A purveyor is an independent business owner whose expertise is sourcing, preparing, and selling food. A true grocer, for example, knows and visits all the farms from which she stocks her bins and shelves, choosing the best each has to offer. A true butcher cuts down whole animals, and can tell you how to cook each part. A true cheesemonger selects the wheels he carries, and knows precisely when they reach peak ripeness.
The industrialization of our food supply and the spread of supermarkets prompted the decline of the purveyor's art. Much that was once known has now been lost. But just as farmers, ranchers, fishermen and cheesemakers have been relearning to produce and harvest excellent food using sustainable techniques, so too are purveyors reviving their craft.
New Amsterdam Market will introduce an alternative system for the procurement, distribution, and sale of food in this region. Rather than selling their own products directly to city consumers (as in traditional farmers markets), farmers and food producers will be represented by sustainable purveyors including butchers, grocers, fishmongers, cheesemongers, and other expert provisioners.
Sustainable purveyors are components of a web that begins with the concept of the region itself, and includes farmers, food artisans, dairies, slaughterhouses, distributors, vendors, and consumers. They deal directly with multiple components of this system, and mediate between both producer and consumer. When brought together under one roof, the market's purveyors will greatly increase and strengthen these relationships by also interacting with one another. The creation of such a forum is an important step for regional, sustainable agriculture to come into its own.
The public market, as a historic institution, has long served just this purpose: to gather individuals so they can forge relationships and create new systems. New Amsterdam Public is dedicated to this mission.
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