Stop and smell the stinky roses

The Bonners Ferry Farmers Market is prepping for one of its most popular (and maybe smelliest) events: the annual Garlic Festival, this year celebrating its 15th anniversary.

“It is a big draw,” said market manager Sam Smith, adding that it is one of their most popular events.

Garlic, the “stinking rose,” has long been a popular seasoning for many dishes across many cultures. References of its use date as far back 5,000 years ago.

It has been used medicinally, as cash, to preserve meat, as an aphrodisiac and to repel pests and vampires. Ancient Egyptian builders, early Olympians and Greek and Roman soldiers ate it to improve strength and vitality. In ancient Greece, brides carried a bouquet or wore a wreath on their head made of spices and herbs, including garlic.

With the average American consuming nearly two pounds of garlic each year, it’s no wonder the Bonners Ferry Farmers Market has chosen to annually celebrate all things garlic.

“It grows well here,” Smith said. “Everybody loves garlic, I think [all the vendors] grow garlic.”

The festival features a wide variety of the pungent bulb vegetable. Smith noted that she was “amazed at the variety [and] different colors.” Those varieties include ones most people have probably never heard of, like Syrian, German Magic, Yugoslavian and many more. The festival also sports products made with garlic: roasted garlic Italian dinner bread to jalapeno lime garlic jelly to garlic apple pie.

Vendors bring a number of other products, too. You can find a wide variety of produce, baked goods, soaps and scrubs, flowers, jewelry, local honey, crafts and so much more. Most of the produce is organic, Smith pointed out and at “lower prices and better quality” than specialty stores.

“[There are] new vendors this year with fantastic products,” Smith said. “I hope they stay.”

The festival also features the music of “Coeurimba,” a marimba performing group. They play high energy dance music on marimbas, a percussion instrument composed of wooden bars struck with yarn or rubber mallets, similar to a xylophone. They help give the event a “festival atmosphere,” Smith said.

Bottom line? It’s an event worth checking out. After all, as celebrated chef, author and travel documentarian Anthony Bourdain once said, “garlic is divine.”

You can join the fun at the corner of Kootenai and Highway 95, Saturday, Aug. 21, from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m.

For more information or if you are interested in being a vendor, contact the Bonners Ferry farmers market team at 208-610-9821 or info@bonnersferryfarmersmarket.org.