Exploring Santa Barbara's locally-grown food

Exploring Santa Barbara’s locally-grown food

By Donna Wares

Jan. 13, 2008 12 AM PT

Special to The Los Angeles Times

MARKET FORAYS WITH LAURENCE HAUBEN

Saturday market shopping and cooking expeditions that began in spring 2007; the cost is $125 per person and includes a multi-course meal, local wines and recipe booklet so you can create the dishes at home. The forays are a good choice for a single traveler, couple or small group of friends. No previous cooking experience is required. Hauben also hosts weekday market feasts in conjunction with a local restaurant; in spring and summer she does fruit-picking and canning forays. “What I want to stress is that you don’t need a $500,000 kitchen, you don’t need to go to culinary school for four years, and you don’t need to wear a tall hat to cook good food for your family,” she says.

Info: (805) 259-7229, www.marketforays.com.

FISHERMAN’S MARKET

A small dockside market at the Santa Barbara Harbor at Harbor Way. The market opens at 7:30 a.m. Saturdays, and its size depends on ocean conditions; offerings vary and may include live crab, a variety of rockfish, halibut; and spiny lobster during fall and winter months. The market closes when the the seafood is sold.

SANTA BARBARA CERTIFIED FARMERS MARKET

Open 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Saturdays at Santa Barbara and Cota streets downtown. The city also hosts smaller farmers markets during the week, including a Tuesday market in the 500 and 600 blocks of State Street (summer hours: 4 to 7:30 p.m.; winter hours: 3 to 6:30 p.m.). Along with fresh foods and flowers, visitors will find locally harvested lavender, olives, olive oil, pistachios, walnuts and honey. Info: (805) 962-5354, www.sbfarmersmarket.org.

C’EST CHEESE

Small, gourmet shop downtown with an excellent selection of cheeses.

Info: 825 Santa Barbara St; (805) 965-0318, www.cestcheese.com.

SLOW FOOD SANTA BARBARA

A group of cooks, farmers, restaurant owners, environmentalists and others that promotes locally produced food that reflects the region and hosts farm visits, school gardens and cooking demonstrations. Info: www.slowfoodsantabarbara.org.

GREEN SANTA BARBARA

Take a walk on the city’s eco-friendly side; www.greensantabarbara.com.

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Donna Wares

Donna Wares returned to the Los Angeles Times in 2019 to launch the Los Angeles Times Book Club. She has previously served as an editor on the paper’s national desk, state desk and Orange County city desk. Formerly managing editor of the Orange County Register and director of the Spokesman-Review’s Northwest Passages Book Club in Washington state, Wares began her career as a reporter for the Miami Herald. She has written several books and edited “My California: Journeys by Great Writers,” a bestselling anthology that raised more than $100,000 for children’s writing programs in the state. She left The Times in January 2024.

Exploring Santa Barbara’s locally-grown food

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