Monday, June 7, 2010

Prettiest Farmstand in Sullivan County

We try to get up to our house in Sullivan County every weekend, and we're lucky enough to have some really great farmers markets up there, and a couple of farmstands, that make it so we don't have to bring up food from the city. Probably five years ago this was not the case--we would have had to bring up bread, cheese, wine, meats...now we have a two great local bakeries, Beach Lake Bread out of Pennsylvania, Flour Power Bakery out of Livingston Manor, NY. We have a great wine and cheese shop in Callicoon, run by a great guy named Robin, who moved up from the city with his wife and daughter a couple of years ago. There's the Catskill Harvest Market, in between Liberty and Youngsville, that has a great selection of everything you'd need to cook for a weekend, and then some (just bear in mind all their meats are frozen, so you can't show up on a Friday at 5pm and think you're buying burgers there to make that night). And the Pecks Market in Callicoon has excellent product (the one in Jeffersonville however does not), like naturally raised local chickens, local cheeses and milk from the local Tonjes Dairy and Calkins Creamery. As for farmers markets, there's one on Fridays from 3-6pm in Liberty, and one on Sunday in Callicoon from 11am-2pm. However, what if you don't get up there til late on Friday night? Well, there's Alice's River Brook Farm. It's open from 10am to 2pm every Saturday and Sunday, and two Fridays during the summer (the one before the 4th of July, and the one before Labor Day weekend). It's an organic farm, and she has probably the best produce I've seen since I've been to the precious San Francisco farmers market. It's just that good. She has things I've never even heard of--Vitamin Greens? She makes her own salad mix, that really feels like it was put together with love. I know that sounds corny, but it's true. Most salad mixes can taste too aggressive or grassy--hers is perfect. And the setting is too. She's got everything in a beautiful barn, which sits next to a stream, and a bridge, and on the other side are her gardens, her chickens, goats, sheep, ducks, and her new donkey Hannah. She also sells Beach Lake breads and pies, local cheeses, homemade quiches, and organic meats (frozen). It's a fun field trip for Clara, because she gets to run around with the animals while we shop.

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