Fresh. Tasty. Local.
Photos by: John Burns
The freshest produce. The tastiest baked goods. Plants galore. Locally sourced meats and eggs. Hand-crafted quilts, candles, wooden toys and the like. Tons of other community-created concoctions. All in a family-friendly atmosphere.
Name the place in Topeka you can find all ofthose items?
That’s right. It’s the farmers market!
We’ve hit one of the most glorious times of year for Topekans who like to support local business folk and enjoy the literal fruits of the greater capital city area. And this spring, summer and fall, Topeka has a few options for your enjoyment, including the brand-new Breadbasket Farmers Market and the nearly 100-year-old Downtown Topeka Farmers Market.
“My husband probably puts it the best way. He says it’s a high,” said Mary Tyler, Breadbasket market manager, in describing the farmers market. “I have never been high in my life, so I’m not quite sure what that means. But it’s very energizing. Our market is an amazing experience.”
“The farmers market is one of the truly good, wholesome family things that people can get out and do,” said Barbee Szuwalski, Downtown market manager. “I love the friendliness and the consistency of the vendors. You know if you come one Saturday, and you get something you really like, more than likely you come back the next week, that same vendor is probably going to be there. We are out here, rain or shine. It’s been that way for decades.”
Downtown Topeka Farmers Market
The Downtown Topeka Farmers Market, a staple of the community every Saturday morning since the 1930s, has witnessed a few changes in 2022.
Barbee Szuwalski, who has been with the market in various roles for close to 10 years, is in her first full year as market manager. The location of the market is back where it was previously, in the parking lot on the south side of the Kansas Judicial Branch building, 301 S.W. 10th, near S.W. 12th and Harrison.
“The market holds a special place in a lot of people’s hearts,” Szuwalski said. “It’s just become a part of Saturdays in Topeka. For it to be downtown all this time, that’s something special.”
The Downtown Farmers Market also began on April 2 this year and will go through Oct. 29. It’s open from 7:30 a.m. to noon every Saturday.
Szuwalski estimated the market has 140 to 150 vendors on average, with about 3,000 people in attendance on a given Saturday. The market downtown also participates in Double Up Food Bucks and the Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Program, giving participants $25 and $35 in additional food for free, respectively.
Szuwalski said she is very committed to continuing the tradition that the Downtown market has had while also making it bigger and better and bringing it up to speed to the 21st century.
“The new people that are shopping today, they’re into the technology. That will allow us to reach new customers,” Szuwalski said. “Our goal is to make it more fun for families and make it more inclusive. I’m wanting to come up with ways that the younger kids will want to come and bring their parents. We hear all the time that kids are begging their parents to bring them to the market.”
During the height of the pandemic, the Downtown market stayed open the entire time. Szuwalski said things were a little iffy at times, and they probably lost some elderly vendors who didn’t want to suscept themselves to exposure, but they were out there every Saturday, and for the most part, the market continues to grow. She said some vendors have left for other opportunities, but new people have joined.
“It continues to be a very positive thing in the community,” she said.
The Downtown market has an event committee working on new happenings for the year, and Szuwalski said they will continue to hold events like the corn feed, watermelon feed and children’s day.
What’s one of Szuwalski’s favorite things at the Downtown market?
“I have one vendor that I love to go to that has amazing baked goods, including jalapeno cheese bread, cookies and cinnamon rolls,” she said. “Going through the winter without their baked goods is like torture for me.”
Breadbasket Farmers Market
New to the city, the Breadbasket, 1901 S.W. Wanamaker, is in the parking lot at the end of Furniture Mall of Kansas. It was started by Mary Tyler, who is also one of dozens of vendors at the southwest Topeka location.
Tyler was a vendor at the Downtown Topeka Farmers Market for nine years and manager for three before starting the Breadbasket this year. The new weekly market occurs from 7:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. every Saturday until Nov. 19.
“Am I excited? I am way, way excited,” Tyler said of her new creation. “I’m a people person, and I like to serve. My family serves at church every Sunday. And I’m doing this as a service to the community—to the vendors and customers alike.”
The Breadbasket features strictly locally grown and locally crafted products. Tyler, who also sells baked goods as part of her business, Kan You Say Oh Yum, said she hopes to have 150 vendors at the Breadbasket by the end of the farmers market season.
The new market is planning several promotions for the year and also participates in Double Up Food Bucks and the Senior Farmers’ Market Nutrition Program. For the Double Up Food Bucks, those participating in the Kansas food assistance program (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) can use their Kansas EBT card and spend $25 on food items and then get an additional free $25 to use on food. And for the Senior Farmers Market Nutrition Program, which is for low-income seniors, participants can spend $35 on food and get an additional $35 on food for free.
The Breadbasket is also joining with Harvesters once a month to help raise donations for the food bank.
“Our goal is to make it a very happy, family-friendly place,” Tyler said. “The energy that comes from being at a farmers market is awesome because they’re all local vendors. They’re excited about their product. And then the customer in return is excited about buying it and supporting their friends and family.”
Farmers Market Vendors
Are you looking to taste Akaushi, a high-quality Japanese breed of beef? Trying to find a good gourmet or medicinal mushroom? Or are you itching for one of 20 different varieties of tomato or pepper, an ear of squirrel corn, some kohlrabi, or even some homemade dog treats or candies? There’s a local farmers market vendor for you. All of these things are home grown in the Topeka area and can be found at either the Downtown or Breadbasket market
COUNTRY GREENHOUSE
Janice and Dennis Hollander have been coming to the Downtown Farmers Market for about 25 years, as part of their Holton-based business, Country Greenhouse, 17080 246 Road.
Their offerings include plants, planters, hanging baskets, garden decor, fertilizer, fresh veggies, eggs, squirrel corn, seeds, onion sets, seed potatoes, sprays, wood for smoking, candy, dog/cat treats, cut herbs and much more.
“We just enjoy seeing all the people,” said Janice Hollander, who has had a green thumb her entire life. “We’ve been going so long we know a lot of the customers and vendors. We like the fellowship. It’s a good place to sell our product. In the country, there’s a lot of people that won’t come out on the gravel roads to buy at the greenhouse, so we take our stuff to the market, and we do real well.”
Hollander said the farmers market has been very good to them over the years, and they plan to be at both the Breadbasket and Downtown locations this farmers market season.
“I would say we sell probably half of what we sell is at the market and spring and fall festivals,” she said, adding they have six greenhouses with which they grow a lot of their products. “I just think it’s a good place to get homegrown vegetables that people can’t grow on their own. A lot of people don’t have the space to do a garden, or they don’t want to do it, or aren’t able.”
APRIL’S MUSHROOM HOUZZ
Another vendor you can find this summer at both the Breadbasket and Downtown markets is April Cummings, of April’s Mushroom Houzz. Selling more than a dozen varieties of mushrooms—gourmet and medicinal—she offers blue oyster, golden oyster, pink oyster, Italian oyster, elm oyster, black pearl, king trumpet, lion’s mane, shiitake, maitake (hen of the woods), chestnut and reishi, among others.
A relatively new business that started in 2019, Cummings said she started it after her husband passed away and used mushrooms as a means to get over the grief. A mom of four, her children, including twin 13-year-old sons, help her with the business.
“I just like to be able to talk to people about my mushrooms,” Cummings said. “A lot of people are really interested in mushrooms.”
Depending on the mushroom, the fungi offer several benefits, Cummings said, from everything to a vegan or shellfish substitute to a source for prevention, alleviation, or healing of multiple diseases.
Growing from her farm in the Danbury neighborhood of west Topeka, the ex-mechanical engineer built her farm from nothing, learning initially from magazines and YouTube videos. She has even taken the initial steps to be an organically certified mushroom grower, she said.
She also sells her mushrooms at the farmers market locations in the City Market and Brookside in Kansas
City. Additionally, she sells to several restaurants, including the White Linen and Flavor Wagon food truck, and several more in Kansas City.
“One of the reasons I go to the farmers market in Topeka,” Cummings said, “is because I don’t have a presence in Topeka.”
Cummings said she is working with vendor Casey Jamison, who sells jams and relishes through a company called Got Damn!! Peppers & Jam
BOLZ RANCH
If you’re more of a carnivore and you’re looking for a unique, homegrown Japanese beef, look no further than Bolz Ranch, 4990 S.W. 21st Street in Topeka.
Offered at the Breadbasket Farmers Market a couple of Saturdays a month, Tim Bolz sells a specialty beef called Akaushi.
“I think it’s a great opportunity for people to get a high-quality, healthier product at a reasonable price,” Bolz said, adding the Japanese breed of cattle only came to the U.S. in the 1990s. “No one has the unique type of beef we have. It’s so tender.”
A chiropractor by day, Bolz has been in the cattle business his whole life. He said the beef his farm produces is all-natural, and they don’t use antibiotics or hormone injections. At the farmers market, Bolz has a trailer with five freezers full of meat. He indicated the past few years, the farmers market has been a substantial portion of their business, saying it funded quite a bit of the farming operation. Ground beef is the business’ top-selling item for quantity, he said, and people really like skirt steaks and ribeyes, as well as sirloins.
He tells a story of people who would come and say his product was too expensive. Bolz said he’d give them a half-pound of hamburger or a small steak for free and say, “Just try it.” “They’d come back a few weeks later and say, ‘I gotta have more of that. Yea, I tried the other ones, but yours is so good, I’ve gotta come back,’” Bolz said. “And that’s what we’re depending on, our repeat customers and reputation that the meat is good and healthy.”
Other Farmers Markets
MONDAY FARMERS MARKET AT YOUR LIBRARY
The Monday Farmers Market at Your Library is held 7:30 to 11:30 a.m. every Monday from May 9 to Oct. 3 at the Topeka & Shawnee County Public Library parking lot at S.W. 10th and Washburn. The market is closed Memorial Day, May 30; Independence Day, July 4; and Labor Day, Sept.5.
Topekans can shop high-quality, locally grown produce, farm-fresh eggs, baked goods, fresh-cut flowers and bedding plants. According to Bonnie Cuevas, TSCPL events coordinator, the market has been active at the library since2009, and it serves the thousands of employees that work downtown.
INDOOR FARMERS & MAKERS MARKETAT TOPEKA VENDORS MARKET
The Indoor Farmers & Makers Market at Topeka Vendors Market is open from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on the third Saturday of every month at 520 S.E. Adams in downtown. Tentative upcoming dates include May 21 and June 18. In addition to the dozens of Topeka Vendors Market vendors at 528S.E. Adams, the farmers market features a mix of pop-up farmers and makers set up in the adjacent building (one block east of the Downtown Ramada). Bingo is also hosted on the third Saturday from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.
