To Market: Fort Greene Park

Should you lose your way to the Fort Greene Park greenmarket — held each Saturday from 8 to 5 on the corners of Washington Park and Dekalb — you may pass some of Brooklyn’s prettier old brownstones. Still in morning shade, their windows boxes may spill over with pink and red blossoms, or ferns, or else be taken over entirely by the climbing wisteria also looping their stoop railings and garden gates.

Walk too far south and you may discover The Lafayette Meat Co., where the script on its sign is the only thing to half recommend it, or the Peter Jay Sharp Building, which houses BAM's Howard Gilman Opera House and features an architectural detail like a line of mean faces, or maybe steamed Chinese buns...

Too far east, and you may arrive in a hot, concrete landscape of auto body shops, all looking like the exact place stolen cars temporarily call home.
















But reorient yourself (a simple thing to do from the Fulton St. G train, the Lafayette Ave. C, or the B69 bus), catch a glimpse of the park's green hills and the early barbecuers setting up under the trees, and the details of your journey will fall away, replaced by the distracting scent of warm, ripe peaches and the very unusual blueberry- rhubarb- and cherry-pie muffins for sale ($2) at the Willow Creek Orchards stand.






























Fort Greene is a long, skinny, market that snakes north along Washington Park's shaded stone wall, creating a single lane with farm stands on either side. This Saturday there was just about every type of summer vegetable — sans the mass onslaught of corn, still to come — and gorgeous displays of summer fruits: raspberries, gooseberries, red currants, and even the season's first Lodi green apples (Very Sour! the sign warned).

There was also meat and fish and poultry, at their respective stands; bok choy, lemon kirbys (pictured below), varieties of kimchi and fresh honey (whipped, traditional, and still on the comb); potted white lilies, cut flowers, cookies, breads, spicy pickles, and fresh juices; and countless young couples (with and without baby carriages) running their fingers over heirlooms and examining big bags of zucchini flowers, and saying things like, "These peppers would go great with sausages tonight..." and "Should we make that pizza again?"

An incomplete vendor list follows (apologies, a girl can become overwhelmed by crowds and heat and honey bees and organic rhubarb juice). Should you need still more motivation to visit, know that you can fill up your market bag with baby eggplants, speckled borlotti beans, and pattypan squash, skip the Ronnybrook Farm yogurt and Pura Vida fish stand, and then head to brunch at The General Greene, which is oh-so-trendy and just a few blocks east down Dekalb.

If it's packed to the rafters, as expected, there are other attractive options all around. Or, you can just assuage your disappointment with a cone of the General's egg-free ice-cream, sold from a cart outside its front door — flavors this Saturday included Salted Caramel Pretzel, Salted Hazelnut Gianduja, and Raspberry Frozen Yogurt — before heading back down into the G train.



























































• Willow Creek Orchards {peaches, apples, pork, beef, berries, squash and more}
• The New York Times {selling 50 percent off home subscriptions, poor guys...}
• The Market Information table {offering a live cooking demonstration and food stamps information}
• Rexcroft Farm
• Pura Vida Fisheries
• Cato Corner Farm {cheese}
• DiPaola Turkey Farm
• Baker's Bounty
• Rick's Picks
• Glebocki Farm
• Meredith's Bread
• Ronnybrook Farm Dairy
• NYC Beekeepers Association
• Flora Perfecta
• DJ Organic {lettuces, tomatoes, dandelions, sorrel, frisse, spinach, Asian greens, kimchi, etc.}
• Toigo Orchards {peaches, plums and more}