Bringing Farmers' Markets Back To Cork

In 1995 Darina Allen travelled to San Francisco. She came home with an idea^[1]. In California she had seen busy markets where farmers sold straight to the people who cooked their food.

Why not in Ireland? Small farmers and food producers needed a place to sell. Cooks wanted fresher food. A market could bring them together.

The First Stall

In 1996 Darina and her mother-in-law, Myrtle Allen, opened a new farmers' market in Cork^[1]. It was described as the first new-age farmers' market in the area^[1]. Two of the most respected names in Irish food were standing behind it.

It was the start of a movement. Darina helped set up the Farmers' Market Movement in Ireland^[2]. Markets began to pop up in towns and villages across the country.

Midleton And Beyond

She did not just talk about markets. She chairs the farmers' market in Midleton and has led the market network around Cork^[3]. She sees them as a lifeline for small producers and a joy for shoppers.

The same thinking led her to Slow Food. She is Ireland's councillor in the Slow Food movement and president of its East Cork group^[2]. She also sits on the Taste Council of the Irish Food Board and chairs the artisan food forum of the Food Safety Authority^[2].

She also took the message into schools. Through the East Cork Educational Fund, she runs a programme that teaches local primary pupils about food from garden to plate^[2].

She is a patron of Irish Seedsavers and a trustee of the Irish Organic Centre as well^[2]. Every one of these roles points the same way: towards small growers, honest food and people who know where their dinner comes from.

In 2014 she gave a talk on food and markets to the Oxford Symposium on Food and Cookery^[1][3]. The idea she brought home from California had become one of the great causes of her life.