an open cupboard

I try to get to the farmers market every Saturday or so, barring torrential rains or an insatiable need to laze around the house on a Saturday morning. While the Ferry Building farmers market in San Francisco is not the cheapest around, it’s still my favorite for its varied, high quality products, as well as the sheer fun of people watching. (There’s always an interesting array of locals and tourists, fancy city folk and laid back farmers.) The Ferry Building farmers market offers just about all the groceries you need, except perhaps, toilet paper. Among the goods: beautiful seasonal produce grown by local growers, freshly baked bread, fresh pastries, cow’s and goat’s milk cheeses both fresh and aged, grass-fed beef, pastured chickens, ducks, and eggs, the most delicious charcuterie around, nuts, jams, preserves, pickles, pasta, beans, fresh tortillas and tamales, and even wool yarn and blankets.

The purveyors sell their wares outdoors in front of and behind the ferry building all year round. The ferry building itself houses food-related shops such as a mushroom shop, meat shops and delis, an organic pastry shop, a chocolate shop, an ice creamery, an olive oil shop, an excellent cheese shop, as well as a combination wine shop and tasting bar, a tea room, caviar and oyster bars, and several very good restaurants.

The ferry building and the farmers market surrounding it is teeming with deliciousness that is constantly changing. The ebb and flow of the seasons bring herald new produce, which in turn inspire chefs, jam-makers, sausage-makers, fishmongers, bakers, pastry chefs. New stalls sprout up selling something new and different. And it’s quite common to see growers exchanging goods and sharing ideas. This is a living organism—a supermarket is dead in comparison. (Those of you who’ve been to a lively “shouk” or “souk” can attest to that!)

This past Saturday as I started my weekly round of shopping, it occurred to me that I had never photographed the farmers market I most often frequent. I’ve blogged about markets in Stockholm and New York, why not the local joint? And so I did. The following photos capture most of the foods I bought this week, and illustrating something of my favorite purveyors along the way. Bear in mind, I only captured a fraction of the market and its remarkable bounty. It would take several months of blogging, or perhaps a book, to document the market in its entirety.

Mariquita Farm, one of my favorite vegetable growers. I love the little cards they pin to the vegetable crates explaining the variety of each vegetable and suggestions for preparation.

Bodega Peruvian goat cheeses are delicate and light. I typically get the cilantro serrano chile spread and some fresh feta-style farmer’s cheese.

Della Fattoria sells European style breads baked in wood-fired brick ovens, as well as pastries such as cupcakes and cookies.

This is what’s left at the Fatted Calf stand in the early afternoon. Everything sells out fast, so it’s best to place your order in advance through their website (which, luckily, I remembered to do). Those saucissons secs in the jar are great for snacking.

Spring Hill produces excellent butter, often churned the day before. They usually offer tastes of all their cheeses, so their stand gets very crowded.

Stone Free Farm is where I like to buy greens such as chard, spinach, baby bok choy, and mountain spinach.

Marin Sun Farms is famous for its very fresh pastured eggs, which are typically sold out by 11am. A carton of their eggs is like a small multicultural egg community, with different sizes, colors (from white to grey, brown, or pale green), and variations in shape. They also sell some excellent grass-fed beef and lamb. The Marin Sun stand is conveniently located adjacent to the Hayes Street Grill stand.

The farmer’s daughter recommended Huckleberry potatoes as her favorite variety. I bought Huckleberries, Purple Vikings, and Katahdins from Little Organic Farms. The potatoes are dry-farmed, a method that results in more flavorful produce.

My favorite little apple stand (I’ve forgotten their name!) has a number of unusual varieties such as “Black Twig” and “Wickson.” Wicksons are very small apples, only about an inch and a half in diameter (about 4.5 cm), perfect for snacking or cooking with meat or poultry. I love the old-fashioned wooden crates in which the apples are displayed, and the explanatory text for each variety. You can also buy apple tree twigs, apple syrup, and cider at the apple stand.

I’m a tough customer when it comes to olive oil. Having lived in Israel for twelve years, I was spoiled by a relatively affordable selection of good Mediterranean olive oils. In the Middle East, spicy olive oils tend to be popular, as opposed to milder, buttery olive oils. I suspect this has to do with the variety of olives used, or perhaps their ripeness at harvest. Consequently, I’ve had difficulty adjusting my palate to the admittedly excellent California olive oils. Bariani is an exception. The flavor of their olive oil has a powerful flavor that reminds me of the dominant olive oils beloved in the Middle East and the Mediterranean.

G.L. Alfieri Farms sells an incredible variety of nuts and nut products, including nut butters, chocolate covered nuts, and nut brittle. The bittersweet walnut brittle had me hooked on the first taste.

This post is day two of documenting all you can eat, a blogging event hosted by Sam of Becks and Posh.

I spent the day at the de Young Museum with my family visiting from out of town. We had lunch at the museum cafeteria, which is actually pretty good.

breakfast

Breakfast was a strawberry, almond milk shake with half a banana, coconut butter, ground flax seeds, and cinnamon. Yes, it’s exactly the same as yesterday. I like a simple breakfast—one that requires little to no thought this early in the morning. My five-year-old niece would be overjoyed to eat a pink breakfast.

My French butter with fleur de sel sits quietly in the background, just waiting to be spread on some crusty bread.

lunch

The lovely salad was baby spinach and arugula with goat cheese and fresh sliced beets. The beets were rather mild, but tasty. The burger was medium rare Niman Ranch with provolone cheese on an Acme bun. Pretty good burger (although not rare as I ordered it), with a rich, beefy flavor. The bread was several notches above typical burger buns, with a pleasantly firm texture that withstood the meaty juices.

snacks

My mid-morning snack was eggplant spread samples with crisp flatbread chips at the Ferry Building farmers market. The smoky fire-roasted eggplant spread was my favorite. Sadly, I don’t remember the name of the producer.

For an afternoon snack I had about a quarter of a large shortbread cookie with nuts from Bakesale Betty (purchased at the Temescal farmers market on Sunday). These are some buttery cookies, and not too sweet. The nuts add both flavor and texture, rounding out the cookie.

dinner

My brother-in-law cooked a great dinner tonight! We had barbecued burgers with barbecued bacon and aged cheddar cheese on English muffins. I put together some home made ketchup by cooking down overripe heirloom tomatoes with apple cider vinegar, brown sugar, salt and pepper. There was also a garden salad with a balsamic vinegar dressing and oven baked potato wedges. I took the opportunity to finish up my broccoli, bok choy, and seaweed from yesterday.

The bacon-burger-cheddar combination is brilliant, I highly recommend it. Barbecuing the bacon gives it a smokier taste, which complements the burgers very well. The cheddar adds a tangy flavor and a creamy texture (I didn’t melt the cheese). The ketchup was quite good, if I do say so myself. I threw in the tomatoes, seeds, skin and all, which produced a chunky, more natural tasting ketchup.

afterward

Looking over these photos, I’m a little shocked at today’s menu. I don’t think I’ve ever eaten that much beef in a day. I think tomorrow will be a vegetarian day, otherwise I might start growing horns and udders. And blimey, I’ve been eating a lot of junky snacks. Shall I eat more fruits and vegetables tomorrow? Will I abstain from meat? Stay tuned to find out.

Sam of Becks and Posh has issued a challenge: document everything you eat between November 20th and 26th. Being a word-centric person, I completely forgot that this challenge involved photographing everything I eat (duh!). So I’m afraid today’s entry is missing a breakfast photo, and, er, the lunch photo is a little unusual. But all of this week’s breakfast photos should be much the same as today’s, so worry not.

Wait a minute, I hear you say. What’s this all about anyway?

Sam thought it might be fun to see what food blogger’s actually eat on a daily basis, as opposed to the usual foie gras with calvados reduction served on a bed of dry-farmed heritage xanga. (What’s xanga, you say? It’s such a rare heritage plant that nobody’s ever heard of it. Pronounced ZANE-gah.)

Here’s all I could eat, day 1.

breakfast

My usual almond milk smoothie with fresh strawberries, half a banana, coconut butter, cinnamon, and ground flax seeds. It’s a very portable breakfast, which you can drink in the car or on the train. It’s usually quite tasty, depending on the combination of berries I use and the sweetness of the berries. Sometimes I throw in some raw chocolate nibs for zip and zing.

lunch

Due to last night’s laziness, I relied on the cafes at work for sustenance. Not the best idea. I had teriyaki chicken breast with cilantro rice and tempura butternut squash. The chicken was alright, only a little dry, and the teriyaki sauce wasn’t too sweet. The cilantro rice was a bit mushy, but it had a nice cilantro flavor (I ate it despite myself, just for the cilantro). The tempura squash was neither tempura, nor squash (discuss). The tempura coating was soggy with oil (ugh!) and the vegetables weren’t squash at all, but rather somewhat flavorless string beans. To their credit, the flavor of the string beans was probably overpowered by the tempura coating. I bought some greens at another cafe, to make sure I had enough veggies. These were a perfectly reasonable steamed baby bok choy, broccoli, and seaweed. I nibbled at them and then rushed off to a meeting.

It’s a good thing I scroll through foodblogs while eating my lunch, otherwise I would have completely forgotten to snap any photos. Think of the first photo as the absence of teriyaki chicken and cilantro mushy rice with soggy tempura green beans. It’s better that way.

snacks

My mid-morning and afternoon snacks consisted of a slice of buttered challah which I prepared this morning with French fleur de sel butter. Oh how I love that butter.

I also ate one bite of some cake I found in the break room. I decided it wasn’t nearly worth the calories and promptly disposed of my slice.

dinner

I arrived home from work at around 7:30, and threw together the following:

• Baby spinach salad with winesap apples, peppercress, and hazelnuts sprinkled with olive oil and pomegranate molasses
• An Afghan crepe filled with mildly spicy spinach, bought from the Afghan food stand at the Temescal farmers market on Sunday
• A spoonful of hummus bought from the same stand (great hummus!)
• A couple spoonfuls of tofu cilantro salad from Hodo Soy Beanery, also purchased at the Temescal farmers market. I love their tofu, and this was quite a good salad.

The foodblogging event, Food Destinations #3: My Favorite Chocolate Shop, has officially closed. Emily of Chocolate in Context kindly hosted the event originated by maki, and posted a roundup of chocolatey entries today. If you’re a chocolate enthusiast, you must check out the entries for this event. Even if you aren’t a big chocolate fan (is that possible?), it’s fascinating to make the virtual acquaintance of chocolate shops and their very dedicated patrons in Switzerland, Australia, New York, and Italy. I lost count of all the chocolate retail websites I must’ve added to my del.icio.us today, as a result.

The greatest eye opener for me, however, was the video in Ed’s post over at Tomato. The video is a short PR film on Grenada Chocolate company, called “Radical Chocolate” by Eti Pelig. I’ve seen a bar or two of Grenada chocolate at my local chocolate shop, but haven’t really gotten around to picking some up. Its packaging is bright and playful, almost the sort of packaging you’d associate with candy for children. I like my chocolate bitter and intense, so perhaps maybe that’s why I never tried it out. According to the film, Grenada Chocolate is perhaps the first solar-operated chocolate producing cooperative in the world. This is a far cry from the behemoth chocolate producers who engage in appalling labor practices, particularly in some parts of Western Africa. In contrast, founder Mott Green decided to revive the dying cacao industry in Grenada by developing a small-scale chocolate production facility owned by workers. The company provides dignified, safe work to the people in the area, and the cacao is sustainably, and ecologically grown. It’s really an amazing story, but Pelig’s video tells it best. As soon as I saw the film, I understood that Grenada Chocolate’s colorful packaging is simply an accurate reflection of the vibrant Caribbean community where the factory resides.

Many thanks to Emily for hosting this fun event, and for choosing an open cupboard as the winner.

beurre d’isigny sainte-mère

I recently bought a tub of fancy French butter from the local high-falutin’ shop. It was on sale for three dollars, so I picked it up (kind of a bargain for fancy butter, and I couldn’t resist the cute wooden basket in which it was packaged). I hadn’t realized that butter can have its own AOC, but apparently it can in France. I took it home, intending to have a little schmear on a slice of sourdough. I ended up eating several schmears, and even tasting it plain. It’s that good. Naturally, the butter disappeared pretty quickly, as I used it on bread as well as in every meal I cooked until it was gone. There’s nothing quite so heavenly as spinach, chicken, anything at all cooked in really good butter.

where to get it: your local gourmet food shop, Todaro Bros., Wally’s, Amazon, Sainsbury’s (U.K.)

wine grapes

While shopping at Berkeley Bowl one day, I happened upon some pinot noir and cabernet grapes. These grapes are smaller, darker, and much more intensely flavored than ordinary table grapes. They also have seeds, which you may not mind eating as they have a slightly acidic taste that complements the natural sweetness of the fruit. Wine grapes have tremendous culinary potential. You could stuff a chicken with grapes and garlic cloves for a roast. You could use them with lamb in a tagine. You could dry them outdoors or in the oven for some really flavorful homemade raisins. Or you could just snack on them along with some almonds.

where to get it: If you live near an area featuring vineyards, you can look for wine grapes at the local farmer’s market or perhaps at the vintner’s.

broccoli with butter and grapes

This is more of a non-recipe, as it’s so easy to prepare. The butter and grapes really make the dish (and the garlic doesn’t hurt). You could substitute spinach, asparagus, or even artichoke hearts for the broccoli. Remember, the grapes do have seeds. You can discard them while eating or just eat them along with the fruit.

1-2 heads fresh broccoli or broccolini, chopped into longish florets
very good butter, copious amounts
wine grapes or ordinary grapes
1 clove garlic
salt and pepper to taste

• Steam the broccoli until it’s nearly ready. It should almost turn bright green, but not quite.
• Melt the butter in a heavy skillet on a medium to low flame. Toss the broccoli in the butter, allowing it to cook a little and absorb the butter.
• Throw in as many grapes as you like.
• Press the garlic clove over the broccoli and stir. Cook to slightly soften the grapes and mellow the garlic, about a minute or two.
• Season to taste with salt and pepper and serve right away.

Allow me to introduce you to my dealer: Bittersweet Café, readers, readers, Bittersweet Café. Bittersweet is a chocolate shop and café in Oakland and San Francisco. It’s a cozy place to have a cup of coffee, or satiate your chocolate craving.

While many chocolate shops concentrate on truffles and confections, Bittersweet offers a wide selection of high quality chocolate bars. The bars at Bittersweet are displayed on shelves, according to category and ascending levels of cocoa solids. First the white chocolate bars (really just vanilla-flavored cocoa butter), then the milk chocolate, the flavored chocolates (Mayan style, ginger, lavender, etc.), the dark chocolates, and the hardcore baking chocolates. I like a good dark chocolate truffle now and then, but I prefer a bar with a high percentage of cocoa solids for everyday consumption. I like my chocolate intense and flavorful, not necessarily sweet, so I usually head straight for the dark and baking sections.

Among my favorite bars:

• Hachez Premier Cru, 88%—A creamy-textured, slightly berry-like chocolate that’s fun to eat.
• Domori Puro, 100%—Very intense, dark and strong, almost coffee-like in flavor. A little goes a long way, half a square is usually enough for me. Although this bar has no sugar, it’s still a little sweet and delicious on its own. This is the kind of chocolate you want to eat slowly while sitting in your favorite chair and maybe sipping a cognac. Actually, skip the cognac. Who needs cognac when you have chocolate this good?
• Santander Dark, 70%—A smooth, creamy bar that tastes of kahlua, but contains no coffee liqueur.
• Dolfin Noir 88% de Cacao—An intense, yet smooth bar. I particularly like the tobacco pouch packaging, no fiddly foil to gently open only to rip to shreds when you try to re-package the rest to save for later.

In addition to bars, Bittersweet offers all manner of chocolate goods and knick-knacks, such as wooden gift boxes filled with a variety of chocolates, books about chocolate, CDs by a band called the Bittersweets, drinking chocolate and cocoa, and cocoa butter chapstick (”chocolate for your lips”).

Of course the requisite t-shirts bearing the store’s logo are fetchingly displayed as well.

Once you’ve picked out your take-home goods, you can order a hot drink and a little something to go with it.

My favorite drink is the Bittersweet:a hot drinking chocolate prepared without milk. Rich, smooth, and not too sweet, the Bittersweet is truly a balm for the soul on a cold day. I can never finish it at one go, as it’s so intense. I often refrigerate the remainder and eat it later as a sort of chocolate pudding.

Bittersweet’s excellence in all things chocolate is only exceeded by their friendly, knowledgeable staff. Every employee I’ve spoken to at Bittersweet knows their chocolate, and is thoughtful enough to consult a fellow staff-member if they don’t. Most employees enjoy sampling the goods, so they can guide you in choosing a bar that suits your tastes. One staffer once took the time to explain the rules of thumb in finding chocolates produced without the abominable use of slavery (cocoa grown on family-owned plantations, cocoa grown in South America as opposed to certain regions of West Africa).

I especially appreciate the staff’s accommodation of my picture-snapping today. I really do try to be unobtrusive, but people eventually notice that you’re the only idiot in the shop taking pictures of chocolate. They were enthusiastic when I told them about the Food Destinations chocolate blogging event and we started talking a bit about foodblogging. When I commented on both baristas’ lovely henna-painted hands, I got into an interesting conversation about the ancient Egyptian art of henna hand painting with new employee and henna artist Silvana. That’s just the kind of place Bittersweet is.

Bittersweet Chocolate Café
5427 College Avenue (two blocks south of Rockridge BART Station)
Oakland, CA 94618
(510) 654-7159

Opening Hours:
Sunday through Thursday 9am to 7pm
Friday 9am to 9pm
Saturday 9am to 9pm

Food destinations #3: My Favorite Chocolate Shop

Wandering around Chinatown one evening, I happened upon the Feast of San Genarro, a noisy street fair on the cusp of Chinatown and Little Italy. I’d heard that the Feast of San Gennaro was once a charming event celebrating the Neopolitan heritage of the residents of Little Italy. Sadly, the festival is now a kitschy spoof of its former self. Throngs of people wander from one identical street to the next, surrounded by a mass of vendors all noisily hocking the same cannolis, calzones, and irritating pop music. It all looked so commercial, I didn’t even feel like eating a cannoli. Who knows, the cannolis might have been good. On the other hand, they may have been just as bastardized as the Feast.

On I went, away from Little Italy and into Chinatown. A lot of stores were shut, but many restaurants and some markets were still open. I walked into what I thought was a hole-in-the-wall food shop, which, like Mary Poppins’ bag, turned out to be a quite an extensive Chinese market that was much bigger on the inside that it looked on the outside.

The market is basically a long, wide aisle, stretching from one street all the way through to its parallel. Either end has a take-out section with food rivaling that of any local restaurant. The left aisle has a series of meat, seafood, and confectionary counters, while the right aisle is filled with cured meats and fresh and frozen produce, meat, and seafood. Naturally, I couldn’t resist photographing as much as I could. There’s something satisfying about capturing on flashdisk the smoked duck legs for which you’re lusting. Though not quite as satisfying as actually consuming said foods.

Fresh bao at the deli counter. I believe these are stuffed with shrimp.

The deli section between the fish and meat counters offers “beef tendon balls,” meatballs, “fishballs,” and “fish meat bean curd” balls.

Dainty fresh fish fillets and steaks at the fish counter (I wonder what the “silver fish” tastes like?).

Prawns, shrimp, and very large fish.

Raw and fried chicken feet.

Honeycomb tripe. According to Wikipedia, this might be steamed and served with spring onions and garlic sauce, for example.

These preserved duck feet bunches are in the cured meat section of the store.

Preserved quail in the cured meat section with butchers hanging out behind the meat counter.

Smoked duck legs, smoked bacon, and Chinese sausages.

The sign says “Preserved Duck Head” but they look more like duck necks.

Scrumptious looking goodies ready for take-out.

I’m really curious as to what exactly a turnip cake tastes like. Is it savory? Sweet? I probably should’ve just bought one and put it in my carry-on.

Lotus seed buns, red bean buns, and muffin-looking rice cakes in the bakery section.

I was recently amused to see a lulav and etrog on display at the Berkeley Bowl. Apparently, you can order them from a guy at the produce section and buy them along with the rest of your groceries.

The lulav and etrog are symbols used in the Jewish celebration of Sukkot, or the Feast of Tabernacles. The lulav and etrog consist of a citron, a ripe palm frond, a myrtle branch, and a willow branch. Each element of the Four Species, as they’re called, represents a different type of Jew. Like Voltron, the Four Species are bound together to create a greater whole, representing the entire Jewish nation. Traditionally, the lulav and etrog are blessed and then gently shaken in four directions, representing the presence of the divine in the four corners of the earth.

My fondest memories of Sukkot are of eating in the sukkah. A sukkah is a sort of temporary hut built outdoors, with a roof typically made of palm branches. The idea is to re-create the huts in which the Jews lived as they traveled the desert between Egypt and the promised land. The sukkah must have a roof that is sparse enough for dwellers to see the stars at night. Ideally, you’re supposed to live in the sukkah for seven days, meaning eating, sleeping, hanging out. For children, this is great news. Any child who loves building forts and camping has a field day, or rather seven field days, during Sukkot.

But nothing is quite like a candle-lit holiday dinner in a sukkah. The palm frond roof rustles in the breeze, and the stars peek through as you enjoy your dinner. The air is permeated by the perfume of the branches, the sweet smell of challah dipped in honey, and the fragrant etrog which is carefully wrapped in a long lock of flax and laid to rest in its own little etrog box.

At the end of the holiday, the sukkah is dismantled and saved for the following year, the sukkah decorations are put away, and the palm fronds lie beside the trash bins awaiting garbage day.

But the etrog isn’t thrown out. Unlike lemons, citrons don’t rot. Instead, they shrivel and harden, which only intensifies their lovely fragrance. An old etrog might find itself snuggled in a sweater drawer. In a Sepharadi or Mizrahi home, etrogs might become etrog jam.

If you can find citrons in your area (try next week, after the holiday), you might want to try making etrog jam, especially if you’re a marmalade enthusiast. Citron jam has a particular flavor of its own. It’s Sukkot in a jar.

Would you believe it’s not too early to order a heritage turkey for Thanksgiving? Heritage Foods USA is offering a $10 discount on orders of fresh heritage turkeys delivered to your door two days before the national holiday of compulsive overeating.

What is a heritage turkey and how does it differ from an ordinary turkey? Heritage turkeys are descendants of any of several old breeds registered with the American Poultry Association. According to William Rubel, these breeds are crosses between domesticated European turkey breeds and North American wild turkeys. Heritage turkeys are often pastured, meaning they have access to open spaces outdoors where they can run around and happily munch on grass and bugs before they’re slaughtered for the benefit of our holiday table. Their meat is purported to be much more flavorful and juicy than that of their commercially-bred cousins.

In contrast, your typical Broad Breasted Bronze or Large White is bred for enormous size and large breast. A commercially raised bird might spend its entire life cooped up in a crowded building before it is slaughtered and processed. The result is turkeys that can’t walk or naturally mate, and dry, flavorless meat.

Last year I roasted an organic, free-range turkey, courtesy of Mary’s Free Range Turkey. It was pretty good, certainly juicier than the usual supermarket variety. This year I’ve pre-ordered a heritage bird, which I’m curious to try. A heritage turkey seems like one of those foods that, once you’ve tasted it, might redefine, for you, the very meaning of turkey.

Aside from their superior taste, heritage turkeys revive breeds that would have otherwise faced extinction. As they say at Slow Food, you’ve got to eat ‘em to save ‘em, a cringe-worthy paradox for any vegetarian, but sadly, true, nonetheless.

This contradiction is a little hard for me to swallow, pardon the pun. I like the idea of raising animals humanely on small farms, and feeding them according to their natural diet (think of cows munching on grass instead of feeding on soybeans, for example).

Put simply, wouldn’t you be happier roaming around outdoors than being penned in a space so small you can barely turn around, surrounded by hundreds of noisy neighbors? (What’s that? You work in a cubicle too?) I certainly would. As such, I try to support humanely raised animal products as much as I can.

But I can’t shake the odd irony that these animals who are raised in a pleasant environment, fed healthy foods, and given space to roam and play, are summarily killed so that I may eat them. I’ve gone the vegetarian route (seven years), and frankly, my palate is much too selfish to go back. Waiter? I’ll have the cognitive dissonance, please. Pass the heritage turkey!

Not far from the farmer’s market is Söderhallarna, Södermalm’s answer to the grand Östermalms Saluhall. Like Östermalms Saluhall, Söderhallarna features a number of small specialty shops, restaurants, take-out shops, and coffee shops all conveniently located under one roof.

Outside Söderhallarna is Medborgarplatsen, the nucleus of Södermalm nightlife. By nightfall, the square is overflowing with well-dressed people having a drink, standing in line for a show at the Debaser, or on their way in or out of one of the myriad clubs in the area. Beer is everywhere, especially in the Tunnelbana station, where patient police officers confiscate bottles and pour their contents out over the tracks. A Greek fast food truck and a hot dog stand provide quick snacks for what appear to be the two hundred people queuing up to the Debaser.

In the morning, the fast food stands are the only remnants of last night’s scene. The square is now home to shoppers, families, and political parties lobbying for votes in the upcoming elections with their cabins and posters.

A bakery, featuring central European style breads. Note the poppyseed challah second to the left.

The poultry section of a butcher shop. The yellow-skinned chickens on the left were raised on corn.

A confectioner’s shop.

Fresh torteloni and canneloni.

The meat shop where I bought dried reindeer sausage.

The butcher shop’s takeout section, featuring pana cotta with cloudberries, various types of terrines, pâtés and mousses, as well as truffles.

Cured meats at the butcher shop. The long, brown sausages in the middle are dried reindeer sausages.

I love the old-fashioned packaging used to wrap these sweets. The yellow ones are cloudberry candies.

An array of sauces and dressings at a gourmet shop.

No, it isn’t matzah. It’s Swedish flatbread!

A greengrocer’s. The weird-looking pipes above the apples and lemons are misters.

A row of political party “cabins” in front of Söderhallarna and an outdoor nursery.

Tables from a restaurant in Söderhallarna and political party cabins. According to Anne, people bid for the cabins after the elections and use them as sheds in their back yards.

Medborgarplatsen at night, with Söderhallarna in the background.

Outdoor restaurants and pubs in Medborgarplatsen.

Links:

• Söderhallarna
• P & B Delikatesser—Spices, oils, sauces, jams, and sweets.
  
• Lulles FÃ¥gel & Vilt—Deli and butcher shop.