Because in my childhood world of down parkas to your knees, months of slate-grey skies and salt-trucks de-icing the roads every morning, citrus mostly came in juice form. From exotic places like Florida.

After nearly a decade of citrus plenty (four trees grow on my property, showering us literally with lemons and oranges), my eyes have started wandering toward more exotic cousins: Buddha’s Hand and Rangpur limes.

Combining the two: A white cake studded with dried Buddha’s Hand, then slathered with a tart Rangpur lime buttercream frosting. Yes, it’s that good.

Buddha's Hand Cake with Rangpur Lime buttercream Recipe

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Mei Ibach always seems to have something cooking.

But her newest project may be the closest to her southeast Asian heritage: Banh Mi sandwiches and Asian sauces and curries.

Mei has already set up shop in Windsor at the Sunday farm market where she launched Malaysian Mei green and red curries, pineapple chutney and a peanut sauce recipe cultivated after tasting dozens of sauces in Singapore. Made with nuts she roasts herself, it’s slightly chunky, with hints of kefir lime leaves, fish sauce, chilies and lemongrass — not the peanut-butter sauce often served at Thai restaurants. “I begged and pleaded with a chef in Singapore to give me the recipe. I said, ‘I’ll make you famous!’” So what’s his name. “I’d have to look that up,” she laughs. Good enough to eat straight from the container, they’re $5 and $6 each.

Starting on Thursday nights in Windsor, along with alternative Saturdays at the Santa Rosa Veteran’s Hall Market, she’ll also be selling the coveted Vietnamese banh mi sandwiches from her stall as well. Stuffed with pulled pork, lemongrass chicken or five-spice tofu, they’re crunchy hoagie rolls with layered with mushroom pate, spiced homemade mayo, carrots, daikon, jalapenos, cilantro and cucumbers. Each gets a dousing with one of her curries or peanut sauce as well. For $6 they’re a steal with the culinary stamp of approval of several local chefs (John Ash and Roger Praplan from La Gare were early testers, along with several food writers).

Where to get Malaysian Mei sauces and banh mi…

Sauces only:
- 5/1 to Dec 18 – Sunday Windsor Farmer’s Market
- 2nd/Fourth Saturdays: Healdsburg Farmer’s Market

Sauces & Banh Mi:
- 6/16 through 8/24: Thursday Night Windsor Farmer’s Market
- Starting in June, first and third Saturdays: Santa Rosa Farmer’s Market (veteran’s building)

Kendall Jackson Wine Center

For greenthumbs: The extensive Kendall-Jackson culinary gardens are a tomato lovers’ paradise, harvesting nearly dozens of different varieties of heirlooms on their own property and hosting the annual Heirloom Tomato Festival each fall. For backyard gardeners, they’ll be selling more than 100 varieties of seeds and starts at Saturday’s event. They’ll go fast, so get there early.

For cheeseheads: K-J’s own curd nerd Tracey Shepos (formerly of Stark’s) will be sampling and selling local artisan cheeses as well as hosting cheesemaker Sheana Davis (Delice de la Vallee, Epicurean Connection) as the first featured cheesemaker.

For food truckers: The local mobile kitchens many of us came to know and love (and ultimately lose in downtown Santa Rosa) have been booked non-stop around Sonoma County, most recently getting a gig at the K-J market. Expect to see the usual suspect: Fork, Karma, Street-Eatz, Dim Sum Charlie’s and Chicago Style Hot Dogs on the 7th.

For loafers: Bakers Eric Frischkorn and Brandii Magliulo are bread and pastry whiz-kids who’ll be up at the crack of dawn to bake up fresh and yeasty goodies for the market.

For the fruit and veg crowd: Early season estate grown goodies including favas, lettuces, spinach, beets, carrots and frisee.

The Details: Saturday, May 7, 2011
Where: Kendall-Jackson Wine Center, 5007 Fulton Road, Fulton, California (directions)
Farm Stand: 10am – 1pm
Plant Sale : 10am – 5pm (B.Y.O.B. – Bring your box / bag for packing your tomato plants.)
Food Trucks: 11am – 2pm

Missed this event? The farm stand will be held the first Saturday of each month from May through October (excluding September).

A 2500-square foot Wine Tasting Garden will debut May 11 at Santa Rosa’s seasonal Wednesday Night Market. Mixing of food, music, art and farmers, the popular downtown market runs from May through August and attracts nearly 100,000 people each year.

Plans include a 2500-square-foot enclosed area on E St. between Fourth and Fifth Street will offer tastings from six selected wineries each week. A $10 punch-ticket buys six one-third glass pours and wineries will sample between five and six wines each. Over-21 tasters are invited to relax at umbrella-covered tables within the new Wine Garden.

“This is about discovery and the tasting experience,” said board member Chris Denny of Santa Rosa creative agency, The Engine Is Red.

Of those already signed on to participate, Denny said that many are small or boutique wineries from Sonoma County, which will offer tasters a chance to sample wines they may not tried. Among them, Hook and Ladder, Peterson, St Rose , Simple Math Cellars, Martin Ray and D’Argenzio.

The tastings will not, however, be limited to Sonoma County wineries though they are given preference, according to Denny. Market organizers are still actively seeking applications and hope to have about 75 different wineries represented throughout the summer.

Aware of concerns about security and making the event remain friendly to families, organizers mapped out the project with the help of California Alcoholic Beverage Control, the city of Santa Rosa and local police. Wineries and tasters will be given clear guidelines for the tasting area, including a maximum of six one-third glass tastings for each person, not taking alcohol or glassware out of the secured area and security/age verification.

The addition of the wine garden is part of a number of changes and updates to the market since the addition of new market manager Janet Ciel and several new board members.

Want to be a part of the tasting? Winery applications for additional wineries. Interested parties can also contact market@sonic.net for more information.

A six-member interim board unanimously voted to hire Downing last night, after weeks of controversy during which Downing was fired, rehired and ultimately put into a legal limbo where her employment was in dispute. She was dismissed from her position as a contract-employee at the Wednesday and Saturday Veteran’s Hall market on Sept. 30, and returned on Nov. 8.

“It feels good doing my life’s work again,” said Downing during the meeting. “There are still emotional things to deal with, but it’s feels good.”

Based on last night’s vote, Downing will receive a $500 per month raise, along with benefits as an employee of the market. Ironically, the employment offer made last night was identical to the same offer she rejected in September and which ultimately led to her firing.

The choice to reinstate Downing has been contentious, leading to the mass resignations of of six of the market’s seven board members. The former board resigned after 56 of the market’s 111 members voted to reinstate Downing — an act they deemed illegal and outside the market’s own bylaws.

Several former board members in attendance at last night’s meeting asked both publicly and privately why Downing rejected their offer, which they claim led to the market’s internal upheaval, and accepted it last night.

Downing declined to comment about her decision last night, but when reached for comment today said she anticipated continued negotiations for additional compensation after the new finance committee had investigated the market’s financial solvency. According to its own bylaws, the board was legally required to resolve Downing’s employment status before she could attend any future markets.

Interim board members also voted to suspend legal counsel retained by former board members to mitigate Downing’s employment status during last night’s meeting.

The next board meeting for the market will be held on December 6, and a new board will be elected on January 29, 2011.

“The market is currently working outside its bylaws and the board did not want to be liable for any legal repercussions,” said former board member Nicky Rutkowski of Flour Creations. “I have been a member of the market for 21 years and I have nothing but the market’s best interest at heart,” she said of her decision to step down.

The mass resignation of the board members came two days after a letter was sent to the 111 members of the market outlining what they deemed the illegal actions of a group of 56 members to reinstate market manager Paula Downing on November 8. “It is our obligation as board members to uphold the Market’s Constitution and Bylaws…and represent the interests of the entire Market membership. We cannot uphold illegal and invalid actions that put the Market at risk now and in the future,” stated the letter. Downing was fired from the market by board members on Sept. 30.

It remains unclear if a parent organization will step in to help mediate the ongoing disagreements between the board, Downing and divergent factions within the membership. After a recent dispute over the future of Sonoma’s downtown farmer’s market, the Sonoma County Certified Farmers Market Association (an organization governed by Paula Downing, Sonoma Valley Certified Farmers Market’s Hilda Swartz and Erica Burns Gorman, a manager of two Petaluma farmers markets which also includes the Oakmont Market) ended it’s relationship with the Tuesday night board members and announced it would no longer participate in the Tuesday night farmers market. The California Federation of Certified Farmers’ Markets has a disconnected phone number and states on its website that it does not participate in market disputes.

When reached for comment, Downing said the Sonoma County Certified Farmer’s Market Association has no oversight over the Santa Rosa market, which operates as an autonomous entity.

Several members of the market have suggested that the Sonoma County Agricultural Commssion, which handles the permitting for for the market, may be asked to step in to help mediate.

A meeting for membership of the Santa Rosa market will be held Tuesday night at 6pm at the Veteran’s Building to discuss the future of the market.

Tina Eliason knew better than to open her own food business — any business for that matter. The former banker spent nearly a decade underwriting and risk analyzing small business loans. “After that, I swore I’d never make the mistake of going into business for myself.” Three years later, she’s making (and selling) more than 12,000 raviolis a month as the mama behind Mama Tina’s Ravioli. Very much in business for herself. And growing fast.

It started accidentally, as most good businesses do. Laid-off banker turned barkeep, the longtime Forestville resident whipped up a batch of her tried-and-true Spallina-family ravioli one night at the Rio Nido Roadhouse. “I made 20 servings and they sold out in an hour and a half,” she said. Friends and customers kept asking for more of her family’s ravioli, and despite her initial resistance to calling her pasta-making a business, Mama Tina’s was born.

Several afternoons a week Tina heads over to the commercial-grade cafeteria kitchen of a nearby school where she whips up a a few hundred ravioli, packages and freezes them for her supermarket and farm market clients. But at $8 dozen what’s keeping fans coming back is Tina’s constant experimentation with ingredients: Philly cheese steak (it’s everything but the bread), Thanksgiving (turkey, stuffing), pumpkin pie dessert ravioli as well as more traditional ravioli with local mushrooms; Dungeness crab, lobster, butternut squash and traditional Sicilian sausage and spinach. She’s currently working on another with chocolate and raspberry.

Everything’s made by hand, using local ingredients, and Tina’s a stickler for details. Having been the family pasta-maker since she was a kid, she’s had plenty of training. “I grew up in a big Italian family and the person who started dinner didn’t have to clean up,” she said. Each ravioli is rolled, filled and cut by hand, a process that takes her several hours. “Raviolis are a very labor-intensive,” she said. Eliason shops the local farmer’s markets for produce and meats, mixing up each batch herself and making hearty sauces to compliment the ravioli.

You can find Mama Tina’s Ravioli at Speers Market in Forestville, where Tina does tastings each Friday afternoon; the Windsor Farmer’s Market on Sundays, on the menu at Bear Republic in Healdsburg and she’ll soon be on the menu at Lisa Hemenway’s Fresh in the cafe. You can find her at : mamatinas.us or on her Facebook page

Finishing off a batch of ravioli on a rainy afternoon, she says, “I’ve never had more fun in my life.”

(Props to Chowhounder Melanie Wong for finding Mama Tina)

There’s clearly a lot more to the story than meets the eye, but here’s the official story that I wrote for the Press Democrat…

Paula Downing will return as market manager of the Santa Rosa Certified Farmer’s Market, less than six weeks after she was removed from the position.

In a surprise vote, a group of market members overturned the board’s decision to terminate Downing Monday night during a meeting at the Santa Rosa Veteran’s Hall, next to the parking lot where the popular market is held. The board was slated to discuss hiring a new manager, but invoking the market’s own bylaws, several members in attendance asked that a vote be held to reinstate Downing instead.

According to Elli Hilmer of Wild Rose Ranch, the vote was 53 to 11 to bring Downing back.  A committee of four market members and three board members, however, will convene next week to determine exactly what the terms Downing’s employment will be.

The decision to remove Downing by the six-member market board of directors was made because of her salary demands, according to board member Nicky Rutkowski. “She was not willing to negotiate with us, so we decided not to renew her contract. We’re a board elected by the membership and we presented her with a contract. This is not personal, this was in the best interest of the farmer’s market,” Rutkowski said.

Downing, when reached for comment last month, said she was “asked to leave”. Her departure has fractioned many of the 111 members — mostly producers and farmers who sell at the Wednesday and Saturday market, and emotions have run high since Downing’s departure on Sept. 30.

“There’s been a lot of turmoil around the market and I think that a lot of people have been turned off by it. The community and the market have been active in trying to bring the market back its vibrancy. We’re entering into a season that the community and vendors all thrive when we’re working together,” said Hilmer.

Longtime market director Tracey Pugh is stepping down from the Santa Rosa Downtown Market (aka Wednesday Night Market)

Pugh is leaving the seasonal market after heading its direction for 13 years to work with her husband, Russ Pugh, who heads the Vineman triathalon. “I’m ready for a new adventure. I love the market and I only want good things for it,” she said in a phone interview Tuesday.

The downtown market, which typically runs from May through September, has been a popular evening venue during the summer, with a mix of farmers, downtown merchants, food vendors and entertainment. Funding for the independent non-profit comes from a combination of vendor stall fees and sponsorships, both of which were down this year due in part to the cool weather and economic downturn, according to Pugh. The market receives no cash funding from the city, but does receive significant “in-kind” assistance, according to Pugh, in the form of police, parking services and other city services. With continued city cuts, Pugh said she worries about the city’s ability to continue to support the event.

Currently there are no candidates in line for the position, and Pugh said the board would be seeking a replacement in the coming months. She will remain involved in operations through the end of the year.

“This has always been more than just a farmer’s market, this is a community event. We need to continue to create a place where people can come together and see their neighbors and friends,” Pugh said.

News of the seemingly sudden dismissal from the popular Veteran’s Hall market was sent by letter to the 111 members of the SRCFM — mostly producers and farmers who sell at the Wednesday and Saturday markets — on October 4. Downing has not been at the market since Sept. 30.

According to the letter, obtained by BiteClub, the board decided not to renew Downing’s agreement to manage the market under the terms Downing demanded. “Although we are not able to discuss all the reasons the decision was made due to our concern for Ms. Downing’s privacy, we assure you that our decision not to renew her agreement was warranted under the circumstances.”

Kathleen Miller of Beyers-Costin, attorney for the market and spokesperson for the board said, “Paula Downing had an independent contractor agreement with the market. She was seeking additional compensation and in the process of renegotiation she wanted more money than the market could pay her. The board made her an offer that included additional compensation, but it was not as much as she wanted. The board didn’t believe it was in the best interest of the market to give her as much as she was asking.”

Board members declined to speak publicly about the dismissal but stated in their letter to members that “Downing and her supporters have chosen to vilify and harass the board members as a result of our decision.”

Downing, when reached for comment today, said “It was not my decision to leave. I would never have put the market in this position by leaving at the height of the season. I feel guilty about the farmers get this kind of publicity, this is people’s livelihood.” She declined to elaborate further citing legal actions, but clarified that she was “asked to leave”.

Downing has been at the Santa Rosa Certified Farmer’s Market for eight years. She will continue to manage the Sebastopol Farmer’s market. In the interim, the board has announced that market veterans Susan Nystrom and Ellen Roberts will be acting as interim managers for the Saturday and Wednesday market respectively.

“Nothing about the market is changing except for the Management,” reads the letter to members. “The Board of Directors is working overtime to ensure a stable, healthy, vibrant Farmers’ Market, now and in the future.”

The shakeup comes on the heels of a months-long kerfuffle at the Tuesday night Sonoma Farmer’s Market. After a number of high-tension public meetings and votes, the city has required longtime manager Hilda Schwartz to submit a proposal to continue managing the Tuesday night market on the city plaza. The RFP process, in which anyone can submit a plan for the market, continues until November.