Everybody still have all their digits?

I hope everyone rung in the 5th of July with all digits attached and all critters accounted for.

Today was my sixth Farmers Market.  I totally forgot to do a post on my "Piss on the Revenuers" day at the market last week.  I kind'a ran out of steam, or at least calmed down, since the week before and I didn't do anything really nasty (and I'm sure you'd all roll your eyes if I did three political-ranting blog posts in a row).  I did, however, pass out some patriotic postcards with my version of the Gadsden snake on it, spoke to many people who were disgusted at the fact that the market was being targeted by the ADFA (Arkansas Dept. of Finance & Admin.) and also gave away loaves of bread and bags of cookies and told those who asked, "Why?".....because I would rather give my goods away than collect sales tax in the name of the State.  I will not be their tax collecting bitch.

Everyone was appalled at the pettiness of the ADFA and some even got pretty riled up.  Hopefully some of them will actually call or email Ms. Clipboard (who's name, phone number & email I gladly gave out).

Oh, and I forgot to mention.  Not only were all the vendors expected to fill out the 7 page application and possibly submit quarterly tax reports, but what Ms. Clipboard failed to mention to anyone was that there was also a fifty dollar application fee.  I'm not sure if it was per year or just a one time deal, but regardless, it is still outrageous for them to impose such a fee upon vendors who are lucky to make twenty dollars in sales (not income, mind you).

Unfortunately her scare tactics worked because we've lost one produce vendor, one plant lady, one craft vendor and the fudge lady.  And another really sickening thing about it is that the craft lady just last week lost her husband to Alzheimer's disease.  Her crafts were her escape and now she is no longer going to come to the market because she doesn't want to bother with all the paperwork and doesn't want to chance getting in trouble if she doesn't comply.  We're still trying to talk her into coming back though and we promised that we'd all pitch in for bail money if she did get thrown into the slammer for selling birdhouses!

Basically, the vendors that are left agreed that we were all going to continue selling our wares like Ms. Clipboard was never there.  I guess we'll just all go to jail together for tax evasion.  Maybe I should start up a collection jar at the market for our bail money.

Hmmm, seems like this post did end up being a little bit of a rant.  But to make up for it, I'm going to give you one of my new favorite cookie recipes.  In my farmers market baking whirlwind that happens every Thursday now, I was trying to think of a different type of cookie to bring with.  I normally bring whole wheat chocolate chip (WWCC) cookies and a second type depending on how I feel or what ingredients I have available.  Three weeks ago I made a few modifications to my WWCC and came up with this keeper of a recipe:

German Chocolate Cookies

2 1/4 C. WW Flour
1 tsp. each Salt & Baking Soda
1/2 C. Cocoa Powder
1 1/2 C. Sugar
1 C. Butter
1 tsp. Vanilla
2 Eggs
1 C. Shredded Coconut
1 C. Chopped Pecans

Combine first three ingredients & set aside.  Cream sugar & butter, then add eggs & vanilla & mix.  Add flour/salt/soda/cocoa & mix, then add coconut/pecans & mix.

375 degree oven for 13 minutes or so

I had someone request them again so I brought them with this morning and sold all but one pack (and glad for it because that meant I got to take some back home for us to eat).

Enjoy!  And enjoy my self-imposed rant-free week!