[gooberific]

That's funny (as in weird, not haha) -- when we lived in St. Charles, we went downtown to the big farmers' market... and found it all horribly overpriced on veggies, and relatively cheap on meat... but the meat LOOKED cheap, too. It might've been just that it's sort of a tourist trap.

Out here in AZ, though, we do go to the rancher market. It's conveniently around the corner from my parents' house, and we pass it once or twice a week anyway.

For anyone local, I go to Superstition Ranch Market near Meridian and Main/Apache Trail on the way into Apache Junction.

At first, I was shocked that they were out of romaine. Another customer told me that one of the guys went to go get more. There were four of us waiting for it. He put one pile up on the shelf and then walked away with a shopping cart full of it. Come to find out, one customer only needed two and it was for a dinner party, one needed 20 heads for her tortoises for the week, and the other person and I both needed 3 for guinea pigs... We told him he was just going to have to come back.

Their usual price for romaine lettuce is 3 for $1. Cucumbers and zucchini were 5 for $1, green peppers were 2 for $1, and yellow, orange and red bell peppers were 4 for $1. Their fruits were also looking good and inexpensive. They typically have their corn on sale husk and all, and we got seedless watermelon for 6 cents a pound!

Definitely beats grocery store prices, that's for sure!