ottawa foodies

Local produce and cuisine, served by friendly locals who know their stuff... I love this place!

I come for the finest local produce they sell, and stay for a delicious snack from the ever-changing menu. The take-home dinners are also really delicious and a time-saving option for busy Ottawans.

I bought a delicious jerk chicken here last year and swore to return... but then routine got in the way and I didn't go back until a couple of days ago. I've been missing so much! The shop is just full of new products, compared to the last time I was there.

I left with a gorgeous T-bone for a birthday dinner. Oh, yum. *That* is what beef is supposed to taste like. I also picked up a bunch of fresh asparagus. Like, seriously fresh -- with dirt still clinging to the stalks. I also bought some blue cheese to crumble on the steak... but the meat smelled so good that we forgot all about the cheese. Oops. I think it'll be delicious on some burgers, though.

The butcher who helped me was really nice and had plenty of suggestions for sides to go with the steak, and I got to sample a bit of their salame veneto. I'll definitely go back for more of that! I could see myself doing a lot more of my shopping here in the future...

Dinner after a trip to Piggy Market. Spectacular meat!

New Post: Inspiration Strikes: Grilled Flank Steak, charred vegetables and cilantro relish.
happymouth.ca/?p=5630

New Posting: Piggy Market Update: Piggy Market re-opens as a craft butcher with spectacular results.
happymouth.ca/?p=5568

Between my hours at school and a part time job across the city I leave too early in the day and come home too late from the hours that they are open. It kills me lol

And boy do I miss it! I miss Dave's rotisserie chickens, (seriously, how come no one has written about them?) are simply cooked to perfection. I would always have to get there early before other people snagged them up (and this was at 4:30 in the day time lol).

Be sure to try prosciutto as well.

Tried the pulled pork yesterday. So good! The pork was densely packed into the bun and the sauce was tangy and sweet without being cloying. The sandwiches were offerred with blue cheese, and it was the first time I've had them this way. Soft Blue cheese was an excellent complement as it melted into the hot pork. Warning: there is so much pork packed into that bun, and so much juice, that it is not an easy thing to enjoy without wearing some of it. Maybe I'll bring a towel next time.

Tried out the Chicken curry pattie today. Really nice moist chunks of curried chicken wrapped in a pastry turnover. Pastry had a rich flavor and a crisp exterior/tender interior. The perfect hand food if you're driving or on the run. they also had house made pizza pockets today that I will try another time.

Review on Piggy Market, plus a conversation with Dave Neil, co-owner.

happymouth.ca/piggy-market/

I love this place. I popped in last Saturday to pick up a few things including some bacon (yum!), some Beau's sourdough bread, and some Sirens Bakery granola. I had the bacon for breakfast the following morning with Bekings Farms eggs and it had a lovely smokey flavour to it. Breakfast was accompanied by a wedge of the sourdough bread - it was so soft and delicious! When I was at the Piggy Market Dave Neil was ringing in orders at the cash. I asked him if he will be at the Lansdowne Farmers Market this summer and he said no. Business is picking up at the store so he wants to keep his staff on hand to serve the customers there. He mentioned that the cost of renting space at the farmers market was a deterrent - he would make $1000 in sales at the market but have to pay $500 to rent the space. Their products in the store is always expanding though so a trip to the store is worth the while.

Yep. They're growing on me. I said back in August that I was warming up to them...I might have actually bought meat from them yesterday.

I purchased two of the smoked lamb sausages, for a pasta. They turned out beautifully, and while a bit on the mild side, they were delicious, especially in the sauce that we made! I also bought some sausage ragu, which was a delightful combination of sausages from the days past, along with seasoning and tomatoey goodness.

The ragu was really what impressed me. You could tell that the sausages were of great quality and they worked very nicely as a topping on toast for lunch today.

Yep. I might go broke, but I'm now a Piggy Market convert.

Stopped by today at lunch to give Piggy some lovin. Ordered two sandwiches off the board. Spicy Brisket with pickles greens and mustard. My wife got a roast beef with greens grilled peppers cheese and mustard. Hate to do the negative but both sandwiches had a bitter taste. I'm thinking the greens. Brisket was shaved and flavorless. It was hard to tell the difference between the two sandwiches. Could be we were early for lunch yet even the buns seemed a little off on the stale side. Think I will stick to the patties for a quick snack. The didn't even warrant a pic :(

Jumpin' Jimminy. I might have to nominate The Piggy Market for Best Sandwich in Ottawa. It's not the cheapest, but it is certainly one of the most delicious and one of the best in terms of value.

The one that I had today held roast pork (which had the perfect balance of meat/fat/seasoning), pickled kohlrabi (think pickled turnip, but with a bit more of a cucumber crunch), caramelized onions (!!!) and cheese between two slices of the buttermilk grain bread from Art-is-In.

Sure, there are less expensive sandwiches to be had, but I double dog dare you to find me lunch in Westboro for cheaper that is anywhere near this tasty.

The Piggy Market sells sandwiches now, in case anyone was not aware. They have a schedule of what type are available on what day - which I can't remember. They use their own meats and cheeses of course, and Art-is-in bread which they carry. I have absolutely no idea how much I paid, as I bought a bunch of other stuff at the same time, but it was worth every penny! Delicious (like everything else that the sell).

Today was our second time getting Jamaican Patties from the Piggy market, but I forgot to review last time. Both times, we had the beef ones, and both times, they were fantastic! Nice and crisp on the outside, bursting with juicy meat on the inside. They have a good kick, but not so much that you can't taste anything else. make sure you get there right at 2:30, or even a bit earlier though, because they go quickly! We will definitely be back!

Absolutely astounding, they are expensive at $3 each but they are worth evey penny. They sold veggie (potato and kale), beef and chicken varieties and the flavours present are both rich and delicate. The pastry is flaky rather then greasy and they things microwave like a dream.

I heartely recomend, at least assuming that one can find the things. They are unfortnunatly only present periodically so grab them when you see them.

My dad has been looking for decent Jamaican patties in this city for years, and based on your recommendation he went to The Piggy Market to buy some. All I can say is THANK YOU! These are honestly the best Jamaican patties we've ever had, and we're from Toronto, so that says a lot! The beef was fabulous, great quality meat, nicely spiced. The pastry was flaky and delicious. We also tried the calaloo and the chicken. I thought the chicken would have been ground, however, I was pleasantly surprised to find shredded chicken breast inside with a nice mild curry sauce. Overall, if you have a craving for a Jamaican patty skip the ones at Grace Ottawa and head on over to The Piggy Market....you won't be disappointed : )

I had the ja' patties from the Piggy Market tonight, got one of each: beef and callaloo. Delicious! Pastry from scratch, the callaloo had a bit of heat, the beef was seasoned nicely. It went well with my fresh tomato salad which I seasoned with some Walkerswood jerk seasoning. Amazing! At $3 a piece, they are more expensive than most places, but I feel the quality justifies the price. I was told that they will be available every Wednesday and Friday. Delish!

Just recently tried their chicken pot pie, and it was the best one I've ever had!! especially knowing the ingredients are mostly locally grown. Lots of spice and spinach which is totally refreshing and so delicious. You can buy them from frozen then pop them in your oven for about an hour.

hard to beat pickles that come from a place called "The Pickle Patch" ^^

i think Piggy Market sells them exclusively as 1L jars. i never knew pickles could be... fizzy. thumbs up for fermentation!

Dropped in for the first time on my way home from work. I picked up the potato and okra jamaican patty and a box of sausage pierogies. The patty was great and the pierogies were absolutely delicious. I was told by the friendly folks behind the counter that they were already partially cooked, and all they needed was a quick pan fry. I used butter, olive oil, and they browned beautifully with a nice golden crust. I garnished with S&P and green onions. Every bite was delicious. The sausage was perfectly flavoured between savoury and a slight sweetness. Delicious!

We had picked up some smoked duck breast from The Piggy Market after sampling it. It is absolutely amazing! It is very tasty on it's own, on crusty baguette or also topped with just a crumble of aged cheddar. Not cheap, but a wonderful treat. I'll have to come up with some more tasty ways to eat it.

This may be some of the least local of their products, but the Piggy Market does sell absolutely wonderful wild BC smoked salmon. I tried their Chinook, though one of the owners (whose name I never caught) put half the supply in their cryo freezer so that he will sell some in the middle of the winter. Extremely flavorful and some of the best stuff I have had. I recommend it when you come on by.

Information from the Piggy Market website: thepiggymarket.com

January 18th, 2010
Dave will be hosting a sausage making class at the Urban Element. For more information, www.theurbanelement.ca

I fully concur with zymurgist. I've eaten my share of sausage, and these are honestly the best sausages I've ever had! We tried three varieties: honey and lime, the breakfast sausage and the smoked pork. All of them were fabulous, although, I may be leaning towards the breakfast sausage as my favourite. They were so good that I had to eat more than one! The texture and the fact that they are perfectly seasoned makes them sensational. I can't wait to go back for more : ) Oh, and for those who are true sausage die hards...the owner offers classes on sausage making. He's currently booked up until November 2009, but if you're interested in sausage making it sounds like you would be learning from a master. I think I may give it a try.

Wow! I picked up some of the Sweet Italian sausage, and I can confidently say without hesitation that this is the best sausage I've ever had in my life! Including some of the other local sausages I've raved about here, as well as anything I've ever had while living in Germany. The particular combination of herbs and spices is bang-on! Well done!

hmmm
Jag, these, I must try

My mother and I went to The Piggy Market and we tried out samples of various sausages.

*The Beau's Worst; Brautworst with Beau's in it, beautifully complex flavour. Not normally smoked, but he stated that he was bored.
*Jalapeno and Chive Sausage; a subtle burn that accumulates with samples, and it has a very nice chive flavour backing it up.
*Kiabasa: Awesome, the most flavourful of the sausages.
*The Westboro; Very nice collection of spices which I found as quite unusual. Allspice, Nutmeg and something else.

I grabbed the sweet italian sausage for my home as it was the one I had not tried. :)

I had a smoked pork sausage tonight. Moist, flavourful, with a nice texture.
My father said he would have preferred if we had heated it up, but I thought it was perfect as it came.

I recently bought a smoked turkey and bacon pot pie and a pork and mushroom meat pie from these guys at the Landsdowne farmer's market. Wow! Delicious. The pie crust for both of these were flaky, crispy, and tasty, everything you look for in pie pastry. I'll talk first about the smoked turkey and bacon pot pie. The filling was the usual suspects, veggies, smoked turkey and bacon, smothered in stock and cooked together until all the flavours infused with one another. When I cut the pie open (sharing with my wife) the filling just oozed out. Thinking that the turkey pot pie was delicious, we moved on to the pork and mushroom pie... and we were blown away. The filling is shredded heritage pork with combination of 8 different mushroom varieties (so I'm told). I was able to pick out shitake, portabella, enoki, oyster and honshimeji. I'm not sure if the other 3 were in my specific one (everything is homemade and thus open to change). Because of the many asian variety of mushrooms, there was a distinct asian flavour or flair to the pie. It was absolutely delicious. So delicious in fact that I went again this week to pick up 2 more of them. Highly recommended!

Andrew & I got bacon from here this weekend to have with our Sunday morning pancakes. We both thought it was good, but that it tasted more like meat than bacon. Either way, we weren't particularly impressed and probably will stick to our other favourite meat places for bacon.

Tried the Milk Chocolate Beau's.. yummmm :)

I'm putting this in the Piggy Market, but maybe with all of the buzz, Pascale's Ice Cream should have it's own Vendor.

Last night we tried the Thai Mango. My wife loved it. I am on the fence. It was definitely creamy, Pascale's signature, and the mango flavour was good, just punchy enough. But I found the "spicy" after-effect to be just a burn, with no flavour. It reminded me of a pesky scratchy throat.

Tried the PB salted caramel on the weekend, it is in fact the breakfast of champions. Can't wait to try new flavours

Tried some Milk Chocolate Beau's today at the farmers' market. Was good... but different. I can't say I knew what to expect. The chocolate and beer are complementary, yet not. Together, they taste somewhat like butterscotch or some kind of liquor buttercream. The chocolate is nice, and the beer adds a punch. I was surprised that this is made with the seasonal beer rather than lug tread. I'm not sure if I would get this again. I would be curious to try one of the more "regular" flavours. At the market today, they had some flavours I'd never heard of them having before. I think they must vary by batch.

Overall, I was expecting this to not be so good, more of a novelty kind of thing, but it really does work. Although, if I go again I'll try something more normal.

Peanut butter salted caramel. very good.

yum. the sandwich was $6.50 it was not cheap. but oh. my. word. it was effing incredible. i couldn't wait to get home to eat it.

served with blue cheese, if you wish. i chose blue cheese. i wouldn't next time. it's rich enough.

at first i was taken aback by the price ($17 for a medium container) of this pulled pork, but in the end, it made four good-sized sandwiches. we did them on toasted brown baguette with sauteed onions and crumbled blue. the flavour of the pork was exquisite -- far better than any other in this town.

the piggy market's bacon, on the other hand, did not live up to it's promise. bacon fat is splendid and relevant, yes, but - and i can't believe i'm saying this - there was too much. for that price, i would have liked a better ratio of meat to fat. and the flavour just didn't compensate.

We got a package of pulled pork from the farmer's market. It was about $7.50 for a pack that made 3 sandwiches. I think that's a pretty good price. I'm not sure if the meat was seasoned, or it was just really flavourful. We were wishing we had bought more at the time, so we'd definitely get this again.

FYI, "the guy at the piggy market stand" was Kyle (who also works at Aubrey's Meats in the Byward Market). He was so psyched about them and had to share. As someone who had some too, I've go to say they were pretty darned good.

Ok, the guy at the piggy market stand at the market on Sunday had a doughnut stuffed doughnut. Think baviaran, with those little cider doughnuts stuffed inside - no chocolate on top. He was kind enough to be sharing. Freaking Fantastic!

Love, love, love the Tomme de Gaston cheese.

Since the early days, I have noticed a more diversified stock. I have acquired a goat cheddar from the Piggy Market and it tasted like a most excellent blend of those two discrete elements. They were low on the cheeses, but even then they had a number of different products.

The Piggy Market has a number of artisan cheeses in shop, made from goat and cow's milk, ranging in price from 7-10$/100g, which is a bit out of my price range.

Having said that, we were looking for a softer cheese tonight, and were offered a soft, spreadable goat cheese with wild garlic, oreganc and cracked pepper, at $5/100g. It was leftover that the owner had from making ravioli earlier in the day.

Well, it was some of the best mixed cheese that I've had in a long time. The garlic was perfectly pungent and melded nicely with the cheese. I can't wait to use the rest of it in my favourite chicken dish on Friday.

One observation though: I really hope that The Piggy Market stays in business, but I wonder a bit if they lack the variety to do so, both in terms of price and food. Their food really doesn't reflect a variety of customers, financially speaking, and I don't know if they can sustain themselves in a shop-format without broadening their product. A good example of this is the cheese, because had he made a bit extra of the goat cheese we bought, he would have a bit more of another type of product to sell. Just some (food for) thought.

I picked up some peameal bacon last weekend from the Piggy market and cooked it up on Sunday for brunch. I'm sure it's been said before, but wow does this product taste like a pig should. Delicious... and heritage!