Coi’s Evan Rich surveys Page mandarin oranges

Another sunny Saturday morning found us back at the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market, the secret weapon of San Francisco’s thoughtful, creative chefs. The Bay Area has a wide variety of interesting fruits and vegetables growing here and near year-round, and while we’re surrounded by it all the time, you’re not alone if you have little to no idea what to look for when picking produce. We tagged along with four local culinary artists on their morning run around the various farm stands to steal their valuable tips.

Mission Beach Café’s Trevor Ogden sorts through parsnips.

Trevor Ogden, executive chef at Mission Beach Café, is currently accompanying his braised Prather Ranch lamb shank with a puree of baby parsnips, which he picks up from Heirloom Organic Gardens. When shopping for the root vegetable for home cooking, however, Ogden says size doesn’t really matter all that much.

“You can use both,” he advises. “Bigger can be better, but the little ones you don’t have to peel.” Look for clean, firm roots.

Aziza's Louis Maldonado looks at Romanesco broccoli.

Louis Maldonado, chef de cuisine at Aziza, enjoys working with Romanesco broccoli, which he prizes for its trimmings even more than the crowns. Sometimes he’ll even purchase them separately, often from Dirty Girl Produce. The trimmings work well for him because he doesn’t have to blanch or otherwise prepare some big hunk of broccoli. We’ve always stumbled around and picked huge, fat crowns, but it turns out that’s not a great strategy. Maldonado instead looks for really small crowns and roasts them whole with anchovies, lemon, parsley, and olive oil.

“When they get bigger, it kind of takes the special [qualities] away, so we just try to go for smaller ones,” he says. “The stuff they don’t make money on, we try to buy.”

Credo’s Gustavo Romero ponders the best purple kohlrabi.

Purple kohlrabi is big and scary looking, not the sort of vegetable that timid chefs would take a chance on, but Gustavo Romero, executive chef at Credo, makes it sound versatile and easy to use. Heirloom Organic Gardens is sporting big, beautiful specimens of this traditionally Lebanese, cabbage-like veggie right now.

“All the stuff they bring here is good quality,” notes Romero as we walk back towards the stand and spot the purple beasts. He picks up a few that are bigger, with cleaner white spots. “For the restaurant, I like to use the larger ones to mash them, because it’s easier and you spend less time doing it. In root vegetables, I don’t think the size especially matters unless you’re talking about carrots, because baby carrots have a lot more flavor.” Credo currently cooks a fish in parchment paper with root vegetables, including kohlrabi. He also loves to boil them and use them in a puree for a great consistency.

“Kohlrabi is great steamed in a stew with potatoes, carrots, and a chicken; it’s also great as a crudité or shredded like a cole slaw, skin and all,” adds Heirloom Organic farmer Dave Jamrock.

Page mandarin orange

Like many of his colleagues, Evan Rich, chef de cuisine at Coi, heads to the Hamada Farms stand for citrus. Right now, the Page mandarin oranges at Hamada are really good. He uses the juice for a play on a mandarin sour cocktail: Frozen mandarin ice with mandarin vodka jelly and a frozen meringue flavored with Angostura bitters.

He looks for a fruit that weighs a little bit, and says the color of the skin is important: If it’s more vibrant and darkly hued, the juice will probably be sweeter and more concentrated. He also suggests holding one in each hand; the heavier one will produce more juice.

Hamada is a reliable source, but Rich will often go the extra step to research the weather conditions around the various farms to figure out which ones might be producing the fruit with the most and most flavorful juice at the moment and then do a taste test at the stands.

“At Coi, that’s the kind of intensity we have with the ingredients,” he says. “It’s very important about taste and freshness. With fresh ingredients, there’s like an energy — it’s hard to explain, but it’s like there’s something that you can’t even notice, but it’s a subconscious thing that you just realize it’s better. And that’s why I come here.”

Previously: Bay Area Chefs on Winter Produce

When my friend Natalie asked me if I had any plans for Easter weekend, I was mildly embarrassed to admit that I hadn't. I just hadn't given it much thought this year.

"Well, you do now," she said. "Want to help plant a farm?"

Plant a farm. I couldn't think of a good reason not to. I welcomed the excuse to get outside and do something interesting, something for free. Something more than a little dirty.

It had been a while since I've weeded, hoed, or lugged 4 cubic yards of soil, but I was game for it. I just wasn't sure what I was going to wear. I haven't owned a pair of overalls since the 1980's.

It seems Natalie has gotten herself involved with an organization called MyFarm-- a business that specializes in decentralized urban farming. It's a Community Supported Agriculture organization with heavy emphasis on community. In fact, every herb and vegetable grown comes directly from community members' backyards. Want to know where your mustard greens are really coming from? Well then, go ask your neighbor. With 71 MyFarms planted at the time of this posting, you are likely to know someone who's got one.

When we arrived at the site, we were introduced around to the various MyFarm staff members and volunteers, one of whom came all the way from Santa Cruz to help.

Fortunately, there were a good many people volunteering for the day's planting. With lots of farmhands, well, on hand, the work was swift and enjoyable. I was especially grateful for our numbers when it came time to move the small mountain of soil from a gigantic pile dumped in the driveway to the garden awaiting it in the back-- through the garage, one bucket at a time. At times I pretended I as though I were an ant-- a cog in a great earth-moving machine, but without the ability to lift 25 times my own body weight or smell things through antennae. Of course, in the unseasonable warm April weather, it sometimes felt as though a large bully were holding a magnifying glass over me, trying to set me on fire.

The next time you see me, please feel free to compliment me on my newly-found shoulder muscles and red, red neck.

I was rather stunned by how smoothly everything went. From start to finish, the garden was weeded, top-soiled, dug, irrigated, and planted in less than five hours.

We were a well organized, well-oiled, and well-hydrated team-- the couple hosting the garden kept a blender of filtered water filled for us at all times. I was certain the water was placed in a blender because it was made of non-breakable materials, but I couldn't look at it without thinking that whenever I took a sip, I was drinking a water smoothie.

It was a great day spent outside. I highly recommend it to anyone with a strong back and a good attitude.

And I don't care that someone can't spell Kohlrabi, I'm just glad someone is actually planting it. In an effort to add my own special skills to the endeavor, my pleas for matching font styles on the planting tags went unheeded.

Until the next time, that is.

How MyFarm Works:

MyFarm's Vision (from the website):

At MyFarm it is our mission to make growing food and growing community one in the same. We believe in the power of the individual. But we believe true power comes from working together towards a better future for all.

We want to offer everyone in our community a chance to participate in achieving greater personal sustainability by installing local organic gardens, selling organic vegetables to neighbors and continually seeking ways for others to lend their ideas, their time and their hands to our growing organization.

Interested in hosting a farm?

Their complete list of services include:

* Initial garden set up and weekly follow up to keep your space growing.
* Organic techniques to grow nutrient rich vegetables.
* CSA style pickup a weekly box of very local edibles from a nearby neighbor.
* Permaculture techniques implemented to beautify in a sustainable way.
* Garden design consultations and networking with high quality suppliers.
* Local food feasts with chefs featuring foods from your backyard

Sign up today to host your own garden or volunteer your time-- the kohlrabi and your neighbors will thank you.