January 4, 2015 by Charles Bingham

• The Sawmill Farm to host Farm-to-Table Dinner on Jan. 31 at Ludvig’s Bistro

Bobbi Daniels of The Sawmill Farm grooms a rabbit at The Sawmill Farm Feed and Fiber store on Katlian Street. Bobbi raises some rabbits for their hair (to make yarn) and others for meat.

Want to see and taste some of the local food possibilities in Sitka? The Sawmill Farm will host a Farm-to-Table Dinner with two seatings (at 5:30 p.m. and 7:30 p.m.) on Saturday, Jan. 31, at Ludvig’s Bistro (256 Katlian St.). Ludvig’s Bistro owner/chef Colette Nelson will be preparing the meals.

“We will be featuring locally grown foods as much as possible,” said Bobbi Daniels, co-owner of The Sawmill Farm. “This will include rabbit, eggs and vegetables, among other things.”

Tickets are $75 each, and seating is limited with only 25 people per session. To make reservations, call Bobbi at 738-4481 or send a message to The Sawmill Farm’s Facebook page.

The Sawmill Farm is bringing commercial agriculture to Sitka, and supporting Sitkans who are maintaining their own backyard operations. The farm will raise rabbits, chickens, goats, pigs, and more. It also has a feed store. The Sawmill Farm is one of 12 semifinalists for fledgling Southeast Alaska businesses in the Path to Prosperity contest sponsored by The Nature Conservancy and Haa Aaní LLC (the economic development arm of Sealaska). The three winners, which will be announced in late January, will each receive $40,000 to help their businesses grow.

“The Sawmill Farm is working to produce locally and humanely raised, hormone and antibiotic free livestock and poultry in Sitka using the cast-off food from the grocery stores and restaurants,” Bobbi said. “Currently the city is paying highest disposal rate that is charged to have this food barged as ‘non-recyclable garbage’ to a landfill in eastern Washington. The bottom line is Sitka pays out a fortune to barge perfect pig food to Washington and then we barge corporate factory farmed pork chops back to Sitka. The Sawmill Farm wants to stop the insanity, keep that food and money local, create jobs and produce healthy meat.

“The Sawmill Farm also will support Sitkans who have their own backyard poultry and livestock. We will be selling feed, hay and straw, along with poultry chicks, and baby and adult rabbits. We have started carrying Scratch and Peck organic poultry and goat feeds, and will shortly be adding hay and straw.”

The Sawmill Farm Feed and Fiber store opened in August 2014, on Katlian Street, across from the Alaska Native Brotherhood Founders Hall. A photo slideshow of The Sawmill Farm Feed and Fiber Store is posted below.

“The feed store is stocked with assorted organic poultry and goat feeds, and straight grains for mixing feeds, to supplement livestock diets or for growing fodder,” Bobbi said. “We also have non-organic rabbit feed, hay and straw, and supplemental products such as poultry grit and diatomaceous earth (DE). We still do not have any set retail hours so, again, message us on Facebook or call 738-4481 and we’ll meet the customer there and get them taken care of.”

• The Sawmill Farm Feed and Fiber price list from August 2014

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

September 17, 2014 by Charles Bingham

• Scenes from the sixth and final Sitka Farmers Market of the 2014 summer

Sitka Farmers Market Co-Managers Debe Brincefield, left, and Ellexis Howey, right, present the Table Of The Day Award to Florence Welsh and her daughter Cory Welsh of Welsh Family Forget-Me-Not Gardens at the sixth and final Sitka Farmers Market of the 2014 summer on Saturday, Sept. 6, at the Alaska Native Brotherhood Founders Hall in Sitka. The Welsh family has one of the larger gardens in Sitka, raising a variety of veggies including cabbage, carrots, zuccini, potatoes, greens, and more. Florence received a gift bag with fresh greens, fresh carrots, fresh rhubarb, and a copy of the Alaska Farmers Market Cookbook. This concludes the seventh year of Sitka Farmers Markets, hosted by the Sitka Local Foods Network. While the Sitka Farmers Market is over for the summer, we will host a produce table at the 20th annual Running of the Boots, with registration at 10 a.m., costume judging at 10:30 a.m. and race at 11 a.m. on Saturday, Sept. 27, near St. Michael of the Archangel Russian Orthodox Cathedral on Lincoln Street. For more information about the Sitka Farmers Markets and Sitka Local Foods Network, go to http://www.sitkalocalfoodsnetwork.org/, or check out our Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/SitkaLocalFoodsNetwork. (PHOTO COURTESY OF SITKA LOCAL FOODS NETWORK)

Florence Welsh, along with daughter Cory Welsh, of the Welsh Family Forget-Me-Not Gardens won the Table of the Day Award for the sixth and final Sitka Farmers Market of the 2014 summer, held Saturday, Sept. 6, at the Alaska Native Brotherhood Founders Hall.

This easily was the rainiest Sitka Farmers Market in our seven-year history (we had a record 3 1/2 inches of rain in 12 hours that Saturday), but we still had a decent crowd show up for the market.

While the Sitka Farmers Market is done until the 2015 summer, the Sitka Local Foods Network will host a produce table at the 20th annual Running of the Boots on Saturday, Sept. 27 (10 a.m. registration, 10:30ish costume judging, 11 a.m. race), near St. Michael of the Archangel Russian Orthodox Cathedral on Lincoln Street. The Sitka Local Foods Network also has a local produce table on weekends when Chelan Produce is in town. A slideshow with scenes from the sixth Sitka Farmers Market is below.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

September 6, 2014 by Charles Bingham

• Meet your vendors: Linda Wilson of Seaview Garden and Jewelry Arte

(This is part of a new series of “Meet your vendors” articles, where Sitka Local Foods Network Intern McLane Ritzel is writing features about our regular Sitka Farmers Market vendors.)

Taking a stroll through this summer’s Sitka Farmers Markets, several perfectly baked rhubarb pies may have caught your eye. Outside in the tent next to the Sitka Local Foods Network produce tent, stood the talented gardener and craftswoman Linda Wilson, a Sitka local for the past three decades who owns Seaview Garden and Jewelry Arte.

Wilson’s father was in the USDA Forest Service. Wilson was raised in California until the age of 6, when her family moved to Ketchikan. A few years later, her father moved the family to Sitka and then to Juneau for his work. Wilson attended high school in Juneau, but yearned to be back in Sitka where they had bought a house in 1975 out on Halibut Point Road. The family returned to Sitka after Wilson’s father retired from the USDA Forest Service in 1982. Wilson lost both her mother and her brother to illnesses, and has been taking care of her father in Sitka since his retirement.

In Sitka, Wilson fell into gardening, because outside of the house is where she felt she had the most control and freedom. Inside the house was dad’s territory. She ripped out her salmonberry bushes in 2004, and learned how to grow broccoli when she met Florence Welsh. Today, she grows carrots, snap peas, greens including kale, collard, and lettuce, and rhubarb. She loves composting and mostly uses coffee grounds and spent grains. At the Sitka Farmers Markets, she sold collard greens and delicious pies. Strawberry-rhubarb is her favorite.

This year, she has been growing zucchini and tomato plants inside her newly established high tunnel via a NRCS grant. She thanks those in the community who helped her put up the high tunnel, and particularly market vendor Kerry MacLane’s instrumental assistance. Even though she has retired from the Sitka Local Foods Network board of directors, Linda was one of the original board members. She also was one of the first managers of the Sitka Farmers Market, and she organized the first Let’s Grow, Sitka! education event.

Wilson loves making homemade pizza from scratch with homegrown tomatoes, onions, sliced zucchini, nasturtiums, broccoli, garlic, and basil. She says, “I grow tomatoes because it’s a challenge, and I’m gonna get it.” She also makes a mean pesto with carrot top greens. When she produces an overabundance of produce, she donates to the Salvation Army.

She loves to go mushroom foraging, and also picks berries to make a variety of jams. Her favorite is blueberry-huckleberry jam.

From 1985 until 2007, Wilson managed one of the local gift shops in town, where they sold authentic Russian imports. From 2003 to 2006, she also worked on a cruise ship in the Baltic Sea where she lectured on Russian arts and crafts, knowledge she had gained while managing the gift shop. Today, she works part-time with the Sitka Economic Development Association (SEDA), takes care of her father, and makes beautiful sculpted wire jewelry with gemstones.

Every February, Wilson makes a two-week trip down to one of the biggest jewelry shows in the world. She has attended the show 12 out of the past 13 years. Her favorite stones are fossils: coral, ammonites, and sand dollars, because, she says, “They used to be living.” She has a rock shop in her house where she houses her jewelry making studio with beautiful stones and lapidary equipment including a slab saw, trim saw, grinder, and rock tumbler, throughout. “Nature makes amazing things.”

When she is not out in the garden, tending to her father, or making jewelry, Wilson loves “petting kitty bellies.” They have two cats, Spike and Sandy, at home, though many more are buried out back. “Serving as compost,” Wilson jokes.

If you don’t see her at the Sitka Farmers Market, make sure to check out Linda Wilson’s beautiful jewelry at the Island Artists Gallery, an artists cooperative on Lincoln Street. Her jewelry makes great gifts for yourself, family members, and friends.

September 5, 2014 by Charles Bingham

• Meet your vendors: Allison Sayer of Hearts and Flowers

Allison Sayer of Hearts and Flowers (with certificate) won the Table of the Day Award at this summer’s second Sitka Farmers Market on July 12.

(This is part of a new series of “Meet your vendors” articles, where Sitka Local Foods Network Intern McLane Ritzel is writing features about our regular Sitka Farmers Market vendors.)

Have you been smelling something funny at this summer’s farmer’s markets? Maybe something a bit sour and overdue? Local resident Allison Sayer has been producing and selling her own live-fermented creations to curious consumers at the market, as well as experienced fermenters.

Born and raised in New York City, Allison Sayer graduated high school there and went straight into AmeriCorps on the West Coast. Later, she studied biology at Smith College, and then went to graduate school at the University of Alaska Anchorage pursuing the same track. She was attracted to the major, because she is passionate about landscape ecology, as well as salmon’s relationship with nature. However, she soon realized that the career (where much of her time would have been spent in a lab) was not quite as fun as the ideas behind it.

Sayer then pursued other opportunities that aligned closer with what she really connected with. She worked in Homer, at the Center for Alaskan Studies, and then at many different cooperatives in Santa Cruz, Calif., including a bike co-op, homeless gardener project, and a chicken sanctuary. Then she returned to Alaska, and worked in McCarthy at the Wrangell Mountains Center as a kitchen manager for three years. There she worked in the garden, held workshops, and served meals to participants. Sayer and the facility manager Jim experimented with varying fermented products. There in the Wrangell kitchen, Sayer discovered her passion for live-fermented foods.

At the Sitka Farmers Market on Aug. 9, you may have noticed the fermentation demonstration booth run by Sitka Local Foods Network intern McLane Ritzel. Live fermentation is an ancient practice, but more recently, it has gained a huge following around the world of interested individuals who want to produce their own food following traditional methods. The practice is communal and artisanal, and when consumed, encourages a healthy gut.

In Sitka, this will be her third year working at Mount Edgecumbe High School, running extracurricular activities after school for the students. She loves her job, and says, “High school students are just so cute!” This summer, she has been working at the Baranof Island Brewing Company brewery.

At home, Sayer spends her time fermenting with produce from her own garden, playing the guitar, reading “too many books at once,” and hiking with her 4-year-old Karellian bear dog, a husky named Tulip.

Come out to this summer’s last Sitka Farmers Market from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 6, at ANB Hall to pick up some of Allison Sayer’s creatively edgy and uniquely delicious homemade Alaskan kimchi, sauerkraut made with varied ingredients, and kombucha, a fermented tea.

September 4, 2014 by Charles Bingham

• Meet your vendors: Pat Hanson of Hanson Baked Goods

(This is part of a new series of “Meet your vendors” articles, where Sitka Local Foods Network Intern McLane Ritzel is writing features about our regular Sitka Farmers Market vendors.)

When you walk into the Sitka Farmer’s Market, comforting aromas of freshly baked breads, scones, and cinnamon rolls overcome the senses. Near the entrance of ANB Hall, you can find the talented baker Pat Hanson of Hanson Baked Goods selling a beautiful selection of her baked wonders that are nearly impossible to resist. Trust me, I’ve tried.

Hanson bakes for the market as a public service, not for a profit. She uses organic ingredients whenever she can, and the only thing that is not organic is butter, which she is working on sourcing organically. Her baked goods are more expensive, because of her insistence on using organic eggs and other crucial organic products. Hanson fell into a passion for baking, because she loves to eat and loves organic food.

Born in Colorado, Hanson lived in the Centennial State until she was 25, when she moved to Canada with her husband at the time. For the past seven years, she has lived in Sitka with her second husband, Jim, whom she met here. Hanson used to work as a school psychologist in Washington and California, but is retired now. She now volunteers at the Sitka Food Co-op, a buyer’s club organization that thrives with increasing membership. Her husband works at Sitka Tribe of Alaska and Arrowhead Transfer.

“You don’t go into the food industry to make money.” Hanson says that she likes food and likes to know what’s in it. “I won’t sell anything that I don’t think tastes good.”

Hanson sells organic breads, scones, and cinnamon rolls. She makes white sourdough, whole wheat, and whole grain, dark rye, and honey oat breads. If you’re looking for something on the sweeter side make sure to pick up one of her lemon blueberry, cranberry orange, or maple oat scones. And if you’re really lucky, you might be able to get a taste of her pumpkin spice scone with ginger chunks, the baker’s favorite.

When she’s not busy baking, Hanson enjoys reading, and was actually a literature major before becoming a teacher. She especially loves Arizonian author Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander series, now a popular STARZ original series.

Come out to this summer’s last Sitka Farmers Market from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 6, at ANB Hall (235 Katlian St.) to experience Pat Hanson’s delectable baked beauties.

September 2, 2014 by Charles Bingham

• Scenes from the fifth Sitka Farmers Market of the 2014 summer

Sitka Farmers Market Co-Managers Debe Brincefield, left, and Ellexis Howey, right, present the Table Of The Day Award to Erin Keenan of Bear Buns at the fifth Sitka Farmers Market of the 2014 summer on Saturday, Aug. 23, at the Alaska Native Brotherhood Founders Hall in Sitka. Erin has been selling her homemade diapers at the Sitka Farmers Market for a couple of years, plus she was selling handmade baby booties from Charlee Oh Creations for Springer Black and Raven’s Ink hats for Raven Shaw. Erin received a gift bag with fresh greens, fresh carrots, fresh rhubarb, and a copy of the Alaska Farmers Market Cookbook. This is the seventh year of Sitka Farmers Markets, hosted by the Sitka Local Foods Network. The final market of the summer is from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 6, at the Alaska Native Brotherhood Founders Hall, 235 Katlian St. Check our website to learn about our new bus service to the market. For more information about the Sitka Farmers Markets and Sitka Local Foods Network, go to http://www.sitkalocalfoodsnetwork.org/, or check out our Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/SitkaLocalFoodsNetwork. (PHOTO COURTESY OF SITKA LOCAL FOODS NETWORK)

Erin Keenan of Bear Buns homemade diapers won Table of the Day during the fifth Sitka Farmers Market of the 2014 summer, which took place on Saturday, Aug. 23, at the Alaska Native Brotherhood Founders Hall, 235 Katlian St.

We wound up with a bit of sunny weather for this market, which was a nice change from our recent rain. We also enjoyed another market with our new bus service from Sitka Tours. This free service will be available at all of the rest of our markets this summer.

The sixth and final Sitka Farmers Market of the season takes place from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 6, at ANB Founders Hall. We also plan to host a produce table at the 20th annual Running of the Boots on Saturday, Sept. 27, near St. Michael of the Archangel Russian Orthodox Church on Lincoln Street. A slideshow with scenes from the fifth Sitka Farmers Market is below.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

September 2, 2014 by Charles Bingham

• Meet your vendors: Carole Knuth and Peter Apathy of Reindeer Redhots

TableOfTheDayPeterApathyCaroleKnuthReindeerRedhots

Peter Apathy, second from left, and Carole Knuth, third from left, of Reindeer Redhots won the Table of the Day Award for the Aug. 26, 2013, Sitka Farmers Market.

(This is part of a new series of “Meet your vendors” articles, where Sitka Local Foods Network Intern McLane Ritzel is writing features about our regular Sitka Farmers Market vendors.)

Nine years ago, Carole Knuth, co-owner and operator of Reindeer Redhots, was having a mid-life crisis. So, she and her husband, Peter Apathy, decided to do something totally different than anything they had done in the past. They bought the Reindeer Redhots stand, a business that had been in operation for one year. At the time, they had two young children, who Carole says thrived in the Reindeer Redhots working environment. “It was important for the children to experience.” Other kids in the community also participated in operating the business, and according to Carole, the experience taught the kids work ethic and good conversation skills. Carol says, “The business served other needs too.”

Reindeer Redhots serves hotdogs with reindeer meat and a wide variety of condiments including; sauerkraut, onion, shredded cheddar cheese, ketchup, mustard, no-bean chili, sweet relish, and sriracha sauce. The meat comes from Nunivak Island, where Dr. Sheldon Jackson started a reindeer herd in the 1800s. After the slaughtering on Nunivak, the reindeer meat is sold for processing in Anchorage, where it is produced into a wide variety of products. Reindeer Redhots sells the regular reindeer hotdogs and the mild Polish sausage at their stand. Carole and Peter have dealt with many obstacles in operating their own business, and Carole says that they have “learned a lot about people through the process.”

Today, the dynamic Knuth and Apathy duo run the Reindeer Redhots stand with their son Ryan, who just finished high school. You may have noticed Ryan’s involvement and talent shine in performances around Sitka. Ryan just graduated from the Interlochen Center of the Arts, a competitive arts boarding school in Interlochen, Mich. He also plays the trombone, and is attending the University of Puget Sound this fall. His older sister, Erika, also comes from an artistic background, as a ballet dancer. She currently is studying elementary education at UAS, and just gave birth to a beautiful baby boy named Noah.

Both Carole and Peter are heavily involved in their children’s lives and activities. They are a family that values and supports the arts in many capacities. Carole made costumes for the Nutcracker this past year and has made costumes for other performances around Sitka. She also loves gardening and the family has their own garden at home. As if all of this hasn’t kept her busy enough, she just finished her master’s thesis in public health, which covered a needs assessment for an adult day center in Sitka. She is interested in implementing a kind of senior center in town that offers social and physical activities. When they aren’t serving up delicious hotdogs, supporting their children, or helping out the community, Carole and Peter can be found working at SEARHC. Carole as a physician assistant, and Peter as a electronic health records project manager. Peter also plays bass in the bands Slack Tide and Fishing For Cats.

Reindeer Redhots has created quite a following. The alternative hotdog stand has been featured in high-quality public relations outlets including: Food and Wine, Costco, and Sunset magazines. In addition to the stand’s occasional appearances at the Sitka Farmers Market, on large ship days, you can find Carole, Peter, or Ryan serving Reindeer Redhots at the corner of Lake and Lincoln Streets. The stand operates from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., from May to September, though the operation is very weather-dependent.

Stop by the Reindeer Redhots stand this month on large ship days to try a steaming reindeer hotdog. They also offer gluten-free and whole wheat buns.

August 31, 2014 by Charles Bingham

• Learn about where your Sitka Farmers Market produce is grown

When people stop at the Sitka Local Foods Network booth at the Sitka Farmers Market to buy produce a common question people ask is where is the food grown.

Most of the produce sold at the Sitka Local Foods Network booth is grown here in Sitka and comes from three main sources — the St. Peter’s Fellowship Farm communal garden (Laura Schmidt is lead gardener), some land in Pat Arvin’s Garden she donates to the Sitka Local Foods Network to grow potatoes and carrots, and Anam Cara Garden owned by Tom Hart and SLFN president Lisa Sadleir-Hart. We also receive donations from other family gardens in town with extra produce.

All of the funds raised selling produce at the Sitka Local Foods Network booth are used to support SLFN projects during the year. These include hosting the six Sitka Farmers Markets each summer, operating St. Peter’s Fellowship Farm, providing a variety of education opportunities about local foods and gardening in Sitka, and supporting other projects in town that promote local foods (such as the Sitka Community Food Assessment, Fish to Schools, Sitka Kitch, etc.).

Don’t forget the last Sitka Farmers Market of the summer is from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 6, at Alaska Native Brotherhood Founders Hall (235 Katlian St.). If you live near Sawmill Creek Apartments (9:45 a.m. pick-up), Indian River housing (9:50 a.m.), or the Swan Lake Senior Center (10 a.m.), we have free transportation to the market through a contract with Sitka Tours. The shuttle bus picks up at the times listed, and makes its return trip at noon from ANB Hall. We do plan a small produce table at the Running of the Boots on Saturday, Sept. 27, near St. Michael’s Russian Orthodox Cathedral.

August 22, 2014 by Charles Bingham

• Meet your vendors: Erin Fulton of Alaskans Own Seafood and the Alaska Sustainable Fisheries Trust

(This is part of a new series of “Meet your vendors” articles, where Sitka Local Foods Network Intern McLane Ritzel is writing features about our regular Sitka Farmers Market vendors.)

Walking past the Alaskans Own Seafood booth at the farmers market, you may have noticed a kind and bright-eyed brunette with black-rimmed glasses selling extra frozen fish from the first community supported fishery (CSF) program in Alaska.

Alaskans Own Seafood is similar to a community supported agriculture organization, or “CSA program,” where on the last Wednesday of each month, they ship fish to participating individuals or families in Seattle, Wash., Juneau, Anchorage, and host a pick-up day for members from Sitka.

Erin is program coordinator of the Alaska Sustainable Fisheries Trust, but her job entails working with many fishery organizations around Sitka, including the Alaska Longline Fishermen’s Association (ALFA) and their Fishery Conservation Networks (FCN) which engage fishermen in both research and conservation initiatives. Alaskans Own Seafood is part of the Alaska Sustainable Fisheries Trust.

Sitka had always been at the back of her mind as her family took a cruise around Alaska 10 years ago. Despite the fact that they were only in town for one day, they kayaked Sitka Sound and determined it their favorite spot on the trip. Laughing, Fulton says, “I need space. I need more trees than people.”

Most of her family still lives in her hometown of Mahtomedi, Minn., a suburb of St. Paul. Her father is the president of a steel-casting firm and works with the mining industry, and her mother stayed home to raise her and her younger brother, Alex. Alex attended Duke University for graduate school and is now a mechanical engineer for Polaris Industries.

In 2009, Fulton graduated from St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minn., with two degrees in biology and environmental studies. When she wasn’t studying, she played the contra alto clarinet for the St. Olaf band (“a 90-member family”) when it went on 10-day tours around the United States. Concerned about the environmental effects of their carbon footprint while traveling around the country, Fulton began a carbon-offset initiative for local farmers.

After St. Olaf, Fulton attended graduate school at Duke University’s Nicholas School of the Environment and graduated with two master’s degrees in environmental management and forestry. According to Fulton, at Duke, there are 7,000 acres of timberland. Her master’s thesis involved getting carbon-offset, surveying the forest, and examining afforestation, reforestation, improved forest management, and avoided deforestation.

Having never worked in or pursued an education in the fisheries industry, Fulton took a job in Sitka as a Tongass Forest Resident with the Sitka Conservation Society. She was very interested in resource management in Alaska, because unlike the Lower 48 which is “locked in” with strict laws and regulations, Alaska is an active and dynamic place with constantly changing laws and continued resource extraction. Also, given her background in forest management, she is fascinated by the life cycle of salmon and its role as a “great fertilizer for the trees and forest.” She drove from her home in Minnesota to Alaska with a friend, through the Canadian Rockies and took a ferry to Sitka from Prince Rupert, British Columbia.

Here in Sitka, Fulton is a member of the local roller derby team Sitka Sound Slayers. Last year, she broke her leg twice, but is looking forward to getting back to the sport stronger than ever this season. And from 9-10 a.m. on Friday mornings, you can catch Erin on KCAW-Raven Radio’s Good Day Show.

Come meet Erin and check out Alaska’s Own at the next Sitka Farmers Market from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturday, Aug. 23, at the Alaska Native Brotherhood Founders Hall (235 Katlian St.).

August 22, 2014 by Charles Bingham

• Scenes from the fourth Sitka Farmers Market of the 2014 summer

Sitka Farmers Market Co-Managers Debe Brincefield, left, and Ellexis Howey, right, present the Table Of The Day Award to Lori Adams of Down-To-Earth U-Pick Garden at the fourth Sitka Farmers Market of the 2014 summer on Saturday, Aug. 9, at the Alaska Native Brotherhood Founders Hall in Sitka. Lori has been selling fresh produce, jams and jellies, and her local book on gardening at the Sitka Farmers Market for several years. She received a gift bag with fresh greens, fresh rhubarb, a pair of earrings, a dozen eggs, and a copy of the Alaska Farmers Market Cookbook. This is the seventh year of Sitka Farmers Markets, hosted by the Sitka Local Foods Network. The next market is from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturday, Aug. 23, at the Alaska Native Brotherhood Founders Hall, 235 Katlian St. Check our website to learn about our new bus service to the market. For more information about the Sitka Farmers Markets and Sitka Local Foods Network, go to http://www.sitkalocalfoodsnetwork.org/, or check out our Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/SitkaLocalFoodsNetwork. (PHOTO COURTESY OF SITKA LOCAL FOODS NETWORK)

Lori Adams of Down-To-Earth U-Pick Garden won Table of the Day during the fourth Sitka Farmers Market of the 2014 summer, which took place on Saturday, Aug. 9, at the Alaska Native Brotherhood Founders Hall, 235 Katlian St.

National Farmers Market Week was Aug. 3-9, so several Sitka residents celebrated by attending the Sitka Farmers Market. We wound up with a bit of rainy weather for this market, but we still had a nice crowd and some new booths. We also enjoyed the third market with our new bus service from Sitka Tours. This free service will be available at all of the rest of our markets this summer.

The fifth Sitka Farmers Market of the season takes place from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturday, Aug. 23, at ANB Founders Hall. A slideshow with scenes from the fourth market is below.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.