People ask what I bring to the market, and the honest answer is: less than you'd think, and more than fits. The booth is eight feet of table and a back rack, and I have to load it in the dark at 6am and stand it up by 9. So the crate gets planned the night before, and it gets planned by what I actually have, not what I wish I had.
The tinctures go in first. They are the spine of the table — a row of amber one-ounce droppers, labels out, arranged by what they do for people rather than by alphabet. Yarrow and skullcap together, the nervine plants. Chaga and turkey tail together, the mushrooms. Chamomile on its own because it sells on sight. Twelve to fifteen bottles, maybe twenty on a good week, and a small sign that says what a tincture is and what it is not.
Then the pantry, which is what people actually reach for. Fire cider, always, front and center. The honeys — lavender and chamomile — in their little jars. Two or three jellies, depending on the season. The garlic scape salt, both sizes, because the big one sells to the cooks and the small one sells to everyone else. The pickled garlic and the pickled shiitakes, side by side, because people taste with their eyes and then their hands.
Jewelry goes on a small velvet board at the back of the table, the pieces that can take being handled. The river stone ring, the birch leaf pendant, a pair of earrings. I do not bring the whole bench. The booth is not a shop and the wind is real. Six pieces, chosen for the day, and a card that says each one is made by hand and will vary.
What does not come: the pickup-only things. Birdseed wreaths and the mullein tapers stay home — they are too bulky, too breakable, too much for an eight-foot table in the wind. Those are Main Street pickup, and I tell people so. The fermented ramp soy sauce, if the spring batch is gone, stays home too. I would rather an honest empty hook than a sign that says sold out on a thing I cannot make again until the ramps come back.
I pack the crate the way I pack for a hike — heavy on the bottom, fragile on top, the things I reach for most near the front. A roll of linen for the table, a small cash box, a card reader, water, a snack, and a folding chair I will never sit in. The crate goes in the back of the car at 5:45. The coffee goes in my hand at 6:00. The green is empty when I arrive and full of neighbors by the time I leave.
If you want the real version of the booth, come to a Saturday in Newport. If you want to skip the line, pre-order a Market bag and tell me what to put in it. I will have it packed with your name on it, and you can walk the rest of the market with both hands free. That is the whole system, and it is the one that has worked for a few years now.
These offerings are traditional botanical preparations and foods. They are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease. Forage and consume only what you can identify with certainty.
Written by Serena Morgan · Newport, Vermont
