Celebrating the 30th anniversary of L.A. County farmers markets

Sept. 3, 2009 5:45 AM PT

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Los Angeles is celebrating 30 years of farmers markets today with -- surprise, surprise -- a farmers market and lots of food.

The fun part includes a salsa -- the eating kind, not the dance -- contest, chef demonstrations and a fruit tasting at the weekly market outside City Hall in downtown Los Angeles. Vendors will be joined by some guests, including the organizer of L.A. County’s first market, Vance Corum, and some of the farmers who set up that very first market in a church parking lot in Gardena.

There are some serious issues on the table as well. City officials are talking about a food policy council and a permanent retail and wholesale market hub. Designers, architects and others with ideas have been submitting them for a competition. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa will be there, as will the state’s agriculture secretary, A.G. Kawamura.

The event takes place from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

-- Mary MacVean

Daily Dish

Mary MacVean

Mary MacVean is the former Mind & Body editor at the Los Angeles Times. She’s a runner and a cook, and has worked at The Times as morning assignment editor, web liaison, food writer and copy editor. She was a national editor and writer focusing on food at the Associated Press and a features editor and a columnist in Moscow, where she also ran a children’s cooking school. She left The Times in 2015.