The St. Petersburg Saturday Morning Market's Taste A La Cart, a new portable cooking demonstration station, will roll out to its weekly gathering in downtown St. Pete at 12:30 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 1.
Using ingredients from the neighborhood market's vendors, local chefs from both sides of the bay will show marketgoers how to prepare fresh, in-season meals in their home kitchens, with recipes provided.
Chefs will have access to products like veggies, fruits, meats, seafood and small-batch dairy items.
An invite-only preview of Taste A La Cart was held Tuesday afternoon next to the Al Lang Stadium parking lot, where the Saturday Morning Market operates. This tree-shaded area will accommodate the recurring demos.
Market co-founders Gail Eggeman and Mark Johnson traveled around to different farmers' markets and noticed many of them hosting cooking demos for the public. Eggeman said she wants the events to be interactive.
"This will be our taste education," she said.
Meaning, people will come to understand more about their food — how it tastes, where it comes from and the like. A mirror above the cooking station gives the crowd a better view of what's being prepared, too.
During the preview, Marchand's Bar & Grill executive chef Mark Heimann and Pelagia Trattoria executive chef Brett Gardiner served up veggie stir-fry and pan-roasted snapper over a baby butternut squash puree to a group of about 10.
Ingredients from vendors like Worden Farm and Rebecca's Bees were integrated into the dish. (This reporter and Edible Tampa Bay's Kay Clark shared a second helping.) Spice Routes owner and chef Judy Staunko, another market co-founder, also brought her pumpkin crisp dessert for the group to taste.
Although seating and samples of the demo dishes will be limited at the market, the events are free to watch. Heimann will lead Taste A La Cart's inaugural demonstration.
This article appears in Oct 16-22, 2014.