“Eat your fruits and vegetables.” It’s a common dinner-time phrase we heard as children. And it’s true.
According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), Americans should eat between 2 to 6-1/2 cups of fruits and vegetables daily. This translates into four to 13 servings a day. Eating a variety of fruits and vegetables can help decrease the risk of having a stroke, high blood pressure, diabetes and some cancers.
Eating lots of fruits and vegetables can also help ETSU students avoid gaining the “Freshman 15,” and maintain a healthy weight.
Unfortunately, in 2007 less than 40 percent of Tennesseans reported eating more than four servings of fruits and vegetables a day and less than 20 percent of adolescents reported eating the suggested daily amount of fruits and vegetables.
In Johnson City, there is a great place to help you meet those goals by buying affordable, fresh fruits and vegetables: The Johnson City Farmers’ Market.
The market is located just a few miles from the ETSU campus on State of Franklin Road. in downtown Johnson City in the parking lot in front of the Karma Klub.
For more than 20 years, the market has been a home to a variety of vendors that bring their produce and other homemade goods to sell every Wednesday and Saturday from 7 a.m.-2 p.m. from the first weekend in May until the end of October.
I arrived at the market around 8 a.m. on a Wednesday morning and already a row of white tents and tables were set up on one side of the parking lot while customers browsed the freshly-picked produce.
I began to glance at the cornucopia of produce in front of me and realized that today I wouldn’t have any difficulty meeting the requirements of eating four to 13 servings of fruits and vegetables.
The difficulty would be deciding which combination of fruits and vegetables to eat: colorful heirloom tomatoes, speckled beans, deep purple muscadines, yellow sweet potatoes or the standard red apple?
According to Larry Benfield, one of the vendors at the Johnson City Farmers’ Market, around 70 percent of the produce sold is grown by local farmers from Northeast Tennessee and North Carolina.
Not having to pay for transportation costs or the overhead of maintaining a store allows the vendors to sell the produce for a lower price than what you would pay in the supermarket.
For less than the price of a bottle of soda, you can buy a pound of apples, a pound of tomatoes or a small container of sweet potatoes, all grown by local farmers.
However, one customer who identified himself as Daniel, expressed concern that not all produce sold at the market is local. He mentioned finding bananas and Peruvian onions being sold at the market. On the other hand, he conceded that the market was a great place to buy tomatoes.
“The tomatoes you buy in the store are bred for shipping,” he said as he pointed to a table full of a variety of tomatos. “You won’t find a tomato equal in flavor or color to the ones here at the market.”
Winnie Ledford, Johnson City, an alumna of ETSU and formerly crowned “Miss ETSU,” said that she comes to the market twice a week to buy produce because “it’s cheap, it’s good, and it’s fresh.”
In addition to selling produce, many vendors sell other items such as homemade baked goods, cheese, soap and plants. Joe and Janice Blevins of Bristol, Tenn., have been selling their homemade cakes and casseroles for more than eight years at the market to satisfy the cravings of those with a perpetual sweet tooth.
Janice Blevins uses a separate, industrial kitchen, inspected by the Department of Agriculture, to bake her tasty goods.
The Johnson City Farmers’ Market will be open until the end of the month. Take time one Wednesday or Saturday morning to purchase some locally-grown produce, satisfy your sweet tooth or just meet members of the community.
As for me? Wednesday’s half-price sushi night will have to wait for another week. Tonight, I will be eating my fruits and vegetables, purchased at the Johnson City Farmers’ Market.

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