Saskatoon Farmer's Market

I challenge anyone under the impression that the prairies are boring and bland, to make the drive from Edmonton to Saskatoon. The prairies are absolutely beautiful with big dynamic skies full of horizon to horizon blue, or towering clouds. 

While only in Saskatoon for a short bit this time around, I managed to get a visit in to the Saskatoon Farmer’s Market. I was flipping out! What a great market!

This lady was my favourite person I chatted with at the market. She approached me as soon as I walked into the market to show me what she had. After buying her out of some beautiful heirloom tomatoes as well as some nice peppery arugula, she grabbed my hands in hers and said “thank you sweetie”. No problem Tomato lady!

Some nice bright yellow habaneros (my favourite chili at the moment) caught my eye from outside so I had to investigate. I met Fred Gittings, from Grandora Gardens, who grows a bunch of varieties right here in Saskatoon including Nagga Jolokia’s, or Ghost Chilis as they also go by in North America.

Naga Jolokia's: Serious business!

I have no idea what I’m going to do with a bag of Nagga Jolokia powder but I couldn’t resist buying some. This bag includes: 18-22 peppers dried, ground, and nothing more. They came with a stern warning of not to get them in your eye (you can go blind), and to rinse with milk if you do. As I left, he barked a final warning: “if you mess with them, they will mess with you”. Warning noted.

Many other vendors, but no other photos (sorry). But here is what I ended up with. Not a bad bounty!

Wonderful Heirloom tomatoes, arugula, basil, gold beets, black lentils, corn and wild board sausage

I like Saskatoon a whole lot, and I’m looking forward to spending more time here.

Wanting to make cook use of the heirloom tomatoes I found, I cooked up a tomato sauce that night that I think represents what I saw at the market: beautiful ingredients that are simple and not dressed up, but come from a profound love and respect for food and the place it came from.

I included a simple recipe that has become my favourite way to celebrate tomatoes.

Not much to this simple tomato sauce recipe:

1. Get a big bowl full of beautiful ripe tomatoes (The quality of tomatoes is the most important part of this, so don't be cheap, your local farmers work hard and deserve to not be haggled down).

2. Toss them in an oven safe skillet. Don't be afraid to crank up the heat. Tomatoes have a lot of liquid and can handle it. The point here is using direct heat to "pop" the tomatoes and release the liquid, which we will then reduce.

3. Coming along nicely, almost all "popped"

4. In the oven at ~ 280 for a few hours to get that tangy sun kiss, as the Italians would say.

5. Sautee a couple cloves of garlic (4-5 if you like garlic like me) in a deep pot, add the tomatoes and continue to simmer and reduce until it has an intense tangy tomato flavour. Add whatever else you would like because at this point its ready to be mixed with some nice pasta with a good amount of parmesan cheese. I added some wild board sausage, basil and arugula.

Super easy, but amazing result, trust me and do it.

Note: some weird formatting issues that I can't seem to correct, and I'm too full to do anything about it. Sorry.