Foodies swamp farmers' market, swoon over peaches and squash and roasted peppers and all the rest

I love our farmers' market.

Smells like roasted peppers, for one thing, which excites my senses. I want to buy bags of peppers and shove them up my nose. No good can come from that.

But smelling the pablanos and jalepenos gets me in the mood for buying other foodstuffs.

First up -- peaches. I know that it's slightly early for Colorado peaches but I bought a few from Palisade and some apricots. Nothing quite as sensual as the smell of peaches. I love the juices running down my chin and onto my clothes. Sweet and sticky. Better yet -- slice peaches onto vanilla ice cream.

I also bought some Palisade-grown apricots. Very good. Not sure about apricots and ice cream but I'm willing to give it a try. BTW, Palisade is 12 miles east of Grand Junction, Colo., along the Colorado River Valley. The Palisade Peach Festival is Aug. 19-22.

Vanilla ice cream is the starter for so many fruits. Strawberries, peaches, cantaloupe, blueberries, raspberries, etc.

I bought some pattypan squash from a farm located between Kersey and Greeley, Colo. Before I left for the market, my wife asked me to buy some of those squashes that looks like blossoms and have ridges around the edge. The seller told me that another customer had told her how wonderful these squash were when cooked on the grill.

Did someone say "grill?"

The seller told me to cut them in half, drizzle olive oil over them, and let the propane-fed flames and/or coals lick them to perfection.

I bought some olive oil. Foodies thrive on olive oil. They would drink gallons of the stuff if they though they could get away with it.

Carol Ann Kates, author of "Secret Recipes from the Corner Market," makes some dazzling olive oils. I bought a bottle of the Mexican lime. Sample cups were set out with chunks of bread. I sampled the lime and blood orange and several other varieties. Carol told me that the olive oil comes from California but she juices the limes at her place and puts them together for a fragrant combination. I may end up drinking the Mexican lime olive oil.

Dipping chunks of that bread into the olive oil samples sparked numerous conversations. Good food sparks good talk. We all hung around Carol's stand and dipped and munched and finally bought. My idea is to take the Mexican lime oilve oil and slather it on the squash and grill them. I bought a loaf of Jewish rye from the Styrian Bakery out of Fort Collins. This will be great for dipping. I also may use the olive oil as a marinade for the steaks I bought from the 7 Bar 2 Ranch, which is 20 miles west of Cheyenne along Happy Jack Road.

I bought three sirloins. "Wyoming-raised, dry-aged and all-natural beef."

Can't wait to grill them. I revel in the fact that the beef was raised within a few minutes of my house in Cheyenne. I sampled some of the 7 Bar 2 burger and it was very tasty without any added elements.

After the farmers' market, I headed to Safeway to buy some cilantro grown at Grant Farms in Wellington. I also bought some shrooms for the steaks and ice cream, of course, because farmers' markets aren't the best places to buy ice cream.

I have a lot of my own leaf lettuce that needs to be eaten. Chinese pea pods, too, along with a couple of tomatoes. I am watching the tomatoes very carefully. I want them so bad.