In this second instalment, The Sun reporter Hunter Wells carries on exploring the appeal of Tauranga Farmers Market, which is celebrating 20 years of existence in 2023.

The Tauranga Farmers Market is also a special place for Alistair and Diana Melvin too. They live nextdoor to a supermarket but on Saturday morning the farmers market summons them, and they answer.

'Every weekend since it started,” says Alistair. That's 20 years. 'It's a ritual, part of our lives, our biggest social event of the week.”
Like Wyn, who spends all week under his macadamia trees near Katikati. 'We don't have people like this strolling through the orchard, so this is our big social day out.”

Lyn knows her onions. Well, tomatoes actually. She's been growing them for 32 years and selling them at the market for 15. 'We all like the familiarity. It's a very social occasion, people meeting, eating and chatting – makes shopping so much more enjoyable.”

Then there's the information exchange – the tomato plants at home are manky or aren't fruiting so they ask the tomato lady, the chooks in the backyard aren't laying so they ask the egg lady. That's all okay because part of the farmer's market ethos is to educate people about food.

And that's what probably sets the farmers market and supermarket apart.

'I am standing and staring at the items on a supermarket shelf and saying: ‘Well you aren't talking to me, you aren't telling me where you came from, who made you and the passion with which you were produced',” says Trixie.

But at the market you are talking to the producer, they will discuss every skerrick of their produce, and what a wonderful or lousy week it has been.

Turning 20

It's a special place enjoying a special occasion, because the Tauranga Farmers Market is turning 20. It started at The Historic Village where Mary can remember selling red rascal spuds out of the boot of her car.

'The market was set up to provide local producers with an outlet,” says Trixie. 'In those days there were also crafts.” Nowadays they stick to their knitting, they're an authentic, dyed in the wool farmers market.

'One foundation member still has a little bit of craft – history dictates that's okay.”

Then one Wednesday, down at the Village, we're told there was a big flood. The market went scuttling for higher ground and in just three days found a new, long-term home in the schoolyard at Tauranga Primary. Pitter patter during the weekdays, shuffling and shopping Saturdays.

'We are intrinsically tied to the school – we pay a lease and make an annual payment to the school so children, whose families can't afford school camp, can actually attend.” That makes the price of a dozen of Nicki's eggs an attractive deal.

Did you know they used to put an apple in one end of a Cornish pastie so the miners would get both savoury and sweet in one buttery short crusted treat when they went down the pit? And that the Welsh oggie is a Cornish pastie except the oggie is lamb and the pastie is beef with swede and potatoes and onions and seasoning?

Alistair and Diana Melvin have attended Tauranga Farmers Market every weekend since it began. Photo: John Borren/SunLive.

The pastie man should know – he'll sell perhaps 250 pasties from his truck at TFM this weekend.

'Been here 12 years – wouldn't have invested all that time if I didn't enjoy it. Vendors are the salt of the earth – people making a bit of extra coin and having great fun doing it.”

See, taste, like, buy

The guitarist is picking his way through a Gershwin standard and the woman at the mic is crooning: 'Summertime and the livin' is easy...”. It's also sweet, and juicy. Because Billy, a wee dude, has half his face consumed by an outsized slice of watermelon.

A vendor had just whacked off a sampler for Billy: the theory being see, taste, like, buy. Now that doesn't happen in a supermarket.

'You can't beat the smile on a kid's face when you give them a slice of watermelon,” says the vendor. It's one of nature's truly great delights. Then you get to spit the pips. The Tauranga Farmers Market is open from 7.45am to midday Saturdays.