Eating locally grown veggies and fruits can be tough at this time of year (squash really palls around now), which is why a loud cheer rises over the city at the first crisp hint of fresh farm-reared produce. So let's hear it now. Because Saturday (May 14) sees the opening of the East Vancouver Farmers Market, where, even though pickings may be lean this early in the season, just being at Trout Lake stirs up sensual memories of juice-drippy peaches, fat black cherries, and heirloom tomatoes.

A new season sees a new head at the organi?zation behind it all. Back in January, when Tara McDonald took over as executive director of Your Local Farmers' Market Society (former director Devorah Kahn moved to the City of Vancouver as food- policy coordinator), she also gained a new office at 1163 Commercial Drive. It's the perfect location, she says. "Our new message and method of operating is one of public input and participation," McDonald explains. "We really want folks to come in," she adds, pointing out the number of like-minded organizations already in the area, from organic-produce stores to the food co-op down the street.

With a background in community-food security projects and nonprofit management in Canada and the U.S., McDonald brings a lot to the table, and plans to put more on it too. "It makes sense to offer one-stop shopping [at the markets]. In terms of new vendors, meat and fish is really the big one." This year, at the East Vancouver Farmers Market, you'll be able to pick up wild Pacific fish and seafood from Iron Maiden; beef from two producers, Greenhill Acres and Pasture to Plate (and from others who carry it occasionally); plus lamb and ostrich?-all, of course, frozen. In Eugene, Oregon, where McDonald lived most recently, refrigerated trucks sold the fresh kind. "So many people in this city want to buy fresh poultry," she says. City hall: listen up.

Typically, about 60 percent of the stalls sell farm products, with the rest split evenly between prepared foods like jams and preserves, and crafts. Many small farms now bypass the wholesaler and, as McDonald points out, "markets are a venue for small and new producers to get started and test products.…We have about 200 vendors in our pool, but we're always looking to recruit new ones."

She'll need to. Farmers markets are booming. "They're becoming trendy and hot, and they're centuries old." She laughs at the irony. "Supermarkets are trying to pick up on the popularity [using terms like] market fresh or farm fresh for food that's trucked in from thousands of miles away. Here you can actually meet the person that grows it." While Your Local Farmers' Market Society doesn't coordinate the other markets in Coquitlam, Ladner, Haney, North Vancouver, Yaletown, and elsewhere (there's a list at www.bcfarmersmarket.org/), it does support their efforts. This season has already seen a new community-driven market in Dundarave village that hopes to have about 40 vendors by midsummer. Opening June 4, UBC Farm Market will sell eggs this year, and greater amounts of produce. The Thursday growers' market at Granville Island is already under way. The most telling evidence that we want to be in direct touch with the people who grow our food is the numbers. Sales are on a steady upward curve, now about $1.5 million annually at the East Vancouver, Nat Bailey Stadium, and West End markets alone, McDonald says. "It's an important local economic generator, something we can call our own and be proud of."

"I really believe farmers markets are an example of the health of a community," and she's not talking just about physical health. She calls the one-on-one interaction between farmer and consumer "a societal cornerstone". Part of her mission is to develop urban agriculture and urban food security. She talks of creating a city of gardens, of looking at any space as available growing space. "Education is ongoing and we'll be developing that as the years go by. It can be anyone from a chef doing a demonstration to a home cook who's fed her family for 40 years." McDonald has also teamed up with the Ministry of Agriculture, Food, and Fisheries to promote the markets to chefs. "That's why our West End market [opening June 18] is so great; it's right downtown." Handy for restaurants, just as Nat Bailey Stadium market on Wednesday afternoons (opening June 15) slots in with regular work schedules.

So get out your basket or backpack, and be at the East Vancouver market Saturday morning at 9 sharp, no earlier. (It's the law.) Bike if you can, and if you do bring a vehicle, McDonald says, please park thoughtfully.