Sarasota Farmers Market — Attraction in Sarasota

TLDR: Excellent Farmers market with a great variety of vendors. Come for the pizza truck, hand rolled cigars and empanadas.

Vibe: 5/5. Located in downtown Sarasota on Saturday mornings (7am-1pm), the Sarasota Farmers market spans across several city blocks. The variety of vendors is excellent, ranging from local produce to fresh cut flowers to brick oven pizza. During the peak hours of 10-12am, the market can get pretty crowded, which can make parking challenging. During our visit, they had a local school's music department set up adding lovely background music to the hustle and bustle of the marketplace.

Service: 4/5. The vendors and people in attendance are extremely friendly, making it an overall great way to spend a Saturday morning. My only gripe, which is aimed more towards the market security and Sarasota police department, are the amount of panhandlers that solicit inside the market. On several occasions, we were solicited for money as we were in the process of receiving our change back from vendors. Market organizers should add more security/police presence to thwart this problem.

Food: 5/5. Amazing selection and quality of products from all the vendors we tried. During our trip, we ate at the Il Petraro Pizza food truck, the Caribbean Pie Company, The Empanada Girl, Kurtos Chimney Bread and Haraki Golden Tea. Overall, everything we tried was yummy, however the must haves of the day we're the margarita pizza from Il Petraro and the iced red tea from Haraki. The margarita was perfectly cooked well done, with the taste of fresh basil cutting through the creamy mozzarella. It paired perfectly with the slightly nutty, yet super thirst quenching taste of the red tea from Haraki. As expected, prices at the market are a little elevated compared to dining at a normal restaurant. However, the quality of the product you are receiving in a lovely outside atmosphere 100%...

I LOVE THIS SO HARD. I usually refrain from all Caps, but I've built my Saturdays around getting to the Market. My first experience was a few weeks ago, late Summer - when I told several vendors how overwhelmed I was, they all said "Oh, this is nothing - wait a few weeks and it'll be packed with more vendors and more people." You can taste your way through, and you should - Lisa with her canned pickled goods, the vegan cheese spreads, guacamole made right in front of you, the burrata and olive & balsamic oils from Mazzone, THE KEY LIME PIE... Sorry, all caps again... plus the breads and honeys and produce and soaps and art and plants... and make sure you get something from The Empanada Girl! It's potentially my favorite aspect of Sarasota thus far. Great dog watching, great people watching, great way to spend an hour or more on a...

I live 10 minutes from here. it's absolutely a must visit. This area is so cultured. Music, ballet, theatre, everything you would love coming from a large city. I have one negative ( please don't kill the messenger). Florida is a growing city, and traffic is getting worse every year due to many folks relocating here. We need to implement big-time changes on public transportation. The traffic gridlock is becoming like LA and NY. Florida has become one of the highest revenue states. We need public transportation. This will be a goldmine with more people getting out without the hassle of parking. It's done in Miami. Why not here? ❤️ Love...