One of the joys of cooking for yourself and others is getting out and meeting the folks who make it all happen. With that in mind, I headed down to Little Rock's  Bernice Garden Farmer's Market to visit with local farmers, check it out what they had and see what we could find to cook on the PK. 

Straightaway, I found Katie Beaton, who runs  Weal and Woe Farm with her partner Andy Olson in nearby Toad Suck, Arkansas, which is about 45 minutes up the road on the Arkansas River. Today she's working the market with her family, selling flowers and produce. Beaton said she named her farm Weal and Woe because the phrase, which means that you should take the good with the bad, seemed to fit appropriately for a small farm. The humble phrase almost belies itself in this instance, because not only is Beaton offering the best looking flowers I've seen in a long time, the food she's offering today is top notch. I've got my eye particularly on something I have wanted to put on the grates of my PK for awhile - the shishito pepper. 

I walk away with squash, tomatoes and the shishitos. The shishito pepper is an interesting one. It's quickly gaining popularity as a trendy food item, and I'm very happy to have found them without having to look hard for them. They're best cooked over flames, charred a bit, and eaten shortly afterwards. Like their Spanish cousin, the padrón pepper, most shishitos are mild, but there are a few outliers: sometimes, you'll come across a hot one. Both are delicious. 

Prepping for the grill, I prepared our meal with salt, olive oil, and not much else. For being such a trendy, hot choice, the shishito is very unfussy, requiring little work to make right. Our PK is perfect, offering quick, direct heat for the tomatoes and peppers. I throw some peppers I have in the fridge in with it, because any food photographer has red peppers at the ready. Since I have room on the grill, I throw on a loaf of focaccia bread I have in the freezer for such an occasion. There are real simple joys I get out of grilling, and the taste of slightly charred bread, fresh from the top of the grill is one of them. The PK is perfect as an oven and grill to get this just perfect with little work.

The PK makes quick work of the shishitos, while the squash and tomatoes take a little longer. Keep an eye on grilling tomatoes, as they'll bust open on you if you're not careful. After you pull the shishitos off the grill, they're good to go, but you could always brush the peppers with teriyaki sauce for a different vibe. I've opted for eating them just as they came off the grill. The entire meal we're having was fresh, simple, unfussy and absolutely delicious. Everything was sourced from within an hour of our home. Even the focaccia, which had been frozen, was bought fresh at an earlier date from Boulevard Bread Company, which is next door to the farmer's market. ( Read about how Boulevard uses the PK Grill at their restaurant.)

Simply going out to the local farmer's market one Sunday and talking to the farmers made for one of the best meals I've eaten in a long while. All with little fuss. There's lots of talk in the culinary world about the farm-to-table movement, and a lot of rhetoric and high-minded discussion. That's great, but what's better for me is just getting out and making great food.

For more information on the PK Grill, visit pkgrills.com.