Reems California Ferry Plaza Farmer's Market

Everything’s a last time now with the places and photos dwindling as I approach the end of this current food journey down memory lane. And in this instance, knowing the ending does not make it any easier. It’s also why post are further apart as writing them is harder. Funny and sad how the remembrances are last times around with the SO, and the current journey is first times without them. Hmm, seems to make more lyrical literary sense in my head than it does typed out. But I know what I mean.

This time around finds us at the Ferry Plaza Farmer’s Market. A Saturday jaunt we’d taken often in the last decade or so to check stuff out, but honestly, it was always mostly to get out of the apartment for a bit and not feel like we totally wasted our day by laying around watching tv. That and the SO had a chance to get some Blue Bottle Coffee and make a free sample stop (or two) at G.L. Alfieri Nuts to see if they had any new flavors of brittle. I was just looking for anything new, or a giant frosted pastry, whichever came first.

It’s a super sunny day in August and surprisingly not too cool or hot or windy. And oddly enough, we both seem to be hungry enough to actually find something to eat—at the same place! Looks like we stumbled across a relatively new place at the Farmer’s Market called Reem’s California. Though, in truth, we’ve come across them before a couple of years ago at one of La Cocina’s food festivals. There they were serving up flatbreads with za’atar, here they’ve got the flatbreads again, just in suped up versions with different fillings.

They only have a couple choices and in the interest of food tasting I get one and the SO gets another, and voila! They both looked like this:

That’s right, we just paid $13 and $15 for what amounts to rolled up sandwiches and we all know how I feel about overpriced sandwiches in this town, but the SO was buying and well, I just went with it. I decided to get what they were calling the MLM, mozzarella, sujuk (a spicy, cured beef sausage, cherry tomatoes and arugula. They were making the bread itself by hand in the back of the tent and you could see them hand roll out the dough like pizza and put it on some kind of heated upturned wok looking thing to cook . Which is kind of why the bread really was the star here. Like a soft puffed up pita with a little bit of crispness on the outside. As for the fillings inside, here is what you get.

I’m gonna say they were a little light on the fillings. More arugula than anything. Just the cherry tomatoes you see, a couple pickle red onions tossed in and what amounted to 5 small slices of beef sausage. Which, by the way, I asked how spicy it was before ordering and she proclaimed it had a real kick. If that was the case, then I must have gotten the non-spicy version because neither me nor the SO tasted any spice, hot or otherwise. So two thumbs up for the bread, a big sad frowny face for the minimalism of fillings and price.

The SO’s was the full on one called Pali Cali. Sumac berry braised chicken, caramelized onion, arugula and olive oil.

Well, at least he got more meat in his than I did, though the chicken did look a little weird upon fist inspection, but that is from all the sumac which gives it a kind of earthy tartness and the pinkness since sumac is derived from a berry. Definitely an interesting flavor that you are either gonna love or not. Can’t say I was the biggest fan of it. The SO liked it well enough and said at least the chicken didn’t come across as dry. Sometimes it is the small things in food flavors that matter—I guess. Still, while the SO gave it an okay, I had to give it a pass due to the slightly bitter spice and of course, that price for something less than half the size of a standard burrito.

Point of note, he did like the color of the chicken as it made an interesting shot for his instagram account. And spent a fair amount of time trying to get the right shot after taking a bite, including rearranging some of the fillings to show off the color contrast between the arugula and chicken. Ugh, these kids and their social media!

Like I said before, it was all about the bread here and if they would have just sold it with a side of butter to spread rapturously across its warm and slightly brown bubbles, I would be in heaven. Depending of course on how much they would charge me for it!

Ultimately, while I can’t say I recommend them and their pricey roll-ups, situationally I’m definitely not gonna forget them as the final food stall stop for me and the SO. And that is thing about memories, sometimes the lasts aren’t always the bests, they are just….the lasts. But the place will still evoke memories even though the food may be forgotten. Kind of why I’m just gonna look past the fillings and remember the bread and the fact that the Farmer’s Market was always our go to for friends, family and ourselves whenever we wanted to get out of the house, enjoy the day and just hang out together.