delicious French/North African spicy lamb sausage from the Halal butcher there. In Malaga I was able to recreate my old Saturday morning routine of getting up, wandering to the market and buying my groceries for the week, doing my best to chat in Spanish to the stall owners. In Seville there’s the famous Mercado de Triana (located in the old Inquisition headquarters), the Mercado del Arenal (located in an old prison), the newer Encarnacion Market at Las Setas, the touristy but well-located Lonja del Barranco, the Mercado Puerta de la Carne, and the Mercado de Feria.

In this age of technology and giant industries, the act of buying food from the person who grew it or made it at a nearby farm seems almost revolutionary. It feels different, it smells different, and it tastes different. It tastes… full of life force energy. If you take a bag of prepackaged and prewashed lettuce from the supermarket, even if it’s organic, and put it next to a beautiful head of lettuce you just bought from a farmer, who displays them like flowers, the difference is shocking. If you choose to eat strawberries only in season, you will never have pale, flavorless, white-topped strawberries again. If you eat figs that were picked just that morning and carefully driven to the market you will have a revelation. So, whenever you possibly can, buy from a local farmer who can tell you a story about the food you’re going to eat, because it represents his or her hard labor of love, and that is priceless.