by Sandra Harper
Contributing Writer

On a trip to New York a few weeks ago, I visited the greenmarket at Union Square and found Alice Waters signing copies of her new book, The Art of Simple Food: Notes, Lessons and Recipes from a Delicious Revolution.

Alice Waters, author, restaurateur, advocate for farmers’ markets and sustainable agriculture and the founder of the Edible Schoolyard has written a book that all of us can use and treasure. Read it and let her lead you from the farmer to the kitchen to the table. It’s a cookbook whose heart is based on the relationship between people and their awareness of nature.

“I’m convinced that the underlying principles of good cooking are the same everywhere,” said Waters. “These principles have less to do with recipes and techniques than they do with gathering good ingredients, which for me is the essence of cooking.”

Eat locally and sustainably

“Seek out a diverse variety of vegetables and fruits from small, local producers who take care of the land. Buy eggs, meat and fish from producers whose practices are organic, humane, and environmentally sound.

Since its founding in July of 2006, Farm Stand Marfa has been bringing locally grown and produced food products to the market every Saturday morning. Today our producers are supplying not only visitors to the market, but also restaurants and caterers with more and more locally grown products.

Eat seasonally

“Eating seasonally inspires your menus, gives you a sense of time and place, and rewards you with the most flavorful food.”

Our Saturday market makes seasonal food available and brings awareness to what is not in season and is not grown locally.

Shop at farmers’ markets

“Farmers’ markets create communities that value diversity, honesty, seasonality, locality, sustainability and beauty.”

We are open at least ten months a year. By encouraging growers, producers and artisans all year round and providing them with a location to sell their products, Farm Stand Marfa is inspiring more locally grown and raised food and handmade products.

Plant a garden

“It is deeply satisfying to eat food you have grown yourself, in your own backyard or in a community garden.”

New backyard gardens are being planted in and around town. We have a School Garden Project and a Community Garden is underway. Growing all year round is a practice we are focused on with great intent.

Conserve, compost and recycle

“The more you conserve, the less you waste, the better you feel.”

From its beginning Farm Stand Marfa has advocated for and taught the techniques of composting. We supply recycled plastic bags at the market for our shoppers. Some homemade market bags are for sale. Marfa now has a Recycling Center. How can we do more? Always carry a recycled bag in your pocket or purse or backpack. Keep bags in your vehicles. The best bags are cloth. Since all of us have a collection of plastic shopping bags, recycle them. Soon it will be second nature to supply your own shopping bag every time you buy something in a store. It is possible. We need to make this a useful habit and keep the plastic out of the sea where it has collected and is killing our wildlife.

Cook simply, engaging all the senses

“Plan uncomplicated meals. Let things taste of what they are. Enjoy cooking as a sensory pleasure…”

Shopping at the farmers’ market on Saturday mornings is an invitation to cook simply and engage the senses. The vegetables grown year round offer the freshest and simplest meals- greens are sautéed in oil and garlic and salads are tossed with raw vegetables.

Cook together

“Include your family and friends, and especially children. When children grow, cook, and serve food, they want to eat it. The hands-on experience of gardening and cooking teaches children the value and pleasure of good food almost effortlessly.”

Marfa is a community that lives and breathes this principle of the delicious revolution. At most meals friends and families come together to share food and its preparation.

Eat together

“No matter how modest the meal, create a special place to sit down together, and set the table with care and respect. Savor the ritual of the table. Mealtime is a time for empathy and generosity, a time to nourish and communicate.”

Many meals in Marfa are communal, especially at the outdoor tables of the Food Shark. You will also find table sharing at Squeeze and the Brown Recluse. The bar at Maiya’s is a nightly spot for meals with whoever shows up. The Blue Javelina’s main dining room’s centerpiece is one long table. The Spanish courtyard at the Paisano makes you feel like you are on vacation or an actor in your own movie. Eating at Mondo’s, Borunda’s and Conchita’s is like being at home with people you know. The new BBQ place is built in a communally designed environment that includes a kiva.

Ranchers begin their day at Alice’s; one table under the wall-mounted TV is a designated daylong hangout spot for women. At every breakfast eatery, people spontaneously sit down together. It’s a small town and people often go home for lunch. Husbands and wives eat together in the middle of the day. On their lunch hours, adult sons and daughters visit their parents. Even the Dairy Queen is a ritualized meeting place at 3:00 for several coffee klatches. Next to the bookstore, the coffee shop is the dream den where many go to relax, work and meet friends. Potlucks are a weekly event. Vegans and vegetarians bring their own dishes and share their recipes.

Remember food is precious

“Good food can only come from good ingredients. Its proper price includes the cost of preserving the environment and paying fairly for the labor of the people who produce it. Food should never be taken for granted.”

People here appreciate good food as much as they do good company. This is traditionally a ranching area, not an agricultural one; so many understand the costs of raising cattle better than they can comprehend the costs of producing food. At the market visitors learn that there is a difference between monoculture and food grown by hands that they know.

There is a difference between highly processed food laced with corn syrup, and bread taken fresh from the oven as the sun comes up. There is a person clucking in the morning to her chickens; another one milking his goats; another keeping his bees alive; others fighting off the grasshoppers and planting seeds. This community of people caring for animals and nurturing the soil that feeds us keeps us connected to the seasons and the rhythms of life. It’s based on mutual needs and loves. This way of living describes how we think about what we are doing and how we conduct our relationships. Visit the market on Saturday mornings where you can savor the spirit of the Farm Stand community and share the gifts of our land.

The Farm Stand opens Saturdays at 10AM SHARP at our new location: the railroad tracks next to Food Shark. All of us at Farm Stand Marfa want to thank Marylee and Dax Pass who gave us a home for over a year, next to Pizza Foundation. Their gift of shelter enabled us to be a year-round market, with only a two-month winter break, and to become a weekly stop for hundreds of Marfa residents and visitors from nearby towns.

A writer and a painter, Sandra Harper has combined her artistic pursuits with her interest in market gardening since the early seventies. Now living in Marfa, she is the founder of Farm Stand Marfa, a weekly, nearly year-round farmers’ market. Her essays on sustainable growing and the history and culture of food production in the Trans-Pecos area have appeared in the newspapers and literary journals of the Far West Texas region. She can be contacted directly at: farmstandmarfa@gmail.com.

Author Alice Waters and contributing writer Sandra Harper donning their Farm Stand Marfa bags at the Farmer’s Market in New York City.