I don’t know about where you live, but last week was a mixed bag for us weather-wise. It was a week that was full of holidays from around the world celebrating Spring (see https://blissfullu.com/2026/03/21/meatless-monday-welcoming-spring-with-many-celebratory-tarts-edition/ for more information). Yet a week ago today, school was cancelled due to tornado warnings. Tornadoes never came, but especially when dealing with children, I guess safe if better than sorry. I do know that the temperatures dropped into the 20s the next couple of nights, and my Wednesday morning carpool duty on a windy and gray morning that was around 30 degrees was…let’s just say, not my favorite experience. But then the sun came out again and it got up into the 80s later that week. Such is the nature of Spring.

Weather is weather…it comes and it goes. But one thing I can trust is what is showing up at our Cary Farmers Market. Fruits and vegetables don’t bloom until it is their time. So the picture above shows what was available at our Market this past weekend.

It may be hard to see, but I got rainbow chard, scallions, gai choy, spinach, and chives as my greens. One of our regular season (which is April through October) vendors came back a couple of weeks early with fresh turmeric (the brown knobby things) and the first carrots of the year! So I knew I had the ingredients for some great Spring meals this week.

Last night I made some Saag Paneer. Saag Paneer is a spicy (at least at our house) creamy sauce of mixed greens served over rice with paneer, which is a non-melting Indian cheese (so it stays in cubes in the warm sauce). Regular readers may remember I just made Saag Paneer on Friday (again, see the link above for details). However, since I had some new additional greens and leftover brown basmati rice and paneer to eat up, I made it again. To be clear for American audiences, if you make the sauce with only spinach, it is Palak Paneer. My one last week was mostly spinach, but this one had a greater variety of greens. Plus, I added fresh turmeric and fresh ginger (I got from a store, since the farmers market doesn’t have that yet), which are much tastier than their dried spices from a jar I used last week. It turned out really well, and was a lovely first days of Spring dish.

I will go to the Farmers Market next Saturday, but won’t be hanging out with community like I usually do because I have a No Kings Day rally to go to (for more details, see https://blissfullu.com/2026/03/23/i-hope-you-will-join-us-in-the-no-kings-3-0-protest-this-saturday-march-28-to-enact-the-3-5-rule/). The following Saturday, April 2, will be the first day of our new season. I can’t wait to see what other fresh goodies will be available then! That’s Easter weekend, so it’s another opportunity for a special celebratory meal.