{"id":33284,"date":"2016-05-02T10:00:02","date_gmt":"2016-05-02T15:00:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/?p=33284"},"modified":"2016-05-02T10:50:52","modified_gmt":"2016-05-02T15:50:52","slug":"oxford-city-market-offering-affordable-healthy-ingredients","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/oxford-city-market-offering-affordable-healthy-ingredients\/","title":{"rendered":"Oxford City Market Offering Affordable, Healthy Ingredients"},"content":{"rendered":"

Oxford City Market<\/strong> is a weekly event hosted at the community pavilion on University Avenue <\/strong>from 3\u20136:30 pm every Tuesday where local farmers can sell their produce directly to the residents of Oxford.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going into our fourth season,\u201d said marketing director Betsy Chapman<\/strong>. \u201cThe Market was started by the city of Oxford using a USDA farmer\u2019s market promotion grant. We started off with a pretty good roster, offering produce, honey, and meats.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

April 26 marked the first week that BTC Grocery<\/strong> was present selling their pork sausage made from the pigs they raise themselves.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"DSC_5213<\/a>
Luke Fisher, organizer of Oxford City Market’s weekly music and local musician.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This year\u2019s market season has been funded in part by the revenue they brought in last year from vendor fees and beverage sales as well as direct sponsor donations including those from Bradley Hiatt<\/strong> and John Currence<\/strong>.<\/span><\/p>\n

A large portion of their operating costs were covered by a grant received from United Way of Oxford-Lafayette County<\/strong>.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Market acts not only as a way to supply farmers with a platform to sell their produce, but also to help educate young and old about establishing a healthy diet through accessible and affordable farm-fresh foods.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cOur main mission is to make local, healthy food available to everyone regardless of financial or transportation barriers,\u201d said Chapman. \u201cWe\u2019re a redemption site for the Woman, Infants, and Children Nutritional Program (WIC) as well SNAP, commonly known as food stamps.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Previously the OCM was located on West Oxford Loop; Chapman says the new location has helped business. The community pavilion, their new location, is actually a stop on the OUT bus route.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cOur customer base seems to get bigger each year,\u201d said Chapman. \u201cBut the new location has definitely helped us. We\u2019re on the bus route now, so people using public transit can easily reach us.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

OCM regularly hosts programs and demonstrations from \u201carea masters in cooking, gardening, nutrition, and healthy living.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe have chefs come in and do demonstrations to help people get ideas for how to prepare their food,\u201d said Chapman.<\/span><\/p>\n

For those wanting a family outing, the OCM also offers educational activities for children that are aimed to \u201cget them excited about helping mom and dad cook a healthy meal sourced from local ingredients.\u201d The kids programs are supported by the Mississippi Sustainable Agriculture Network<\/strong>.<\/span><\/p>\n

In addition to the farmer\u2019s stalls full of local produce, OCM also features local craft vendors.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe try to offer a few vendor stalls that sell products you can use in your kitchen, homes, and gardens,\u201d said Chapman.<\/span><\/p>\n

If you\u2019re interested in selling your produce or goods at OCM, you can go online to their website, read the vendor guidelines, and fill out the application. Fees will vary depending on the type of stall you want to set up and where your business is based.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cYou can apply to be a vendor any time,\u201d said Chapman. \u201cWe want to add vendors all season long, not just at the start. Our goal is to increase the variety of options as much as possible.\u201d\u00a0\"The<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Oxford City Market is a weekly event hosted at the community pavilion on University Avenue from 3\u20136:30 pm<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":253,"featured_media":33298,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[68],"tags":[3239,8493,1343,8,8494,1094,4,2339,1370,8495,3,753],"class_list":["post-33284","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-food","tag-betsy-chapman","tag-crafts","tag-farmers","tag-food","tag-grants","tag-local","tag-oxford","tag-oxford-city-market","tag-produce","tag-sponsors","tag-the-local-voice","tag-tlv"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/2016-04-28-City-Market.jpg?fit=620%2C349&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33284","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/253"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33284"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33284\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33298"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33284"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33284"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thelocalvoice.net\/oxford\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33284"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}