Fill your shopping basket with regional goodies at Detroit's Eastern Market

It's spring again, and that means it is time for Detroit's Eastern Market to welcome vendors and shoppers back to the outdoor sheds.

I love the fact that the market is open year round, and your shopping experience at the Winter Market can include sighting someone suspiciously resembling Santa among a sea of poinsettias while you pick up supplies for your holiday parties.

But I love the idea that I'll soon be able to shop in the open-air market and pick up fresh produce (I always anxiously anticipate the arrival of local asparagus as the season swings into high gear).

A trip to Eastern Market during the warmer months offers a full-on immersion into the sights, sounds, smells, taste, and tactile market delights. Seeing the colorful fruits and veggies is treat enough, but I look forward to strolling through the market listening to the buskers, smelling smoked and barbecued ribs and chicken cooked on a street-side grill, and all of the other sensory delights that usually go into hibernation during the cold, winter season.

Detroit's Eastern Market is a big place, covering 43 acres and drawing as many as 40,000 visitors on a busy Saturday to check out merchandise from 250-plus farmers and vendors from primarily Michigan, Ohio and Canada.

That means shopping at Eastern Market can be a day-long excursion, and hard-core shoppers show up with folding carts, large baskets or their kids' red wagons to make the rounds.

After a few trips to the market, you develop your own list of favorite vendors. Some of our favorites from last year's open-air market season included: the Grown in Detroit booth, a cooperative garden program where families and youth grow fruits and veggies (like tasty and affordable heirloom tomatoes) in community gardens and urban farms in Detroit, Highland Park and Hamtramck; the booth benefiting Gleaners Community Food Bank, where buying a loaf of artisan bread can help provide six meals for hungry metro Detroiters; McClure's Pickles for spicy pickle relish and pickles that aren't over-processed like some store-bought brands; the Zingerman's booth, especially if they have cream cheese (pricey, but sans added preservatives, vegetable gums or sweeteners) or a Southern favorite, pimento cheese; and Rocky's Peanut Company for bulk nuts and other local products.

Eastern Market lays claim to being the largest historic public market district in the country, with a history dating back more than 160 years. That longevity earned it a place on the National Register of Historic Places in 1978.

The first open-air farmers' markets appeared at Detroit's Cadillac Square in 1841. By the 1850s, more markets opened on the city's east side, near the site of present-day Eastern Market. In 1891, farmers from the original Cadillac Square Market began selling from the first in a group of sheds at Eastern Market. The market expanded, adding more sheds during the 1920s. Wholesalers and food processors came to the district by the end of World War II, and the market became an important wholesale food distribution point.

Eastern Market's yearly Flower Day in mid-May, which marks its 44th year this year, is one of the largest flower shows in the nation and draws more than 150,000 visitors each year.

You can learn more about the market and its history by taking a tour with Preservation Wayne or tour the area on bicycle with Wheelhouse Detroit.

Public market hours are 5 a.m. until 5 p.m. Saturdays, and some businesses in the district are open throughout the week (check their individual Web sites or call for hours). Check out Eastern Market's website to learn more about the market and for information like the easy grilled asparagus recipe I spotted there recently. You can also check out the market's Facebook page for information about upcoming events at the market.

The market is easily accessible via I-75, and we've always found plentiful free parking in a big lot about a block from the market at Wilkins and Russell Streets.

 

Be sure to also check out my story, Ohio's Toledo Farmers' Market has a long history

 

Want to learn more? Check out the newest edition of Detroit's Eastern Market: A Farmers Market Shopping and Cooking Guide by Lois Johnson and Margaret Thomas

© Dominique King 2010 All rights reserved

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Detroit

Comments

[gypsyscarlett]

I love shopping at open-air markets. And they're also a very nice sign of springtime.

[Dominique King]

Gypsy-We're lucky to be within a half-hour of Eastern Market in Detroit, and not more than an hour on a good day from Toledo Farmers' Market...plus we have a lot of smaller suburban markets for a quick trip for one or two things.
I'm thinking next weekend for a big market trip :)

[jessiev]

WHOO!! you are CLOSE! my mom goes there occasionally, loads up her trunk, and brings us scads of goodies. we need to take lillie!

[Kayvee]

The Eastern Market is simply wonderful. Thanks for such a great article -it made me smile and brought back smells and sounds and memories. One not-to-miss place that I have to mention is the R. Hirt Jr. store that has an amazing selection of cheeses, cut from the rounds, and gourmet treats and meats, baskets and other things too numerous to mention.
Now I'm going to have to plan a field trip to get back to the Eastern Market!
Thanks for the memories.

[Dominique King]

Kayvee-Hirt's is great, too...kind of like a cool, old general store. It can be super-packed on regular market days, but you can always make a special trip down there on another day for more unhurried browsing. Writing this story really got me in the mood for an Eastern Market field trip, too :)

Jessie-It might be a half-hour drive for us, so it's fairly easy to pop on down to the market. We've got a few nice stores around here that stock a lot of Michigan-made products, but one nice thing about purchasing at Eastern Market is the fact that you are often talking with the company owner or someone else directly involved in producing what you're purchasing.