Little Chan : Market part 1

Apologies to all for keeping schtum on what's been going on regarding the work front of late. As mentioned before, I left the job I had back in November and the weeks since then have been filled up with my first foray into working for myself!

After much persuasion, I managed to secure a place at a farmers market near where I live, allowing me to sell cakes and pastries made by yours truly! Even though its a relatively small venture, there was a whole bunch of stuff to organise and sort out before my first trading day. Then there was the baking itself which on the first go, took much longer than I expected (interrupted by trip to haggisland at the beginning of the week)! I ended up getting to bed at 2am (!!) the night before trading and having to get up again at 6am to prep stuff before heading to market! :(

On a more positive note, I was blessed with a lovely day on my first day of trading and luckily, JD was also around to help me drive to market which was a lifesaver. We had got to the venue much earlier than expected and waited for a couple of hours for the market manager to turn up before I could set up. The waiting was a little nervewracking but I was rewarded with a pitch at the front of the market (a regular was not there that week) which was unexpected and fantastic. I landed my first sale (a banana bread) before I had even managed to set up properly which was great! To be honest, I wasn't sure what to expect for my first day and was just hoping that I would bag a few sales and keeping my fingers crossed that people would not hate my product!

During the quiet periods, I managed to have a few chats with the stall next to me, Antonius Oils which is run by Antonio, a lovely guy originally from Puglia. He sells mainly olive oil (which is imported from his home region) as well as other goodies and recently, has been looking into the development of spelt flour and products which can be made from it. He has managed to develop a flour which is good for pizza and breadmaking and the next challenge is to find a mix which will be more suitable for pastry. One of the things which I forgot to bring along was bags and I was very grateful when Antonio very graciously gave me one of his for one of my customers who got rather haughty when I didn't have any - grazie mille Antonio! :)

Despite my lack of sleep, I really did get a great buzz from my first day at the market and was over the moon by the reception of my products from the customers. I didn't manage to sell out but more than two thirds of what I made was sold so was happy out.....a very good start all things considered! :)