MONIQUE KEIRAN
Farm, farm, everywhere a farm, and the bounty’s bursting on the Saanich Peninsula
We’re lucky here on the coast. We don’t have to travel far to come across one of the region’s best summer features. Farm stands dot many of the Peninsula’s roadsides.
They offer passersby the bounty of the day, all on the honour system. Select a dozen eggs, a bouquet of flowers or a basket of berries. Put your money in the box provided. Thank you, please stop by again.
In addition, most municipalities are home to at least one seasonal, outdoor farmers’ market. Some of these — including the well-known Salt Spring Island Farmers’ Market — open as early as April, featuring the work of local craftspeople, artisans, bakers and food processors until spring produce comes online. But many markets wait until May or even June to open, when the supply of locally grown garden goods becomes plentiful and reliable.
The markets and roadside stalls connect area food producers with local consumers. They keep us city dwellers grounded and mindful that chickens must lay eggs and a person must grow and pick the strawberries before we can enjoy either.
And as the seasons progress, the colours displayed among the farmed goods for sale change with the foods on offer.
Greens dominate market produce stalls in the spring. Young lettuces ready for eating still retain their tender, light green. Their chloro phyllladen food-factory cells have not yet come fully online and turned the leaves dark green, as happens once they’ve experience prolonged exposure to bright sunshine.
Winter kale and cabbage respond to the rising temperatures by sprouting flower stalks — to these plants, spring means time to reproduce, but our tables benefit from these tasty shoots.
Leafy seedlings, too, are for sale, inspiring some browsers and buyers. They are willing to risk the plants being browsed by deer, nibbled by feral rabbits and slimed by slugs for the chance of being able to eat gardengrown produce within minutes, not hours, of it being picked.
Brighter, more varied tones and flavours mark summer’s start. These past few weeks, I have found crisp young carrots and radishes alongside cherry tomatoes and strawberries. Chard with yellow, pale red and white stalks is a mainstay at this time of year, while garlic greens, called scapes, appeared only briefly before they were replaced by freshly harvested heads of fall-planted garlic.
However, I’m really looking forward to the jewel-toned foods that herald summer’s height. The deep reds of the cherries are just starting to appear now, brought in from those Okanagan orchards that haven’t yet been uprooted in favour of more lucrative grape vines. Fortunately for cherry fans and addicts — among whose number I count myself — we can expect to see a procession of varieties of sweet cherries in the markets and the grocery stores throughout July and possibly into August.
We can enjoy golden, sugary rainiers and some of the early purple varieties now, early in cherry season. Bing cherries will typically ripen in a week or so, with the cycle continuing with lapins and skeenas, then sweethearts. Where cherry season was once limited to a handful of varieties, today’s diversity can extend the season to six weeks in a good year.
And as cherry season winds down for the year, other gem-coloured foods take their place. We’ll see blueberries and raspberries, and local green and black figs. Once again, the Okanagan will come through for us with more stone fruit — this time, apricots. Although these, as well as cherries and peaches, can be grown in the Victoria area, few commercial orchards in the region do.
And after that, the season’s flavour and colour highlights join in the perfectly timed complementary combination of peaches and blackberries. Add a scoop of vanilla ice cream or yogurt, and you capture the essence of a lazy August weekend afternoon in a bowl.
Harvest colours accompany summer’s end, with an abundance of bright yellow corn, golden-brown winter pears, and many coloured apples and squashes.
It’s worth exploring farm stands along the Saanich Peninsula’s back roads and seeking out the different outdoor markets to capture the changing colours and flavours of summer in the region.