Plate to Plate

In the years I’ve spent together with Dan, one thing has been certain: I’m the photographer. I’m the one behind the lens, happily snapping away, producing piles (well, digital piles) of photos of my accommodating husband’s wide grin, our many shared dinners, and structures near and far in various states of crumbling decay. This truth held for a long time. Actually, it held until last weekend, when, while I was otherwise occupied, Dan snuck off to the Pioneer Valley armed with my camera and a list of farmers’ markets.

The Pioneer Valley is a swath of western Massachusetts around the Connecticut river, a big hunk of the state just to the east of the Berkshires, and probably much larger and more demographically varied than our little western corner. When I think of the Pioneer Valley, I think of Amherst and Northampton, but I think the region also includes the wonderful Hilltowns — Ashfield, Plainfield, Cummington, and the like — and the tiny towns to the north, like Turner’s Falls. Parts of this region of western Mass are spectacularly beautiful. And parts of it fill me with a little bit of that exciting, big-city energy that I so miss.

Those two elements combine at some of the region’s farmers’ markets, which Dan visited last Saturday in search of some shots for a humdinger of a book he’s working on. He visited the Ashfield farmers’ market, and the Northampton and Amherst markets. (There are many, many more.)

I wanted to share these photos with you, because they’re lovely, and so celebratory of the zenith of the season — a complete riot of veggie goodness. Plus, the photos illustrate the somewhat incongruous way that the more developed, urban parts of the state — at least this side of the state — seem to have a lockdown on the most fantastic produce grown in the region. One particularly thrilling discovery was a grower with long beans and Thai basil, two Asian staples we’d otherwise have to get from decidely un-local sources at a supermarket in Albany.

We’re lucky, really, to live near so much good food.