Not your ordinary farmers’ market
Jamie Aramini is many things—a writer, a homeschooling mom of two boys, a farm-market manager. A lot of friends and neighbors in Pulaski County call her a local-food activist. “I guess I’m okay with that label,” she says. “To me local food is all about community, so I think of myself as more of a community person.”
Sometimes she organizes her community, and sometimes she creates it.
After writing several articles about interesting food-oriented people who approached life with sustainable notions, she decided to organize a green living fair. “Even if only a few people show up,” Jamie recalls thinking, “the connections made would be just as meaningful.”
People did show up—plenty of them—to learn about fermenting food and to meet alpacas, buy locally made yarn and sustainable, local food. The fair was such a success that friends encouraged her to start a farmers’ market in Somerset.
So she started a Thursday evening market and invited a variety of vendors, in addition to those selling produce. The Market on Main features live local musicians each week through August, and you can shop for meat, eggs, pasta, produce, cheese, baked goods, soap, granola, and more.
To celebrate the success of the market, Jamie organized another event: a harvest dinner with everyone gathered at long tables to celebrate seasonal abundance. She invited culinary arts students at Somerset Community College to cook a meal for 60 or so. “Many people told me it was the best food they’d ever had,” says Jamie. It included pork belly with apple slaw and an heirloom tomato salad, and an apple crisp Jamie made with apples from nearby Haney’s Orchard and a topping with Kentucky-made Sweetgrass Granola that’s sold at the market.
