It's the most wonderful time of the year: Spring farmers market season! Don't get me wrong, I love my Winter markets, but now we're coming right up on the time when everything is growing and in bloom and it's just a magical thing. I try to visit at least two markets a week, if not more. My favorite market in the world is the one in Burlington, Vermont. It's huge and it's in the most beautiful state and if you need more reasons to go, it also have more free booze than I've seen at any other market, ever. Pretty much perfect.
Unfortunately, though, that's not my local weekly market. I'll get up there as much as I can this summer, but for most of the time, I'm stuck in Massachusetts, so I make do. If you're also stuck in Massachusetts, the Federation of Massachusetts Farmers Markets is a great resource for finding your local markets. You can search by area, by day of the week, by time of day. It's great; don't let the awkward website fool you. If you, like me, actually live in the Boston/Camberville area, I've even done you one better: I've made a Google Calendar with most of the local markets on it. This makes it easy to see the day, time, location, and other relevant details in one place. You can add this to your personal GCal experience as a handy reminder of where to go any particular day of the week.
Now, this doesn't have ALL the area markets on it (in fact, it mostly has those I've managed to try for myself), so if you have one you really like that you think should be on here, please just let me know. I'm making a plan to try more markets outside my immediate neighborhood this summer, and I'm excited to find some new favorites. In the meantime, I'll be finishing my dinner of the first, tiny, perfect strawberries of the season and some lovely goat cheese which really does go perfectly with them, just like the farmer said it would.
What's your favorite farmers market? Is there a food you're most looking forward to finding at a market this summer? Why are farmers markets so freaking awesome??!