Amy Lozier hand crafts a dozen types of European style bread plus flaky croissants, sweet and savory scones and delectable desserts all from scratch at Omega Artisan Baking. It’s all made by hand and fresh from the oven daily.
We know that many of you have fun keeping tabs on the North Market through our website, blog, Facebook page and Twitter. But some of you appreciate the tactile distinction of printed pieces too. With the help of some special friends, we’ve printed the North Market Holiday 2009 guide to celebrate the season and inform you of all the fresh, local goodness the North Market has to offer!
This edition includes holiday sentiments from David Wible, our Executive Director, plus gift guides, recipes, upcoming events, wine suggestions and a preview of the upcoming School of Cooking and Chef Series classes. Stop by your favorite merchant and pick one up!
I had a meeting with the Market’s new WCBE underwriting representative, Jim Coe, today. We were “reintroduced” as it were, though we had never made a formal acquaintance. He, with wife Sharon, was the proprietor of Red Rooster and purveyor of one of my early North Market addictions when I was a newcomer to Columbus more than a decade ago, the Blue Rooster Sandwich. He was kind enough to share the recipe for re-creation at home. For those who know him you can read along in Jim’s deep voice:
1# Danish Bleu cheese, crumbled
liberally sprinkle in fresh-ground pepper and a little salt
add freshly diced garlic cloves (to taste)
stir in olive oil to your desired texture
stir in the fresh-squeezed juice of 1-2 lemons
add coffee cream or half-and-half
NOTE: It is KEY to use nothing but a SILVER fork to stir with. There’s a chemical thing going on here with the mold, the citric acid and the silver. You’ll taste the difference.
THERE you have the dressing for salad, but I found it a little too rich and thick for the chicken sandwiches so I cut it 50-50 with Hellman’s Real Mayonnaise.
Take one of Jerry’s (of North Market Poultry) roasted chickens and pull the meat from the skin and bones and pull into small pieces to thoroughly mix into the bleu cheese/mayo dressing.
The final touch was always putting this on a bun from Thurn’s Bakery. Nowadays you can pile it onto an Omega Artisan pretzel roll or avunzucci. Bon appetite!
When one is at the North Market daily (like me) occasionally it takes a little break to see things with fresh eyes. I was fortunate enough to have a some time off after Christmas and when I returned I was delighted to see that a handful of our merchants had made a few of those subtle changes that keep the Market fresh and exciting.
A new layout at Market Blooms as always emphasizes their signature hand-tied bouquets
A superior selection of cards from sentimental to laugh-out-loud hilarious.
New counters and great graphics liven up the Pastaria in 2009!
Omega Artisan Baking orchestrated a little fixture-shifting party as well. The display counters for the daily array of a dozen or more types of bread, scones, cookies and croissants shifted to the center of the stand. When the scent of cinnamon rolls or focacia is wafting through the air, shoppers in the west aisle will see straight away the stand that is issuing the aromatic siren’s song! And make sure to take a peek into the refrigerated cases on the right….Amy and her bakers are frequently concocting delicious desserts. Some of my personal favorites include the moist carrot cake (OK, I’m really a sucker for cream cheese frosting), marscapone cheese cake, princess pudding and assorted cupcakes.
