Farmers markets a sure sign of spring.
Callingwood version is always first to greet the arrival of spring
Every spring in Edmonton, fashion is the shibboleth separating the hopeful from the pessimists. Winter-wary skeptics stay cosy in their Arctic-ready puffy coats, while the optimists throw on T-shirts and sandals.
Solidly on the side of short shorts? The folks at Callingwood Farmers’ Market.
“We’re sort of two, three weeks ahead of everybody else,” says Wayne Hryniw, manager of the market at 69th Avenue and 178th Street.
“The community just can’t wait for the market to get going.”
Callingwood is Edmonton’s biggest Sunday market, and now in its 31st season, it’s easily the longest-running. Among the city’s dozen official listed farmers markets, it’s like the first robin of spring, a portent of sticky waffles and face-painting to come.
Even though an increasing number of our city’s farmers markets shuffle indoors for the winter, summer is still king, and most markets open outdoors in the second or third week of May — the bustling downtown market opens May 16 — a week or two behind Callingwood.
Hryniw doesn’t know why Callingwood is the early bird of the city. But it’s always been that way, at least in the 16 years he’s been there.
Getting a jump on the season does lead to the occasional slushy misfire. Like last Wednesday. Their first mid-week event, a smaller afternoon affair that runs Wednesdays from 2 to 6 p.m., was interrupted by piles of gloppy white snow.
Hryniw has experienced only two or three cancellations in his 16 years, but states an inviolable law: rain or shine or sleet, they always open Sundays.
Farmers markets change throughout the season. Right now, stalls are dominated by bedding plants, flowers, an assortment of last year’s stillfresh vegetables and some hothouse tomatoes, peppers and cucumbers.
Things pick up in mid-June, when the B.C. cherries arrive. After that, local produce joins the party, a cornucopia of roots and stalks.
The number of vendors grows with the crops. At Callingwood, the first week saw 120 vendors, but that number should move up to 150 by midsummer.
Many markets go beyond food with stalls for local charities, buskers, and animals, both of the balloon and breathing varieties.
But a vibrant market need not be massive nor start before the last snowfall, as the city’s newer and smaller markets will tell you.
Ogi Komlenovic has big hopes for a new market in Miller Crossing, which will open June 2 in the parking lot of the Royal Canadian Kingsway Legion, located at 14339 50th St.
Komlenovic, who’s spent the past 20 years selling B.C. fruit from Oliver, B.C. decided after selling his wares “everywhere,” at various other markets, it was time to open one near his home.
He’s got 30 vendors so far. The market will be open on Tuesdays from 4 to 8 p.m. and Sundays from 1 to 5.
“We live in that area,” Komlenovic says. “We know how much the market is really nice for the communities to have. For the families especially, it’s a place to socialize, and buy direct from the farm.”
Hryniw, who spends his winters constructing sturdy cedar furniture for the Callingwood and St. Albert markets, is ready for the season to ramp up.
His woodworking repertoire has expanded from patio and lawn furniture into porch swings and gliders, the most recent of which even have canopies.
Like his craft, the market he oversees is also expanding. This year, there’s a French bread and pastry vendor, along with ethnic foods, crafts, jewelry and woodworking.
The west end supports the Callingwood market very well, says Hryniw.
“Everybody’s really excited, including myself,” he says. “We just need some nice weather now.”