The snow is melting and spring may indeed be making its long welcome appearance. That means the Roslyn Village Farmers Market, in the summer months, will be offering fresh selections for local residents at its location on Old Northern Boulevard and East Broadway in the heart of downtown Roslyn.
The first event is next month. On Thursday, April 2, from 6 to 8 p.m., the market will collaborate with Village Wine Merchant of Sea Cliff and Lucky 13 Oyster Co. for a night of wine and oysters.
“We will be focusing our attention to the selection of wines that you can pair together with oysters,” said Erik Longabardi, market manager and founder of the farmers market. “There will be a oyster shucking demonstration, oysters for sale and of course a great number of wines to be imbibed and bought. We support local businesses and local fisherman and hope that residents will be able to come out and learn a little about our market, the wines at Village Wine Merchant and lucky 13 Oyster Co.”
Beginning in late May and ending at Thanksgiving, the market will also be collaborating with MarGene Farms, an organic vegetable farm in Mattituck to bring a Community Support Agriculture (CSA) into
the community.
This event will take place each week starting on Wednesday, May 27 and ending on Tuesday, Nov. 24.
“For $540, which is only $20 a week, due on April 24, the farm will be delivering a weekly subscription of five to seven organic vegetables that have been freshly picked the day of the drop off,” Longabardi said. He added that the pick up for the vegetables/fruits and flowers would be on a weekly basis in the village.
Special events aside, the farmers market will be open every Saturday, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m., from Saturday, July 11 to the end of October.
“We are getting ready for our second season as our initial season was warmly welcomed by our local community,” Longabardi told The Roslyn News.
“Our vision for this market that we’ve started independently from other markets on Long Island, is to make a truly unique place for the community to come to each week and receive different varieties of quality food that they can bring home and feel good about what they have bought. With the advent of internet ordering and farmers markets online, we are set to creating a weekly meeting place where people can meet their neighbors, hang out and talk directly with the farmers about what they are growing. Nassau County is in a great location in terms of proximity to the East End of Long Island and Manhattan. We intend to utilize both places as a perspective of what we like food wise and hope the community responds to that.
“With this season compared to last, we have a couple of great surprises that will not only expand our market, but hopefully will get people thinking differently about food,” he continued. “We’re retaining most of our team we had from last season and adding a bunch of top quality food purveyors in addition to help us grow as a market. These people who we’re working with are interested in helping expand people’s tastes and in that sense it could help change the current food trends here in Nassau County. We’re hoping to bring people not only what we’re interested in food-wise, but also to help change the culture of food on Long Island. Additionally, this market isn’t just a place where people go to buy high quality food, but a place where ideas are exchanged, friendships are made and progress is achieved. We’d like to work with like-minded people and make this market the best on Long Island.”
In farmers markets parlance, a CSA, according to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), consists of a community of individuals who pledge support to a farm operation so that the land becomes, “legally or spiritually,” the community’s farm, with the growers and consumers providing mutual support and sharing the risks and benefits of food production. Members of such a garden pledge in advance to cover the anticipated costs of the farm operation and farmer’s salary, while receiving shares in the farm’s bounty throughout the growing season. The purpose of a CSA, the USDA further states, is to provide the farmer with working capital that in turn, allows growers to receive better prices for their crops, while relieving them of much of the burden of marketing.
For more information about the market, visit www.roslynvillagefarmersmarket.com.
