Below are the winning numbers from last night’s Hoedown:

Prize Package #2- 698016

Prize Package #4- 698037

Prize Package #6- 698030

Prize Package #8- 698067

Thursday, November 8th, 2012

Join us for the 18th Annual Hoedown – Eat, drink, and be merry!

Taste the culinary genius of our area’s great chefs, savor the flavor of Texas wines and spirits, shop and sample the specialty foods and products from over 30 vendors!

The Hoedown is a private party and not open to the public, so all tickets must be pre-purchased. All tickets will be held alphabetically by host name at the door.

Buy Individual Hoedown Tickets

Buy Group Tickets (10+ people)

The 18th Annual Hoedown, the annual fundraising event presented by the Dallas Farmers Market Friends for the Dallas Farmers Market, will again be dedicated to the 1991 Founder of the Dallas Farmers Market Friends, Ida Papert, who sadly passed away in January of this year.

Ida, or ‘Mama Ida’ as she preferred to be called, was an early customer of the market, beginning her regular Saturday shopping there in 1953 when, as a young bride, she moved to Dallas with her husband, Sam, and started their family. Despite the growing number of grocery stores providing much welcomed convenience to families at that time, Mama Ida never lost her taste for fresh, local foods. And never lost her love of the many farmers and vendors she grew to know personally over the almost 60 years since that first visit.

In the current and particularly powerful ‘Local Food Movement’, it’s hard to imagine that beginning around the 80’s, the Dallas Farmer’s Markets, as well as all Farmer’s Markets—were losing the interest of consumers to the warehouse-sized supermarkets selling produce from the four corners of the world. Enter a group of concerned citizens who saw in Ida Papert a larger-than-life personality that could be the force needed to save the market.

And save the market, she did. Seeing that the city-owned market couldn’t stretch its budget to include programs she felt were needed to keep the market progressive, Mama Ida dreamed up an event that would celebrate the markets’ produce and vendors and the talents of the best of Dallas’ chefs…The Hoedown. Since that first one in 1994 when the first dollars went toward a Junior Farmers program, the Dallas Farmers Market Friends have since funded improvements such as the commercial kitchen in the Resource Center, A/V equipment for the popular cooking classes, tenting, signage, educational conferences for the market staff and a myriad of improvements that help the Dallas Farmers Market keep the undisputed title of ‘Queen Mum’ of all Texas farmers markets.

Though Mama Ida can’t be with us in person, her spirit and her love of good, fresh food and the people who brought it to her will always be with us. For that and her efforts, her five decades of support and friendships with the farmers and vendors and for never swaying from her commitment to the Market, the Dallas Farmer’s Market Friends are proud to dedicate the 2012 Hoedown to the memory of ‘Mama Ida’ Papert.