Mara des Bois Economics

Mara des Bois are up by half a euro a barquette.

Sometimes when something first comes out, we're just dying to embrace everything it means to have that moment in the season arrive. We feel the sting in our pocketbook but it's bittersweet - we still fight to get some of the season's first pickings. Then time marches on. When more producers begin to come forth with more and what stood out as an exception becomes part of the background, competition begins and the prices come down again. This happened with the Cèpe mushrooms - the first ones were cher as all hell, and I paid willingly, with nearly a tear of joy in my eye.

There's a complex relationship between our hopes and memories and signs and signals of the cyclical nature of life as seen on the market table. These vendors of course know when we must have something at any price, and they have the priceless skill of stopping us in our tracks, bringing us back to the moment. We reinvent our limits. We think of the best way to use them. Or sometimes we soak in the view and continue walking, content to come back again when we have concluded between us that things have reached their just balance.