Market Watch: The latest farmers market news by David Karp

Farmers Markets: Among the farms selling at the Encino market are Givens Farms, Underwood Family Farms and Tutti Frutti Farms.

With 30 growers including Finley Farms and Cuyama Orchards, the market makes for a weekday pick on the Westside.

Tuesday Torrance doesn’t sell as much as the Saturday market at the same spot, but it has great finds and many farmers.

Farmers Markets: Kenter Canyon Farms has launched its ‘farm to toaster’ program, with heritage wheatberries, freshly milled flour and breads. It’s the first of several such projects.

Fall Fiesta, which looks like a standard purple pluot, is a Zaiger hybrid: plum, cherry, peach and nectarine.

The West Hollywood farmers market for more than 25 years has served its community well by sticking to the basics.

In Yuma, Ariz., 2,700 acres of Medjool date palms are planted, for a harvest that will surpass the production at Bard, Calif.

The Japanese citrus Sudachi is small and juicy and used to flavor soups, fish dishes and matsutake mushrooms.

It’s prime season for specialty apples. From the Golden Russet to the Hauer Pippin, the flavorful specimens will be available at local farmers markets over the next few months.

Farmers Markets: Wax apples, popular in Taiwan, are uncommon in Southern California. But now Lung Ke Wu is growing and selling them here.

Farmers Markets: After two previous attempts, the latest Old Pasadena farmers market may be able to compete with the Victory Park, Villa Parke and Playhouse District markets.

Panachee figs, marketed as Tiger, have been a long time coming to commercial availability. But their super-sweet day has come.

Redlands’ Thursday market gets more attention, but the Saturday one is home to small, local growers with fine produce.

Barbara and Bill Spencer of Paso Robles are known for bringing some of the highest quality fruit, vegetables and meats to Southern California markets.

A Utah farm provides more than 90% of the sour cherry supply at Southern California stores. But help might be on the way.

Also, sweet corn varieties are in season; market suit is dropped in Santa Barbara.

Production of Valencia oranges, an emblematic crop in California, has dropped dramatically. A bacterial disease deadly to trees could provide another big blow.

Great peaches are available at local markets from June well into the fall, but July is really the heart of the season for the San Joaquin Valley, the state’s largest growing area.

Legislative maneuvering will likely cut the flow of funds for the program by the end of the year.

The Antelope Valley Winery market forgoes the certification process but is the best in its area, with fresh local produce and more.

Arrive early for boysenberries, Persian mulberries, Mara des Bois strawberries, Blenheim apricots and Snow Queen nectarines.

Forget the mediocre early choices. Prime varieties are sweet and flavorful, and extend beyond even the Blenheim.

A bill that for the first time would have provided substantial resources for state and county inspectors to keep cheaters out of farmers markets was held by the California Assembly Appropriations Committee on Friday afternoon.

The Asdoorian family of Kingsburg, Calif., has patented three varieties of early fruit.

Fishermen selling their own catch at Southern California farmers markets are vanishing.

The UCLA market, though small and held only twice a quarter, has caught on fast with students and staff. But there are obstacles to future growth.

Mark Mooring of Buon Gusto Farms brings fresh, well-regarded oils to area markets and has plans to plant more trees.

For many years, Maggie’s Farm, based in Agoura Hills, has sold top-quality salad greens and herbs exclusively at farmers markets.

There are still good choices in April, including strawberries, rhubarb and blueberries.

A new state program hopes to be a game changer by giving managers the information they need to run their businesses properly, including how to identify fraud.

Introduced last month and up for consideration as early as mid-April, AB 996 would bolster some enforcement measures for certified markets but weaken others.

Rhubarb is one of the great joys of spring, with its rosy color, earthy tang and old-fashioned allure, and the story of its local rise and fall is as intriguing as its flavor.

He breeds pigs that produce dark meat of excellent flavor, though he’s still not sure if selling pork will prove economically viable.

— The cherimoya is a peculiar-looking, almost intimidating fruit — “like a pre-Columbian jade pine cone or the finial for a giant Inca four-poster bed,� in Elizabeth Schneider’s memorable words.

The selection is easily the region’s best, even if there are a few bad apples.

Michelle Grant, co-founder of the Grilled Cheese Truck, moves on to pareve prepared food.

Michael O’Brien brings quality olive oil to area markets from his San Luis Obispo County acreage.

For many years, when managers grew frustrated about lax enforcement at Los Angeles farmers markets, they would cry, “If only Ed Williams were here!�

Midwinter is peak time for citrus to be eaten fresh, and this year quality has been superb, probably because of the extended heat earlier in the growing season.

FALLBROOK — Jim Russell’s macadamia orchard looks like a park, 3 acres of holly-like evergreens growing above closely cropped grass.

DE LUZ — High on a hill overlooking an idyllic vista of citrus, avocados and chaparral, Bill Vogel spied a tree loaded with an unexpected bounty and started to holler.

Beets, English peas, Brussels sprouts, Savoy cabbage. These and more call out for a place in the kitchen.

Page and Lee mandarins don’t taste exactly like other oranges. That’s why they’re prized.

When buying carrots, grapefruits, nuts, avocados and more, it pays to know when the time is ripe.

At their best, local recently harvested kiwis have an intense vibrancy.

At their best, clementines are among the finest of citrus fruits, easy to peel, seedless, with firm but juicy flesh and a rich, well-balanced flavor.

The fruit’s baby daddy was likely a large, loose-skinned type of mandarin widely cultivated in Asia and Brazil, research says.

OROSI, Calif. — Easy to peel and nearly seedless, with tender flesh and tangy mandarin flavor, satsumas are one of the most popular farmers market fruits around Thanksgiving.

Two entrepreneurs buy produce from local markets and resell it in small but convenient settings.

The deep purple sweet potato packs plenty of flavor and possible health benefits.

The scarlet nuts will soon show up in markets. They make a festive addition on holiday tables.

Highly perishable, ultra-seasonal green pistachios are making their way to area farmers markets amid a new harvest by the Zannon family’s Santa Barbara Pistachio Co.

REEDLEY, Calif. -- Raisins are the neglected icon of California agriculture, perceived as an old-fashioned industrial commodity, devoid of seasonal sizzle.

Buying at farmers markets enables buyers to get a better understanding of varieties as well as, depending on the stand, the opportunity to buy them unpasturized.

With dark blue, astringent skins, and dry, sour flesh, the ancient plums called damsons aren’t good for eating fresh.

Committee members hope the bit of progress they made will be enough for legislators to get involved.

Two popular and successful farmers markets, in South Pasadena and Westwood, are in the process of replacing the veteran managers who helped build them.

The Palm farmers market launched last week to strong demand and a good number of vendors.

Ray and Elizabeth Billet’s 40 acres feature peach and pear orchards, however, yield fresh flavors.

The revived event features 40 stands, a new parking lot and free valet service.

Rancho San Julian has been in the same family since the 19th century. Its cattle is grass-fed and is not given corn, hormones or antibiotics.

The expected crop from this rural idyll would be citrus. But varied microclimates open opportunities to farmers.

Among the most lamented casualties of industrial fruit commerce is the Gravenstein apple, whose intense, distinctive aroma, honeyed, floral and fruity, has lodged in the memories of many Californians, emblematic of the careless rapture of childhood.

Of the dozen tomato varieties displayed at Vang Thao’s stand last Saturday, one, with purplish black skin over a flaming orange ground color, stood out spectacularly.

Flanked by low-income housing, recently renovated lofts, offices and art galleries, the Historic Downtown Los Angeles farmers market, which opened two weeks ago, is a study in contrasts.

Harry Nicholas, who celebrates his 90th birthday Saturday, drives round-trip twice a week from southeast of Fresno to Los Angeles area farmers markets, where he is likely the oldest farmer to participate actively.

Jennifer Little and James Imhoff ditched their jobs and turned their love, and San Gabriel yard, into farmers market sales.

HANFORD, Calif. — Combining the high sugar and flavor of cherries with the larger fruit size and extended season of plums has been a longstanding dream for fruit breeders, but such crosses are difficult to make successfully so that the hybrids yield abundant high-quality fruit.

Spider-Manlooms incongruously on a billboard above the new Sunset Strip farmers market, which opened last Thursday in a parking lot next to the ghosts of Tower Records and Spago Hollywood.

The farm is known for the highest quality lettuces, and the farmers are known as mentors.

The late-harvest mandarins can be very seedy. But made into juice, as Lucio Trinidad does at farmers markets, they find their sweet spot.

The Altadena certified farmers market, which opened last Wednesday afternoon after weeks of anticipatory buzz, is innovative and deeply idealistic.

— It’s always an event when “Farmer Al� Courchesne of Frog Hollow Farm shows up at the Santa Monica farmers market, where he’ll be selling apricots and cherries for the next month.

The San Joaquin Valley branches out beyond the Bing and Brooks. It pays to know what you’re buying and try samples.

High on a steep, terraced mountainside in Malibu, with a spectacular view of the Pacific, perches the largest and probably the only commercial planting of loquats in the United States.

The intense sweetness, distinctive knobbly appearance and mysterious provenance of the Temecula Sweet mandarin have endowed the fruit with a mystique.

Many growers proudly advertise their local origins, but when David Rosenstein of Evo Farm sells his produce on Sunday for the first time at the Mar Vista farmers market, he says he will be talking “not about food miles, but food feet.�

Northern California may be home base, but in expanding County Line Harvest’s vegetable-producing season, David Retsky makes inroads to the south.

With B&T Farm, Brett and Tanya Wyatt find that their sense of responsibility grows.

Financial problems and conflicting visions are among the reasons cited in Pompea Smith’s dismissal. Reaction among vendors is mixed.

Harry’s Berries will be bringing the Chandler variety back. It’s prized for its sweet, heritage taste.

Zuckerman’s Farm grows the labor-intensive crop in an ideal region for it. He sells the spears at markets across Southern California.

On land near Santa Paula, the Smiths grow everything from apples to wampees. If it tastes good and they like it, they’ll try to grow it.

When Tara Kolla of Silver Lake Farms returned to the Hollywood farmers market last Sunday for the first time in three years, her flower stand was a riot of color, with sweet peas, ranunculus and snapdragons, and her customers were rapturous, but her eyes were rimmed with tears.

Many vendors find the work and driving heavy, the profits thin.

Another great mandarin, Daisy, is approaching too.

The desolate, scrubby plain around Ridgecrest, where the Sierra Nevada meets the Great Basin and the Mojave desert, might seem an incongruous source for tomatoes, especially in the middle of winter.

Southern California has three fine locally adapted hybrids at their peak now: Oroblanco, Melogold and Cocktail.

Although most of the larger farmers markets in Southern California have at least one vendor of cultivated mushrooms, the great majority of these buy from large commercial producers and so must sell in the non-certified section or under a second certificate arrangement.

Drake Family Farms in Ontario sells its artisanal cheeses at area farmers markets but has had a tough time.

While Southern Californians have enjoyed balmy weather over the last week, some citrus growers in the San Joaquin Valley are still coping with the aftermath of harrowing cold last month, the longest stretch of subfreezing temperatures on record in the area.

Dimitman cultivated some of the state’s oldest, largest and rarest exotic Asian fruit trees and sold the fruit at the Alhambra farmers market.

Chidori, Nagoya and Redbor are among the varieties gaining farmers market fans.

Joyce Lukon brings the fruits of her labor to Redondo Beach and Manhattan Beach markets.

Markov Farms is bringing the tropical fruit to Southern California farmers markets.

The last decade or so has seen a remarkable boom in the quantity and variety of limes and lime-like fruits available in the United States.

The pear combines the best features of its Seckel and Comice ancestors. And its origin? Most likely Mississippi, of all places. It’s sweet and spicy, and it’s making a cameo appearance in Santa Monica.

The Cuyama Valley is just 30 miles northeast of Santa Barbara and two hours from downtown Los Angeles, but it’s a world of its own, rimmed by stark, rugged mountains, sparsely populated and little known.

The Dupuys are a rare catch indeed at Santa Monica and Studio City markets.