Jarmark Warszawa

It seems that Plac Defilad is getting some use this year.  It's usually an eyesore of a parking lot and bus station, but the Fan Zone and now the Jarmark Warszawa (Warsaw Christmas Fair) have actually put it to some use.  Last year, the jarmark was on the south side of the PKiN.  This year, it's a little bigger (still smaller than the one in the Old Town Square), and sports a small bar, a ferris wheel, some other rides, crappy Christmas techno, and the wooden stalls selling gloves, food, scarves, and knickknacks.

The 'Warsaw Eye' and the Palace.

The entrance.

I'll ride this some time and write about the views and whether it was worth it.

 I actually like Christmas markets.  I like buying the overpriced mulled wine (not much mead for sale) and hearty bread with smalec and ogorki kiszone.  The music could be toned down (really, it's terrible.  It's almost offensive how bad it is).
It's worth fifteen minutes to ramble through.

Strawberry Time!

One thing I must say about Northern Europe, the produce comes to market far earlier than I am used to.
I come from a place where strawberries are only beginning in mid-June and are full fledged in the beginning of July.  In Poland, strawberries burst onto the scene in late May and early June.  Soon, every peddler on the street is hawking baskets of strawberries upon strawberries.  Cherries will follow in the coming weeks, and I am looking forward to that.

Selling strawberries out of a van.

 A traditional way to prepare the strawberries (besides jams and jellies) is to hull them, cut them, sprinkle them with sugar so they form a tart, sweet, chunky sauce of sorts.  This versatile way of prepping the strawberries allows them to be ladled over nalesniki (crepes) stuffed with cheese, put into fruit smoothies, and mixed with yogurt and cream and eaten with pasta.

Fresh-bought strawberries ready to be washed.

Market Day!

For those of you lucky enough to be within reasonable distance of farmers market, you may want to visit there as often as you can.  There are not just a great selection of fresh vegetables at jaw-dropping prices (1zl for a kilo of potatoes!) there is also a great social experience.  I could go to a farmer's market just to watch the vendors and the shoppers.  It's not like a supermarket where everyone pushes around those metal carts surveying the choices of potato chips and listening to soft hits; here, grizzled farmers with dusty hands the size of dinner plates scoop up potatoes, beets, carrots and dump them into a bag to weigh them.  People mill about the stalls, examining the produce and always looking for the best deals.  Hawkers call out to passersby, sometimes urging to try to taste their superior products.

Shoppers pick up fresh produce at the bazaar.

If you are late in the day (everyone is packing up by 2:30-3:00), sometimes you can haggle over the price of the last remaining cauliflower.  Often, later in the day, you can see where hawkers have scratched out the original prices and marked down their goods just to get them to move.
The farmer market I attended to weekly starts in mid-spring.  I am always eager to buy fresh vegetables, especially tomatoes, because the ones in the grocery stores always tasteless.  Fruits and vegetables that are shipped to supermarkets are picked unripe, then exposed ethylene in transit so they ripen just in time to hit the shelves.  The downside of the fruit not ripening naturally is that the flavors are not as complex and rich as those in naturally-ripened fruit.  During the summer and autumn months, many supermarkets try to carry fruits and vegetables from local sources.  This is especially true in Poland because the weak zloty makes imports more expensive, so it's more economical to buy natively anyway.  But, regardless, I like to buy straight from the farmer.
One of the exciting things about the bazaar is that the in-season produce is always changing.  Prices fluctuate week to week, and it's a little game to buy as much of one product when the price dips low.  Some produce, like fava beans, were available for only two weeks.  I missed my opportunity to buy as much as I can to turn into falafel and hummus (chickpeas are expensive and rare here.  So is tahini.)
A few stalls sell things like cured meats, cheeses, preserves, honey, and imported fruits.  From my experience, these can be hit or miss.  I've gotten excellent cheese and kabanosy (small, dried sausages), but have gotten some not-so-great kielbasa as well.  Many vendors have huge barrels full of ogórki malo solny (a type of pickle) and sauerkraut.

Peaches for sale.

Farmers markets don't just offer produce.  Other vendors, ones selling antiques, DVDs, clothes, books, cleaning products, and kitchenware, also set up shop for the day.  Supermarkets like Tesco become irrelevant on the weekends, because one can get almost anything at the bazaar.

Not just produce at the farmers market.

I truly love these markets.  I often spend less than forty zloty and stagger away with tons of fresh fruits and vegetables.  With fall fast approaching and summer's grip withering, I find it's best to buy up as much cheap produce as I can now and preserve as much as I can.  Already, the kitchen is stacked with countless jars of strawberry and plum jam, plum wine brewing (I finished a batch of cherry wine), and I'm in the act of preserving tomatoes, onions, and potatoes.  I love fall, and everything it offers, but it does urge me to fill up my freezer with as much frozen freshness as I can.  Soon, the farmers will put away their stalls for the winter, and we'll all be forced to eat tasteless tomatoes, sad-looking lettuce, and unnaturally crisp apples.  But, the bright side is that all those wonderful tropical fruits will be hitting the shelves.

Wild mushrooms.

Nuts for sale.

To Market, To Market

I've recently discovered a farmers' market, which sets up shop every weekend and where almost anyone can come and hawk his wares. It's a little bit like a flea market; there are 'stalls' selling almost anything, from half-empty bottles of perfume (or bottles marked "Tester Only") to imported clothes and plastic crap (all for a zloty.) Some stalls are stacked with goods you can buy in any grocery store, others are dedicated solely to spices, packaged up in small plastic baggies, while others sell flowers or baked goods. (I use the word stalls loosely; some are just goods spread out over blankets on the ground, or even less: just some guy sitting amongst various items.)
Mostly, it's dominated by stalls selling fresh produce at cheap prices. Some selections, such as heirloom tomatoes and specialty fruits, are absent from grocery store selves. As I inquired to the price of some ogórki maly solny, the lady selling the stuff offered me a free sample (you don't see Carrefour giving away free pickles; they just have free samples of shitty coffee or yogurt or something.) I was so delighted that I bought half a kilo. I walked in not knowing what I would get, but walked out with bunches of amazing fresh basil, huge onions, large, juicy tomatoes, and some freshly dug up potatoes for 1.50zl/kg. As I browsed amongst the venders, I came along one place selling old stamps. The open page had two stamps commemorating the Soviet space ventures, so I bought two (they came in a pair) for a zloty. The guy immediately tried to interest me with some others, but I politely declined.
Before I left, I snapped a few shots of the colorful stalls. With my last picture, I took a photo of all the trucks lined up. Some guy (probably one of the farmers) came up and started saying something I didn't quite understand. At first I thought was asking about my camera, and maybe even asking if I would take some pictures of him (he spoke in such a rush, using words I didn't understand and I could only pick out a few random things.) It then became obvious that he was quite angry that I had taken a snapshot, saying "Privatny!" I looked at him quizzically (I was in a public space and no one was in the frame, least of all, him.) I shrugged and said, "To OK. Przepraszam" He gave me a glare and walked off. But the story doesn't end there. Some babcia—a cute lass of around 80—was sitting in a truck with the door ajar and the window down. She had seen and heard my "conversation" with the man and asked me to come over. She started speaking softly (dare I say apologetically) in another rush of words of which I had no comprehension. What was she saying? I can only surmise, but she seemed to be explaining something about the man and about photography and its allowance in public areas. Maybe she was saying that he was incorrect. I don't really know.
I left soon after.

Soviet stamps commemorating the Soviet Space Program.