When Becca Knight and Brad Davis first met at Johnson City’s Acoustic Coffeehouse, they discovered that they shared a great appreciation for the many natural and cultural resources the region has to offer; Brad, a native of Kingsport, is a devotee of old-time mountain music, and Becca, who first moved to Johnson City in 2003, spends much of her free time photographing the lush scenery around East Tennessee.  So when the two got engaged this past March, it seemed natural to include in their wedding plans a menu based in large part on local, seasonal foods. 

                “I guess it started when we decided we didn’t want to register for gifts,” Becca said.  “We wanted to keep everything really simple, and we also realized we could invite more people if we asked local guests to bring a side dish to share.”  Turning their August 14^th wedding celebration into a potluck and requesting contributions of food instead of traditional gifts allowed the couple to think outside the box of what is typically expected for a wedding meal, and it wasn’t long before they realized that much of what they needed could be purchased from local farms. 

First, the couple sought out locally-raised meat, and settled on bison burgers provided by Boone’s Trail Bison, a Jonesville, VA farm.  Becca works for the Appalachia Service Project, which operates a home-repair facility across the road from Boone’s Trail.   Earlier this summer, “I would sit on the porch [of ASP’s facility] and watch the bison on the hillside and think, ‘That’s my wedding meat!’” Becca laughed.  They supplemented the local burgers with additional items for the grill (veggie burgers and hot dogs from Earth Fare), but “getting local produce for the fixin’s was always the plan,” she said.  Simply put: “I wanted really good tomatoes.”  Becca knew that the best tomatoes she could offer her guests would come from the freshest source available, her local farmers market.

Becca and Brad were confident they could find what they needed, so they didn’t make arrangements at the Johnson City Farmers Market in advance.  “We just showed up on a Wednesday morning and saw what looked good,” Becca said.  ‘What looked good’ amounted, in the end, to “a crate of tomatoes, a crate of onions, and eleven heads of lettuce, plus a bunch of other food just to feed my family” in the days leading up to the wedding, Becca said.  “We had to go back to the car three or four times—we turned a lot of heads.”

                The wedding festivities also included locally-grown flowers from Aunt Willie’s Wildflowers in Blountville.  “All along, I wanted local, seasonal flowers,” Becca said.  She researched several full-service florists, but ended up finding exactly what the couple had envisioned from Aunt Willie’s, where they could select their flowers in person, just before the wedding, and create all the arrangements themselves. Linda Doan, owner of Aunt Willie’s, sells her flowers at the Johnson City market on Wednesdays and the Kingsport market on Saturdays.  The week of Becca and Brad’s wedding, though, “we actually bought out everything she was planning to take to market on Saturday,” Becca said. 

                The Davises had been no strangers to the farmers market community even before planning their wedding.  Brad, who works with intellectually-disabled adults, lived in Jonesborough prior to the marriage, and got the couple connected to the Jonesborough Farmers Market last summer, where they sold homemade gourmet popsicles (their popsicles also made an appearance at the wedding, even though Becca and Brad found themselves too busy to sell them at the market this season). 

                The two also like to shop at the markets throughout the seasons.  “It’s not necessarily an every week thing,” Becca said.  “But it’s where I like to shop when I can.  I feel like it’s healthier—I know the food is very fresh, so it contains more vitamins and nutrients, and I assume that it’s likely to contain fewer or no pesticides.”  She also enjoys the ability to connect directly to the people at the source of her food.  “I like having a relationship with the grower—I can ask them ‘How did you grow it? Did you use organic methods?’”  Finally, she appreciates the superior flavor and variety that tends not to exist in grocery store produce sections.  “This variety of tomato called Cherokee purples are my absolute favorite, and the farmers market is the only place I can find them.”

                Living in Johnson City, the Davises are fortunate to have several thriving markets in their immediate area, and anticipate that their new routine as a married couple will continue to include celebrating the abundance of good, fresh food the region’s farmers are producing.  “You know, going to the grocery store can be kind of a chore,” Becca said.  “But I always look forward to the market.” 

                You can support local farmers and incorporate fresh, seasonal produce into your everyday meal-planning and big celebrations by visiting www.appfma.org to find the location and hours of your closest farmers market.   To learn more about Aunt Willie’s Wildflowers, visit www.auntwillieswildflowers.com. 

Article and photo by Paige Campbell

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