Breakfast at the Wild Oats Market

As far as food mar­kets go, the Wild Oats Market in Sedgefield on the Garden Route prob­ably comes up tops. Residents of Sedgefield and vis­it­ors to the town head out in their droves on a Saturday morn­ing to the edge of town right next to the Swartvlei lake-lagoon, where the mar­ket has a per­man­ent home under the trees.

The market's full name is the Wild Oats Community Farmers' Market and it has won numer­ous awards dur­ing its ten year life span. Whilst I'd heard only good things about the farm­ers' mar­ket, I hadn't yet had the oppor­tun­ity to visit it, but our road trip up to Hogsback had been con­veni­ently carved into a num­ber of stop­overs that included Sedgefield, and the mar­ket was one of the first to make its way onto the itinerary ...

Sedgefield is beau­ti­ful. The N2 heads right through the town that lies between George and Knysna. What you see from the N2, how­ever, is not the full pic­ture. What you don't grasp when view­ing it from a mov­ing vehicle is that on the other side of the rather slender and vis­ible res­id­en­tial area that lies at the foot of a sand dune, is the Sedgefield Lagoon that winds like the back of a dragon from the Swartvlei Dam — the largest inland salt water lake in the coun­try — to the sea. On its north­ern and east­ern banks lies the buzz­ing but small town of Sedgefield, whilst its south west­ern bank is graced by pro­tec­ted fyn­bos clad sand dunes.

The town attracts artists, hip­pies, those who have opted out of the rat race and a hand­ful of mil­lion­aires. There is the Tortoise Meander that vis­its some of these local artists, includ­ing a woodturner, sculptor, ceramic artist and oth­ers, and the out­door life­style is incred­ible, par­tic­u­larly because of the lakes, lagoon and no fewer than five beaches that attract beach junkies by the dozen. Yet Sedgefield has thus far man­aged to elude the level of devel­op­ment that has trans­formed Knysna over the past fif­teen years or so.

Sedgefield, des­pite all of its sur­round­ing water, was in the midst of a drought and water was scarce when we were there. This in no way detrac­ted from the tran­quil­ity and rest­ful atmo­sphere of the place, and cer­tainly didn't stop the crowds from head­ing out for their weekly sup­ply of organic veget­ables, fruit, jam, eggs, free-range meat and poultry, local cheese, artisan breads, plants and a hearty break­fast thrown in for good meas­ure, at the market.

There is little that the Wild Oats mar­ket doesn't have by way of local food, and there are even a few hand-selected craft sup­pli­ers ,but the main focus is on fresh, local food and bottled goods, and people queue for the fresh-off-the-coals break­fasts, cof­fees, pan­cakes, vetkoek and fresh juices that are in ample sup­ply. The market's main aim is to 'encour­age the art of free-range 'loc­avore' shop­ping in the fresh out­doors', and it more than achieves this.

Wild Oats is care­fully and thought­fully laid out. It begins under a can­opy of trees, just bey­ond a huge park­ing lot that divides the local farm­ers' mar­ket from the other craft mar­kets that dom­in­ate these grounds on a Saturday (you can make a day of it here there is so much to do).

After mak­ing one's way past the ini­tial stalls, it becomes obvi­ous that the main reason for com­ing here is to meet friends, relax and nosh on break­fast. And we obliged. Stools and tables, ingenu­ously made from the stumps of trees, lie inter­spersed through­out the mar­ket wherever there is shade, whilst the stores lie on the peri­phery, con­tain­ing the mar­ket in a rough rect­angle, set beneath sha­de­cloth and eas­ily accessible.

The mar­ket is extens­ive. This might be a little town on the Garden Route, but its farm­ers' mar­ket is in a league of its own. Not even the food mar­kets in Cape Town are as good, des­pite there being a num­ber of excel­lent ones. Perhaps it is because this mar­ket lacks all pre­ten­tion. It's utterly authen­tic and is brim­ming over with choice. I wasn't sur­prised to learn that people come from Knysna, George and the Wilderness to stock up on a reg­u­lar basis.

I wasn't in the mood for a boere­wors roll, English break­fast, vetkoek or falafel filled pita, so opted for Sarah of Zest's fruit, muesli and yoghurt break­fast. You can return your con­tainer to her at the end of the meal for her to recycle. Speaking of which, there was act­ive recyc­ling hap­pen­ing at the mar­ket by way of a three-bin sys­tem, and Sarah gave you a refund for your glass bottle of hibis­cus tea too! If you're a bread fundi then join the queue at Ill de Pain. Whilst the breads are pretty pricey, they're large artisan loaves that are full of good­ness, gor­geous to look at, and last for ages as they're so filling.

The Wild Oats emphas­ises 'sustain-able' habit pat­terns. The mar­ket encour­ages redu­cing, reusing and recyc­ling within the mar­ket court­yard, hence many of their vendors use reuseable con­tain­ers, have con­sciously reduced pack­aging and empty bottles, and tins are recycled.

The mar­ket hap­pens every Saturday, come rain or shine, from 7.30 until 11.30 in sum­mer and from 8 until 11.30 dur­ing winter. You'd be wise to head down there as early as you can as the mar­ket is pop­u­lar and locally-produced food obvi­ously a com­mod­ity, given the rate at which it is snapped up.

PS: make a point of vis­it­ing the fudge master's stall — this is fudge as I've not tasted it before!

Useful Links:
Sedgefield Attractions
Things to Do in Sedgefield
Sedgefield Map
Sedgefield Accommodation
Garden Route Accommodation