Thursday 28 June 2007

stary kleparz


I used to hate Woolies fruit and veg. Every friggin’ time I would purchase tomatoes or radishes I would chuck a tanty, whine about their tastelessness and get annoyed at having to pay a heap for crap that tasted like shit. My dad used to travel Sydney wide looking for the real tomatoes from Maltese wogs selling straight off their hobby farms on the way to Campbelltown. Then he would come home, proud as bloody punch for having found the treasures and we would all crowd around the kitchen table, ooing and aahing over their aroma and wonderful taste. I.e. we were wankers. Same applied to fresh geese, cucumbers, bread or garlic that wasn’t grown in China. And that’s what annoyed me the most – the appalling state of the fresh vegetables in Sydney’s normal supermarkets, forced the more ambitious foodies to become fresh food wankers (Farmer’s Market anyone?). Lucky are those who live in the proximity of food co-ops or delis that suffice (certain wankedom is always present though), or the early birds who have time to hit Flemington. Tough titties to those who live in the burbs and are stuck with shit on their plates. This is wrong. Tasty tomatoes for everyone dammit.

And Krakow? There are fresh fruit and vegetable open air markets in every major part of the city (so you never have to travel too far outside your neighbourhood, even if you are living in the burbs). Despite the influx of huge ‘hypermarkets’ like Tesco, Geant and Carrfour selling fibrous rubbish, the average Pole still purchases at the markets and smirks at the crap sold wrapped in foil or delivered on a styrofoam tray. And because these markets are easily accessible, cheap and convenient they are normal and therefore wank free. The one down the road from ours is convenient but lacks the babushka buzz, so I go to Stary Kleparz, the market we once lived close to (same place the Ukrainian Easter eggs were bought), where I can purchase fresh ewe's milk cheese.

The pics below are of what is in season at the moment.

highlander babcia - I buy farm cheese from her

cherries are back

chanterelles - my fave mushrooms (early mushroom season)


more mushies - don't know their English name

good radish that

blackberries

broad beans

11 comments:

Anonymous said...

may i say fuck off with your tasty food. every time i read your blog i get closer to buying that polish dictionary and a plane ticket and coming to eat my way through your neighbourhood.

i didnt realise your dad was such a foody.

i was feeling exotic at coles the other day and so i bought chokos. they are now rotting in the fridge.

hugh

Justyna said...

You should. Buy that plane ticket that is. And teach these Poles what to do with their wonderful fresh produce. They have a tendency to boil the shit out of their food.

As for my dad - ummm? Have you seen his gut? He is a mad ass foody. He's become buddies with a carpenter from down the road who is taking him to some village where a 63 year old woman bakes bread in a wood fire oven in her kitchen, which she sells for 2.10zl (that's like 90 cents!). My dad thinks it is Christmas.

Anonymous said...

Dammit - you are making my very lovelly life in the Sydeny burbs seems terribly dull!

I visited Galston markets once (the local semi-rural area) only to discover it was a car boot sale with old people selling their junk.

We have a market in the open-air part of hornsby weltfields (how sad I feel writing that), but all that food is imported from god-knows where. It is organic though (urg...)

I have to get my sister to buy stuff in glebe and bring it out to the burbs when she visits my parents on the weekend.

so sad...

However, I do have two king parrots sitting a tree in my backyard trying to ignore the kookaburras having a crack at each other in a neighbouring tree - so I guess it is not all bad.

John Gerard Sapodilla said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
mischa said...

the fruit and vege markets were my favourite place in tunis, mostly for the abundance and the atmosphere (they ain't as civilised as their polish cousins), but it's only now that i've returned to 'straya that i realise how much tastier the stuff was over there. the tomatoes here taste like water. very disappointing.

sorry i'm out of date. are you alerted to comments on old posts or will i go unnoticed?

mischa said...

oops, it's actually YOU who's out of date. there are no more recent posts. where are you?

mischa said...

ignore that last comment. i'm clearly incompetent. there is a post dated 1 july.

Justyna said...

I am alerted to all comments! No matter how old the posts are...And as a side track write to me proper and tell me why you're back in Oz Misch.

Anonymous said...

Bringelly.......Bringelly is the place for "wanky woggy" tomatoes......right between Penrith and Campbelltown......and if your lucky there is a full size soccer goal right out front for authentic italiano feel!

Justyna said...

But is it as good as Chopin' Park in Plumpy? Albeit, no wog tomatoes on sale there, but plenty of Polish sausage every Friday after 3pm.

Anonymous said...

Yes exactly, in some moments I can reveal that I acquiesce in with you, but you may be making allowance for other options.
to the article there is even now a question as you did in the fall efflux of this demand www.google.com/ie?as_q=apollo dvd creator 4.5.0 ?
I noticed the phrase you suffer with not used. Or you profit by the dreary methods of promotion of the resource. I suffer with a week and do necheg