My trip to the Market of the Ancients-
It is a long combi ride to the market (a combi is a form of public transportation via van, with about 15 people riding), and it can be a cramped, un-air-conditioned trip. The market is a large building with probably a thousand or so venders, selling anything from household goods to meat to seafood to fruits and vegetables. The meat and the seafood is rarely refrigerated; I always avoid the seafood obviously, but the meat is often fresher than any supermarket, because of extremely high levels of business; the day's remainder is sold to the restaurants and new, very fresh meat is brought in the next day.
Fruit there can be very fresh, too, though the red bananas I got today were a bust. I had unluckily been pressured into buying five pounds (I'm autistic and sometimes can't stand up to myself) of them. The sweet passion fruits were quite good as were the white grass guavas, as I call them (they taste a little bit like grass, and are far better than the green grass guavas). The star fruits were a bit sour, as is almost always the case (I'm always holding out for good star fruits), and the potatoes were good but not great.
Supermarkets in Mexico pay farmers pennies per pound of fruit, charging quite high prices to the customer, and the market often serves as a happy medium: the farmer can make three times the amount at the market than selling to the big grocery stores, while the buyer can pay a third he grocery store prices.
I paid 1.10 for 3 and a half pounds of grass guavas, 60 cents for two pounds of star fruit, and two dollars for two and a half pounds of passion fruits!
Enough world-crap, here are the pictures. I wish everyone were here to enjoy them. We had already eaten over half the star fruits before I could get the camera. I added also a picture of my cake.
It is a long combi ride to the market (a combi is a form of public transportation via van, with about 15 people riding), and it can be a cramped, un-air-conditioned trip. The market is a large building with probably a thousand or so venders, selling anything from household goods to meat to seafood to fruits and vegetables. The meat and the seafood is rarely refrigerated; I always avoid the seafood obviously, but the meat is often fresher than any supermarket, because of extremely high levels of business; the day's remainder is sold to the restaurants and new, very fresh meat is brought in the next day.
Fruit there can be very fresh, too, though the red bananas I got today were a bust. I had unluckily been pressured into buying five pounds (I'm autistic and sometimes can't stand up to myself) of them. The sweet passion fruits were quite good as were the white grass guavas, as I call them (they taste a little bit like grass, and are far better than the green grass guavas). The star fruits were a bit sour, as is almost always the case (I'm always holding out for good star fruits), and the potatoes were good but not great.
Supermarkets in Mexico pay farmers pennies per pound of fruit, charging quite high prices to the customer, and the market often serves as a happy medium: the farmer can make three times the amount at the market than selling to the big grocery stores, while the buyer can pay a third he grocery store prices.
I paid 1.10 for 3 and a half pounds of grass guavas, 60 cents for two pounds of star fruit, and two dollars for two and a half pounds of passion fruits!
Enough world-crap, here are the pictures. I wish everyone were here to enjoy them. We had already eaten over half the star fruits before I could get the camera. I added also a picture of my cake.
