Farmer's market dinner party night

I really hate shopping for clothes. Nothing fits, I look like a knob in most stuff I try on and I end up leaving with either an age-inappropriate outfit or more kitchen paraphernalia, which I need like a hole in the head.

But ask me to a farmer's market and I'm out the door with bells on.

Yes, I do go on and on about farmer's markets, but getting truly awesome produce, supporting my local economy, and talking to the farmers is so much fun. And yes, you're probably right that I need to get a life, what can I say? I'm a foodie.

I've discovered that shopping and eating the local produce is wonderful fun, every meal I cook is a taste experience, but this year I've cranked up the whole experience a notch.  My new favourite thing to do is invite friends over to dinner the day I go to the farmer's market. This way I get to celebrate the whole meal deal with friends.

I pretend I'm a chef and cruise the stalls for inspiration and then pick my ingredients, drive home in a total whirl of culinary possibilities and create a seasonal dinner.

This week my dear long time friend and a fellow foodie Joanne and her husband Mike came to dinner.

Here's what we ate.

We started with a salad of heirloom tomatoes (they look like tomatoes used to look like, not perfect, different colours with a true tomato taste), pea sprouts (the shoots of edible pea plants), chopped Kalamata olives and thinly sliced Asiago cheese. I drizzled everything with extra virgin olive oil and balsamic vinegar and a bit of cracked pepper. Looked amazing on my square dark green Japanese salad dishes.

Our main course was steamed teeny tiny baby red new potatoes, fresh corn on the cob with butter (yes, I'll probably burn in Nutrition Hell but I used unsalted butter on corn), grilled baby zucchini tossed with fresh herbs, and grilled steak that I got from my local butcher.  I marinated it in canola oil, minced garlic, chopped rosemary, thyme, oregano and cracked pepper. We toasted with a great VQA(Vintners Quality Alliance) Ontario Shiraz.

For dessert we had fresh blueberries and raspberries with a thickened yogurt that I made by straining vanilla yogurt (one without gelatin or preservatives) in a strainer lined with an unbleached coffee filter for about 4 hours. I popped the berries into the bottom of martini glasses and topped with the thickened yogurt and then sprinkled with fresh mint.

Totally decadent. Totally delicious. Totally can't wait till next week's bounty.