Market & Kitchen, July 4th

It is absolutely gorgeous outside today, so I've been making the most of it: walking around my neighbourhood, checking things out and going into all the stores I've spent the last month walking past but not actually entering. I wandered around this morning looking for garage sales (OK, it was a little more premeditated than that) and bought a bunch of cookbooks for $2:



Martha Stewart's Healthy Quick Cook
The Urban Peasant - James Barber
A Passion for Vegetables - Paul Gayler
The Original Boston Cooking-School Cook Book (1896!!) - Fannie Merritt Farmer

The last one should be an interesting read if nothing else....I also bought a butterfly shaped cookie from the kids manning the snack booth, but passed on the lemonade. The cookie is not in the picture because I ate it immediately. Ahem.

A decent haul at the farmer's market:



White Icicle radishes (on the left); the woman at the market said they & the greens were milder than normal radishes...I've already eaten some of the greens in scrambled eggs for lunch, and they were delicious. ($1.50)

Zucchini, spring onions, and mustard greens. I've heard of mustard greens before but I haven't seen them around. I'm eager to try them since I like peppery mustardy things. ($4.50)

New potatoes ($4)

Smoked pork chops from the Mennonite ladies....so basically bacon, I'm guessing. Sweet! I trimmed the bones and fat off one and rendered the fat to start the black beans I cooked this afternoon...it made my apartment smell amazing and gave great flavour to the beans. ($10)

No strawberries unfortunately...my garage sale adventures meant I showed up a little later than I normally do and there weren't any left. I still got some though--I went to the 'natural' food store nearby and bought a pint ($5) of local berries and some oranges ($2.30).

I also hit up the bulk food store earlier this week and stocked up:



I bought hard and soft whole wheat flour (I marked one bag with a twist tie and I think it was the hard flour one....oops), brown long grain rice, ground flaxseed, oatmeal, raisins, black and romano beans, cornmeal, cinnamon, and peppercorns. Mostly organic (the raisins, spices, beans and flax are not) and ~$19 for the lot.

So that's $46.61 spent on groceries this week...I still need to get milk and yogurt sometime, and coffee which I am completely out of (gasp, choke). That will push me over my weekly budget of $50, but I'm stocked up on a lot of things now so I expect I'll be good for the month.

This is what I'm planning on cooking this week:

Black bean & rice tacos with shredded mustard greens, salsa, and cheddar cheese
Pizza with herbs (I don't have enough basil for just that so I'll probably add some oregano...maybe some of the radish greens?)
Black beans, steamed or sauteed mustard greens, cornbread
Lentils & rice from the freezer, quick pickled carrots, the rest of the radish greens
Fried rice with carrots, peas, green onion, egg
Roasted new potatoes and zucchini, broiled pork chop
Ginger-lime salmon with zucchini en papillote, lentil & orange salad

Lunches will be leftovers (especially pizza...) and some tomato soup and chicken rice from the freezer. For snacks I have carrot sticks, oatmeal molasses muffins & cornbread, strawberries, oranges, and I'm going to hardboil some eggs as well. Phew!