The Winter Market kicked off Sunday at the Wheeler Historic Farm in Murray.
FOX 13 News was there talking to a number of the vendors who attend each and every week, and some of them may surprise you.
"We’ve got the produce still — look at that, huh!" said Chad Midgley, a regular vendor at the market, showing off his apples, pears, lemons, spinach and even oranges all picked recently at his farm and greenhouse in the Ogden area.
"So we’re in Ogden, in Syracuse, and one of our farms is a pioneer farm," Midgley explained. "It was grown in the 1800s by John Lionel Wilson. So, it’s got really good soil and we’ve experimented. We’ve got straw bales and compost and compost heaters that actually grow Utah citrus. We have citrus in the snow here in Utah."
Midgley says the winter markets are crucial to helping them stay in business.
"Farmers markets are so important. More neighborhood farms — that’s what we need in Utah — and you can see the people are coming out and supporting it really well," he said.
"I think the market is helping give people in the community a chance to come together and be shown to people the things they might not necessarily see in other places," said Jillian Cain from Wheeler Farm.
Cain helps coordinate the markets and said they have some vendors who come each week, while also featuring new ones each time.
"If you come every week, you might see something new," Cain said.
Ivy Watrous is one of the vendors at the winter market, selling salts and sugars from her business: "Salted Roots."
"It’s infused salts and sugars for cooking, cocktails, baking, grilling — pretty much all of it. They’re all multi-use. They’re all double-infused, real ingredients, so people get really creative with them," she explained.
She said her business started in Millcreek, but they've recently moved to Rose Park and bigger offices, a growing business that started a year and a half ago.
"The whiskey sugar is the first one I started with. You can use it with coffee, lattes, old fashioneds — anything like that. I line my banana bread pans with it so it’s really fun," Watrous said.
West Valley City artist Amy Beyeler said she appreciates the opportunity to talk to her customers at events like this, face to face, out from behind a computer and social media where she normally connects with clients.
"I absolutely love it. I love talking to people and explaining and talking about my art and inspiration and what drives me to keep being creative. This is what makes my soul happy and so I love being able to talk to people about it," Beyeler said.
"I make all this jewelry," she explained. "It’s all real gemstone. I do all of the wire wrapping, all of the metal work and things and then I do all of the paintings. They’re all original. I make my art in my kitchen at my little house where I live with my dogs in West Valley."
The Sunday Winter Market runs from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. every Sunday. It's a place for you to get your fresh produce, arts and crafts. And here’s the nice part: rain or shine, cold weather, blizzardlike conditions, it’s going to always be going on inside the Outdoor Education Center until April 13.
