Eighth annual ‘C.O. Fill Your Pantry’ bulk buying farmers market is back Saturday at the Redmond Fairgrounds

(Update: Adding video, comments from a vendor and the event coordinator)

REDMOND, Ore. (KTVZ) -- This weekend at the Deschutes County Fairgrounds, a popular fall event for buying in bulk is back. The eighth annual Central Oregon Fill Your Pantry event will take place this Saturday from 11 am to 3 pm at the OSU-Extension parking lot. 

"I started it eight years ago, because I saw a need in the community. that to access local food in the winter," said event organizer Megan Kellner-Rode. "It's really challenging here to keep growing, unlike in the Willamette Valley, where you can sort of keep crops in the ground."

Fill Your Pantry is a yearly bulk-focused farmers market created to increase food security and resilience in Central Oregon by encouraging the community to load up their pantries, freezers and cupboards with sustainable local food. Farmers, ranchers, and food makers gather together once a year to offer bulk discounts to the community.

While the market is focused on bulk quantities, there are still plenty of smaller quantities. Customers can find anything from 20-pound burlap sacks of potatoes, bushels of apples, buckets of frozen berries, and half lamb shares to loaves of gluten-free sourdough, holiday wreaths, five-pound bags of carrots and jars of sauerkraut. There is something for everyone at Fill Your Pantry. 

Tim Currie is the owner and operator of Mill Fire Baking, one of the vendors that will be at the Fill Your Pantry event.

"It gives me an opportunity to interact with the other farmers," Currie said. "These are the people that grow the food that I'm milling into flour, the inclusions like peppers, other types of things, and then bringing that on to the customer. So it's kind of that cycle"

Currie will be at the event with 300 to 400 loaves of sourdough bread. 

"For small producers like myself, it's it's a huge opportunity. It's the difference sometimes between staying in business for the slow months between market season and and having to find something else to do."

Pre-orders for FYP are now live and run until 7 am on Saturday. Pre-ordering for FYP is not mandatory to attend the event, but merely ensures that you get the products you want. There will be more items available day-of that are not reserved, but some vendors can sell out quickly. Pre-orders must be picked up at the event on November 11th with no exceptions. 

Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP/EBT) and Farm Direct Nutrition Program (FDNP) vouchers are accepted at this event. Bend Farmers Market, a partner of FYP, will be present to exchange SNAP/EBT for tokens that can be used at most vendor booths, and will be offering up to $20 matching funds with the Double Up Food Bucks (DUFB) program. This means that if $20 of SNAP funds are exchanged, $40 in SNAP tokens will be received! 

Kellner-Rode said, "Fill your Pantry is a really great opportunity for farmers to grow as much as they possibly can, and then get it into the pantries of people who want to eat it, instead of having to store it themselves and potentially having waste."

In an effort to continuously make local food more accessible to our community, they are also partnering with High Desert Food & Farm Alliance (HDFFA) and the Bend Food Project to collect food donations. Bend Food Project will be collecting non-perishable food items at their booth to donate to the Giving Plate Food Pantry and HDFFA will be collecting fresh food items to donate to NeighborImpact and their associated food pantries.

"Consider bringing a non-perishable food item or buying an extra bulk item at FYP to donate," they said. "Help us fill everyone's pantries this year!"

More details from the event organizers:

Other fun additions to watch out for this year at Fill Your Pantry include: 

• Coloring Contest- see website for more details
• Knife sharpening- get those kitchen knives in tip top shape before winter
• Cookbook Swap- bring a cookbook to share, leave with a new-to-you cookbook

Help support and strengthen the Central Oregon local food system! For more information on what to expect, vendor and pre-order information, and more, visit our website at www.centraloregonfillyourpantry.com.