Farm to Market

I had a great weekend. On Saturday morning, I went to the Pearl Farmer's Market that I referred to on Friday. It was a terribly muggy, hot morning, but that didn't stop the crowd from gathering downtown to attend the Grand Opening.

Fruits, veggies and meats galore - the Market was filled with beautiful colors and activity. There were only about 20 or so vendors, and many of them had run out of their supplies within the first 30 minutes!


Chef Andrew Weissman and his colleague, Luca, were on hand to do a cooking demonstration. Weissman is in the final stages of opening one of his newest spots, Il Sogno (The Dream), in the Full Goods building (immediately adjacent to the Farmer's Market). Opening is currently slated for June. (Now those are two guys that have got it going on - handsome, successful, charming, intelligent and both have beautiful families. Their beautiful wives are both customers at my store.)


I'd say that the Pearl organizers have some structural challenges to work through. The flow didn't move in a natural direction and it was so crowded that people were uncomfortable and complaining. For a first time execution, though, I'm not sure that they could've done it any differently. There are just too many variables that are difficult to predict without a trial and error grace period.

This was also my first glance at the River Improvement project. They had just filled the spot with water, so things are really coming together.


If Saturday was any indication of the future growth of this endeavor, it is well on its way. This entire project is going to do wonders for the Alamo City.