Gigi's Farmers Market @ The Americana at Brand (photos)

[lvgoodfood]

We went yesterday to the grand opening, or first day of Gigi's Farmers Market at The Americana at Brand.
Gigi's Farmers Market, feels like a specialty market, they had the highest quality produce, and the setting is beautiful. There were not that many vendors, but nothing was missing, they had plenty to choose from. A little bit of everything, with a big variety of great looking produce, organic produce, beautiful flowers from Cho's Flowers, very tasty pastries, excellent baguettes, and much more.
Frida's Mexican Restaurant has a taco stand at the market, we ate a couple of Chicken Mole Tacos and they were very good.
Overall a great farmers market, everything was spotless, and all the vendors were very friendly. Plenty of parking.
Saturdays 1am to 2pm.

[patz]

I visited today and was pretty disappointed by the selection - there were only about 10 stands selling produce, and most of them had the exact same things. I was interested in one selling greens I had never seen before, but when I asked the person working there about them, all she said was "oh, you won't like these," she wouldn't even tell me what they were! then I saw her try to sell chard to a woman looking for kale (and assuring her that it was in fact kale), I told the woman that it was chard, and the person working had to go to another stand in order to find someone to verify if this was chard or kale (it was chard). It was clearly a bad stand to go to, but I wasn't impressed by the other vendors either. If I'm at Americana while the market is going on, I might stop by again, otherwise I'm crossing it off my list.
Also, the Americana recently implemented a policy that only gives validation for the second hour with a purchase of $150 or more - so if you're going on a weekend, either get in and out within an hour, or buy a lot of stuff to get your validation!

[ValerieConfctns]

Gigi's recently added validation for all market purchases, and will be staying open until 4 pm as of June 27th - Hopefully, this will make it a little easier to navigate.

[lotta_cox]

That is really exciting. This could become a Saturday tradition. I am not crazy about the Americana, but my DH is and this could turn me aorund.

[RoxyGrl]

Ok, those photos convinced me. I'll have to make a trip over there one Saturday very soon. Thanks for the post!

[lvgoodfood]

~ Gigi's Farmers Market plans to be open every Saturday from 10:00 am to 2:00 pm.
The information above 1am to 2pm is obviously a typo. Sorry for the inconvenience,

[SilverlakeGirl]

I should have put a smilie on that. I knew it was a typo but would have loved the hours you typed [being a night owl].

Thanks for the great report. I can't wait to check it out. :)

[SilverlakeGirl]

1AM to 2 PM ... Right after midnight to the afternoon? Sounds great!

[lvgoodfood]

More photos!