Anchor ads are not supported on this page.

4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs

Soup, gloop, fish, crêpe at the PB farmers' market

Customer Matt with his $27 growler full of greens
Customer Matt with his $27 growler full of greens

Cruising down Garnet, heading for the #30 bus at Mission and Felspar, when I find myself crossing Bayard.

It’s closed off to traffic. Huh. Oh, yeah, it’s Tuesday. Must be the farmers’ market. Lots of tents. People sauntering.

I head into it, and it hits me: this scene can’t be much different than, say, 100 years ago, or maybe even those medieval markets you read about. Tents, stalls, veggies, fruits, people shouting, touting their wares. Troubadour singing. Smells of herbs, like fennel and rosemary (there’s a minty-mustardy tingle I get in my nostrils, I swear), and carroty steam from a vegan soup a-cooking.

Why don’t I see if I can get myself a three-course meal here and not bust the bank?

The guy singing is Vic Moraga, the “Castilian Gypsy.” Wailing away on some Gordon Lightfoot. “If you could read my mind, love, what a tale my thoughts could tell…” Pretty darned good voice.

Vic Moraga, the Castilian Gypsy

I hang around to hear the end of the tune, right beside this tent with a hanging sign that reads “Organic Soup.”

“We have three flavors today,” says Camilo, the soup guy. He’s a civil engineer from Chile. “Everything is organic and vegan. No meats, but they’re very filling.”

Sponsored
Sponsored

In the cool of the evening, this could go down great. Tonight’s choices includes a “zesty lentil soup,” with spuds, lentils, tomatoes, carrots, and onions. There’s also a mushroom-and-wild-rice soup, with leeks, carrots, celery, mushrooms, and herbs like rosemary and thyme.

Hey, now I remember this outfit. From the Barrio Logan farmers’ market. I had this same soup last October. Thick as a stew.

This time, to be different, I ask for the ginger-carrot soup. It costs $5 for an eight-ounce cup. It’s got carrots and onions and apple juice, but what you taste most is the ginger, zesting it up. Camilo slices off the end of a big rounded loaf of bread. “I bake this myself,” he says.

Whew. Flavorful, and filling — except, net effect, it only awakens my hunger.

Right at the market’s far end, I see you’ve got a choice. On one side, Chip’s red-and-yellow Beach Eatz truck. Deep-fried stuff, like spicy crabwich ($10) or Kalua pork sandwich ($8). On the other side? Two guys, Joe and Phil, are handing out samples of a green gloop that looks straight from the swamp.

I decide to line ye olde gut with green.

Stall’s called “GreenFix,” and what you get is a witch’s brew of all the dark-green veggies your ma had to force down your gullet: kale, chard, collard greens, romaine lettuce, plus, uh, dandelion greens, and parsley. Everything tossed in a blender.

“It’s what your body needs,” says Joe. “We add apple juice, fresh apple, banana, and flax seed. Live enzymes! It tastes great.”

He hands me a little plastic sample cup. I take a sip.

Hmm…sweet grass, I’d say. You can get it in a 16-oz plastic glassful for $4.95. A one-gallon bottle costs $29.

Right now, this guy Matt’s plunking down a growler and handing over $27 (he brought his own bottle, gets $2 off). “I’ve got a jiu jitsu tournament coming up,” he says. “I need the vitamins. This’ll last about a week.”

It’s clear they really do make it here, ’cause there’s a guy inside the tent with veggies all around him. He’s shredding off big dark leaves from a stalk — collard greens? — and bundling them into a blender.

Why not? I lay down a Lincoln and start slurping it down. Taste? It’s your lawn-clippings-with–Sweet’N Low meets fruitie-smoothie.

I drain it in three, then cross over to Chip’s Beach Eatz truck, ’cause I spotted his sandwich board: “Taco Tuesday. Fish tacos $1.50. Ceviche $5.”

Chip McCarty, owner of Beach Eatz truck

Guess I can handle a buck-fifty for a fish taco. ’Specially when Chip, the happy guy who pokes his head out through the serving hole, says it’s halibut. Caught right off the shores here.

Chip should be a dab hand at this: before launching his food truck last year, he says he spent 27 years in restaurants, 19 as an executive chef.

“I just got tired of working for other people.” He hands me the tight-wrapped taco he’s cooked.

Have to say, standing here in the people-filled street, leaning over, trying not to drool as I chomp — this is the best way to eat anything. And the batter-fried halibut is so succulent. Outrageous amount of fish, with a lot of mayo-ish “secret” sauce to juice it up. Delish.

This gal Desirea gets a paper tray loaded with the $5 ceviche. Tempting, what with the avocado slices, cilantro, and lime on top of a generous bowl of ceviche (little chunks of marinated halibut, I’m guessing). Plus, you get a bunch of corn chips.

Or, I could have two more tacos and be totally bursting for $4.50 total.

But I resist both of these, because I saw a French place farther up. Still want to feel hungry when I try one of their genu-wine French crêpes.

Tent’s called “L’ardiguel.” Gal, Isabel, is from Paris. Everything’s organic, she says. She even buys all her ingredients at this farmers’ market. Cool.

I want to try a galette. It’s a savory crêpe made of buckwheat (which isn’t wheat, meaning it’s gluten-free). Isabel fills them with interesting stuff. Like, for the “Norvégienne” ($7), it’s smoked salmon, cream, and lemon. The “Saint Jacques” has scallops and spinach ($7).

On the other hand, sweet tooth’s kicking in.

So I go instead for a crêpe with chestnut spread ($3). It’s French kids’ after-school favorite, Isabel says. Her crêpe is paper-thin, and the filling’s sweet. Perfect end to the meal.

So: this has cost me $14.50. More than I meant to spend, but still, for a four-course meal — soup, gloop, fish, crêpe — I ain’t complaining.

As I pass by on my way out, Vic the Castilian Gypsy is belting out the Moody Blues classic, “Go now!”

Here's something you might be interested in.
Submit a free classified
or view all
Previous article

Will L.A. Times crowd out San Diego U-T at Riverside printing plant?

Will Toni Atkins stand back from anti-SDG&E initiative?
Next Article

Hip-hop artist Don Elway makes movies for his music

Not Ordinary EP tells a story of life on the streets
Customer Matt with his $27 growler full of greens
Customer Matt with his $27 growler full of greens

Cruising down Garnet, heading for the #30 bus at Mission and Felspar, when I find myself crossing Bayard.

It’s closed off to traffic. Huh. Oh, yeah, it’s Tuesday. Must be the farmers’ market. Lots of tents. People sauntering.

I head into it, and it hits me: this scene can’t be much different than, say, 100 years ago, or maybe even those medieval markets you read about. Tents, stalls, veggies, fruits, people shouting, touting their wares. Troubadour singing. Smells of herbs, like fennel and rosemary (there’s a minty-mustardy tingle I get in my nostrils, I swear), and carroty steam from a vegan soup a-cooking.

Why don’t I see if I can get myself a three-course meal here and not bust the bank?

The guy singing is Vic Moraga, the “Castilian Gypsy.” Wailing away on some Gordon Lightfoot. “If you could read my mind, love, what a tale my thoughts could tell…” Pretty darned good voice.

Vic Moraga, the Castilian Gypsy

I hang around to hear the end of the tune, right beside this tent with a hanging sign that reads “Organic Soup.”

“We have three flavors today,” says Camilo, the soup guy. He’s a civil engineer from Chile. “Everything is organic and vegan. No meats, but they’re very filling.”

Sponsored
Sponsored

In the cool of the evening, this could go down great. Tonight’s choices includes a “zesty lentil soup,” with spuds, lentils, tomatoes, carrots, and onions. There’s also a mushroom-and-wild-rice soup, with leeks, carrots, celery, mushrooms, and herbs like rosemary and thyme.

Hey, now I remember this outfit. From the Barrio Logan farmers’ market. I had this same soup last October. Thick as a stew.

This time, to be different, I ask for the ginger-carrot soup. It costs $5 for an eight-ounce cup. It’s got carrots and onions and apple juice, but what you taste most is the ginger, zesting it up. Camilo slices off the end of a big rounded loaf of bread. “I bake this myself,” he says.

Whew. Flavorful, and filling — except, net effect, it only awakens my hunger.

Right at the market’s far end, I see you’ve got a choice. On one side, Chip’s red-and-yellow Beach Eatz truck. Deep-fried stuff, like spicy crabwich ($10) or Kalua pork sandwich ($8). On the other side? Two guys, Joe and Phil, are handing out samples of a green gloop that looks straight from the swamp.

I decide to line ye olde gut with green.

Stall’s called “GreenFix,” and what you get is a witch’s brew of all the dark-green veggies your ma had to force down your gullet: kale, chard, collard greens, romaine lettuce, plus, uh, dandelion greens, and parsley. Everything tossed in a blender.

“It’s what your body needs,” says Joe. “We add apple juice, fresh apple, banana, and flax seed. Live enzymes! It tastes great.”

He hands me a little plastic sample cup. I take a sip.

Hmm…sweet grass, I’d say. You can get it in a 16-oz plastic glassful for $4.95. A one-gallon bottle costs $29.

Right now, this guy Matt’s plunking down a growler and handing over $27 (he brought his own bottle, gets $2 off). “I’ve got a jiu jitsu tournament coming up,” he says. “I need the vitamins. This’ll last about a week.”

It’s clear they really do make it here, ’cause there’s a guy inside the tent with veggies all around him. He’s shredding off big dark leaves from a stalk — collard greens? — and bundling them into a blender.

Why not? I lay down a Lincoln and start slurping it down. Taste? It’s your lawn-clippings-with–Sweet’N Low meets fruitie-smoothie.

I drain it in three, then cross over to Chip’s Beach Eatz truck, ’cause I spotted his sandwich board: “Taco Tuesday. Fish tacos $1.50. Ceviche $5.”

Chip McCarty, owner of Beach Eatz truck

Guess I can handle a buck-fifty for a fish taco. ’Specially when Chip, the happy guy who pokes his head out through the serving hole, says it’s halibut. Caught right off the shores here.

Chip should be a dab hand at this: before launching his food truck last year, he says he spent 27 years in restaurants, 19 as an executive chef.

“I just got tired of working for other people.” He hands me the tight-wrapped taco he’s cooked.

Have to say, standing here in the people-filled street, leaning over, trying not to drool as I chomp — this is the best way to eat anything. And the batter-fried halibut is so succulent. Outrageous amount of fish, with a lot of mayo-ish “secret” sauce to juice it up. Delish.

This gal Desirea gets a paper tray loaded with the $5 ceviche. Tempting, what with the avocado slices, cilantro, and lime on top of a generous bowl of ceviche (little chunks of marinated halibut, I’m guessing). Plus, you get a bunch of corn chips.

Or, I could have two more tacos and be totally bursting for $4.50 total.

But I resist both of these, because I saw a French place farther up. Still want to feel hungry when I try one of their genu-wine French crêpes.

Tent’s called “L’ardiguel.” Gal, Isabel, is from Paris. Everything’s organic, she says. She even buys all her ingredients at this farmers’ market. Cool.

I want to try a galette. It’s a savory crêpe made of buckwheat (which isn’t wheat, meaning it’s gluten-free). Isabel fills them with interesting stuff. Like, for the “Norvégienne” ($7), it’s smoked salmon, cream, and lemon. The “Saint Jacques” has scallops and spinach ($7).

On the other hand, sweet tooth’s kicking in.

So I go instead for a crêpe with chestnut spread ($3). It’s French kids’ after-school favorite, Isabel says. Her crêpe is paper-thin, and the filling’s sweet. Perfect end to the meal.

So: this has cost me $14.50. More than I meant to spend, but still, for a four-course meal — soup, gloop, fish, crêpe — I ain’t complaining.

As I pass by on my way out, Vic the Castilian Gypsy is belting out the Moody Blues classic, “Go now!”

Comments
Sponsored
Here's something you might be interested in.
Submit a free classified
or view all
Previous article

Looking back at race relations in Coronado

A former football player recalls the good and the bad
Next Article

A poem for March by Joseph O’Brien

“March’s Lovely Asymptotes”
Comments
Ask a Hipster — Advice you didn't know you needed Big Screen — Movie commentary Blurt — Music's inside track Booze News — San Diego spirits Classical Music — Immortal beauty Classifieds — Free and easy Cover Stories — Front-page features Drinks All Around — Bartenders' drink recipes Excerpts — Literary and spiritual excerpts Feast! — Food & drink reviews Feature Stories — Local news & stories Fishing Report — What’s getting hooked from ship and shore From the Archives — Spotlight on the past Golden Dreams — Talk of the town The Gonzo Report — Making the musical scene, or at least reporting from it Letters — Our inbox Movies@Home — Local movie buffs share favorites Movie Reviews — Our critics' picks and pans Musician Interviews — Up close with local artists Neighborhood News from Stringers — Hyperlocal news News Ticker — News & politics Obermeyer — San Diego politics illustrated Outdoors — Weekly changes in flora and fauna Overheard in San Diego — Eavesdropping illustrated Poetry — The old and the new Reader Travel — Travel section built by travelers Reading — The hunt for intellectuals Roam-O-Rama — SoCal's best hiking/biking trails San Diego Beer — Inside San Diego suds SD on the QT — Almost factual news Sheep and Goats — Places of worship Special Issues — The best of Street Style — San Diego streets have style Surf Diego — Real stories from those braving the waves Theater — On stage in San Diego this week Tin Fork — Silver spoon alternative Under the Radar — Matt Potter's undercover work Unforgettable — Long-ago San Diego Unreal Estate — San Diego's priciest pads Your Week — Daily event picks
4S Ranch Allied Gardens Alpine Baja Balboa Park Bankers Hill Barrio Logan Bay Ho Bay Park Black Mountain Ranch Blossom Valley Bonita Bonsall Borrego Springs Boulevard Campo Cardiff-by-the-Sea Carlsbad Carmel Mountain Carmel Valley Chollas View Chula Vista City College City Heights Clairemont College Area Coronado CSU San Marcos Cuyamaca College Del Cerro Del Mar Descanso Downtown San Diego Eastlake East Village El Cajon Emerald Hills Encanto Encinitas Escondido Fallbrook Fletcher Hills Golden Hill Grant Hill Grantville Grossmont College Guatay Harbor Island Hillcrest Imperial Beach Imperial Valley Jacumba Jamacha-Lomita Jamul Julian Kearny Mesa Kensington La Jolla Lakeside La Mesa Lemon Grove Leucadia Liberty Station Lincoln Acres Lincoln Park Linda Vista Little Italy Logan Heights Mesa College Midway District MiraCosta College Miramar Miramar College Mira Mesa Mission Beach Mission Hills Mission Valley Mountain View Mount Hope Mount Laguna National City Nestor Normal Heights North Park Oak Park Ocean Beach Oceanside Old Town Otay Mesa Pacific Beach Pala Palomar College Palomar Mountain Paradise Hills Pauma Valley Pine Valley Point Loma Point Loma Nazarene Potrero Poway Rainbow Ramona Rancho Bernardo Rancho Penasquitos Rancho San Diego Rancho Santa Fe Rolando San Carlos San Marcos San Onofre Santa Ysabel Santee San Ysidro Scripps Ranch SDSU Serra Mesa Shelltown Shelter Island Sherman Heights Skyline Solana Beach Sorrento Valley Southcrest South Park Southwestern College Spring Valley Stockton Talmadge Temecula Tierrasanta Tijuana UCSD University City University Heights USD Valencia Park Valley Center Vista Warner Springs
Close

Anchor ads are not supported on this page.