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It seems that we’re getting to be at farmers’ markets almost as often as the farmers themselves. Keen to seek out fresh produce closer to home, on Saturday morning we jumped into the car and drove the 9 miles from Ipswich to Needham Market.

Alder Carr Farm is a working farm, and sells locally-sourced food from the on-site farm shop, while customers can also pick their own fruit and vegetables. Local farmers, growers, and producers sell their wares at the monthly farmers’ market, and, if the car park was anything to go by, attract a healthy throng of interested buyers.

The farmers’ market at Alder Carr Farm is held monthly

The farm’s courtyard was abuzz with activity, with stalls selling fresh meat, fish, cakes, chocolates, truffles, and even Indian food to go. The equally well-stocked farm shop inside one of Alder Carr’s barns sells fruit and vegetables grown on site, as well as local and European cheeses and cold meats, and quiches, sausage rolls and other meat goods made in its production kitchen. There’s even locally-sourced alcohol.

All manner of local produce is sold in the farm shop

Filling our farm shop basket with an odd pairing of vegetable stock and local beer and cyder (with a hint of blackberry liqueur), it was all very impressive, and encouraged our self-sufficiency and local market selling pipe dreams still further. Again, the locally grown vegetables really were very large, as in so many places we’ve been to recently. There was much to tempt the taste buds, but we even somehow managed to avoid being swayed by the Fruit Cream Ice, also made on the Alder Carr grounds.

Three-week old Highland Cattle calf with its proud mother

There’s even something for the children, and the older children among the visitors. Looking and sounding like a fictional farm from The Archers, a three-week old baby Highland Cattle calf was being shown to the world by a very proud mother, and there were bantam chicks and baby Pygmy goats to stroke. That’s not to mention the roadside field of Lohmann chickens, which rush up to the gate like old women at a Debenham’s sale if they think you have feed.

It was a very enjoyable and relaxing start to the weekend, and we would definitely visit again. The farmers’ market is held on the third Saturday of the month from 9am to 1pm, although the farm shop, tearoom and restaurant are open weekly Tuesday to Saturday 10am to 4.30pm, and 10am to 4pm on Sundays.

Find Alder Carr Farm in Creeting St Mary just off the A14/A140 junction to Needham Market, by following the brown tourist signs.

We like to seek out local produce on goodrichard.com and support local growers and producers, and buyers in East Anglia are spoilt for choice with supermarkets stocking all sorts of food and drink from around the area.

Aspall Draught Suffolk Cyder is lightly sparkling, and is made from a different blend of base cyders, all fermented using the same technique. Using local apples or fruit from their own orchards, the eighth-generation Suffolk brewing company first produced the Normandy-style cider variation back in 1728, when Clement Chevallier fermented his first batch of the golden drink.

First created in 2003 to mark the 275th year of making local cyder, Aspall Draught Suffolk Cyder is refreshing, crisp, and has a fresh apple aroma. Light to drink, not at all gassy, and initially sweet with a pleasantly dry aftertaste, it is enjoyable to drink on its own before a meal as we did, and doesn’t feel heavy like a more traditional lager or bitter would.

It was the perfect introduction to the pressed apple beverage, so beloved of many friends, and that somehow, in the last 34 years, had passed me by.

Aspall also produce English Apple Juice, and Cyder Vinegar (a bottle of which we have in the cupboard), in the village of Aspall near Stowmarket. Click here for more details on their traditionally and locally-made products.

Aldeburgh on a rainy Saturday afternoon isn’t the first place that springs to mind when you think about Christmas shopping, but it’s where we ended up today.

Dodging the seemingly never-ending downpours (not very well, it has to be said), and traipsing in and out of small ‘boutique’ shops – complete with disgruntled and rude owners – gave us an appetite for a late-ish lunch.

Our usual eaterie, Munchies, was full, and for a minute we were stumped as to where to go instead. The High Street was deserted, the rain having forced everyone indoors, but looking across the road, we stumbled across the Market Café (or at least, we think that’s what it’s called. Other reports have suggested the Old Grocery Café. If anyone does know, please leave a comment and enlighten us).

Essentially a shop with a small café with a handful of tables, counters and fridges full with locally-sourced produce and fish greeted us when we stepped through the door. It looked increasingly like we might be thankful that at table at Munchies was unavailable. After all, at the worst it would give us a chance to try somewhere else.

Seeing that sandwiches weren’t on the menu, I mistakenly thought that it wouldn’t be an inexpensive food fix. With a choice of starters, main dishes, and lighter portions priced from £4.50, there really was something for everyone.

Naturally promoting their locally-sourced produce, fish featured heavily on the menu, but it was no matter to us; smaller portions of kedgeree and mussels in Thai spices were duly ordered, and were quickly delivered back to the table.

For the same price as a fancy Panini elsewhere, both dishes were very tasty, and made a nice change from a bread-based meal in the middle of the day. Nik reported that his kedgeree was delicious, if a little hot with chilli, and when my small bowl of mussels arrived, it wasn’t really a small bowl at all.

About 20 very large crustaceans were piled high above the Thai-spiced broth, and were infused with sliced chillies, giving them an extra bite. Cooked to perfection, they were equally tasty.

With tea to wash it all down – it was cold and wet outside remember – we vowed to go back again one day (definitely now, if only to catch the proper name of the place), when our travels once more take us the few miles north to the unassuming resort, so beloved by London out-of-towners.

Locally-sourced produce or not, the flavours of the Market Café’s food are enough to tempt even the most-discerning palette. If you’re in town, give it a try; I doubt you’ll be disappointed.

Expensive wasn’t necessarily best at MPH

We broke our own ‘let’s-not-visit-London-at-the-weekend’ rule on Saturday, and hopped on a train down to the capital to see MPH. Nik and I had free tickets worth £33 a pop, so we thought it worthwhile to tolerate another day another day on the trains to see some spectacular cars.

Once in the city, though, getting to Earl’s Court wasn’t easy. I had foolishly forgotten my Oyster card (which frustratingly needed a top-up anyway), and so we had to battle the tourist queues in order for me to buy a one-day travelcard. The Liverpool Street ticket machine lines of people weren’t moving, so we ended up walking to Bank, where broken down machines weren’t encouraging, and the negative thoughts usually encouraged by our weekday commuting trips to the capital started to creep up on us.

Ticket purchase done, the Central and Piccadilly line Tubes whizzed us through the underground network, where we met with comfortable crowds at Earl’s Court, and stands of expensive shiny cars. The highlight of MPH is a live show, which with presenters Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond, and James May is what a live edition of BBC Top Gear would be like.

The 75-minute show featured handfuls of automotive models wheeled out in front of an enthusiastic several-thousand-strong crowd, and a frenzy of action, games, and stunts. It was enjoyable – and loud – and with pyrotechnics to rival budget movies, was a very visual experience.

The ‘Prestige Motorshow’ (a hall of static display cars) was less exciting, and after an hour of weaving between the crowds and cooing over old Fiat 500s (our favourites of the whole show), we jumped back on the Tube and headed back into the centre of town.

A stroll to Borough Market made it our first stop, where we sidestepped and peered at all sorts of fresh produce stalls. Offering locally and speciality-sourced breads, cheeses, fruit and vegetables, fish, meat, mushrooms, and olives (and olive oil), among other tasty-looking items with which to fill the Borough Market hessian shopping bag, it’s very much a tourist market, as the throngs of ethically-minded buyers proved.

Borough Market baklava or balkava?

Spotting a stall specialising in the near-Eastern ground nut, honey, and pastry delicacy of baklava, we bought a bagful to munch on. I had never tried it, but as Nik had enjoyed more than his fair share while in Greece, I was curious to try it for myself. It’s very sticky, and very, very sweet, but served well as a dessert to follow lunch.

Walking down to the Tate Modern, we were curious to see Shibboleth, the 167m crack which runs the whole length of the old turbine hall at the South Bank museum, not only because part of a London landmark had been sacrificed to make it, but also to see exactly how Doris Salcedo’s vision of racism had been interrupted.

The bewildering Shibboleth at Tate Modern

It was very impressive, though largely from a technical viewpoint. We still weren’t sure if it was art, and quite how it represents racism, but it’s definitely worth going to see, before it disappears in April. Starting as a hairline opening at one end of the gigantic hall, it steadily grows to a gaping chasm, and is as shapely as a crack can hope to be. Like many other curious visitors, we dipped our hands or feet in its contoured internal walls, and so well shaped are these, the bottom of the crack is never visible. It must have taken ages to sculpt it.

Louise Bourgeois’ Tate Modern spider a little creepy-crawly

I was a little disappointed by Louise Bourgeois’ fearsome-looking spider overlooking the Millennium Bridge and gazing toward St Paul’s, though. Still scary against a cloudy and grey November sky, and looking like it’s about to scuttle off and attack the City, it wasn’t as large as I had imagined it would be. This was maybe a relief, for someone who doesn’t like spiders all that much.

Our final stop of the day was the Design Museum, to see the Zaha Hadid Architecture and Design exhibition. Ultimately, I was expecting more from the Iraq-born designer. While the showcase was an interesting mix of buildings, furniture, and other objects, the buildings weren’t recognisably buildings, having a very organic, if geometric appearance.

Renderings were joined by sketches which resembled paintings, bringing architecture and art together, while a fair few of the buildings shown hadn’t been built, but were competition winners, or Hadid’s visions of the future.

Even the smaller exhibition of Matthew Williamson’s past and current colourful catwalk glories couldn’t hold off our gradual tiredness, though, and we headed back to Liverpool Street for the train home having enjoyed our weekend day in London.

And as we zizzed up the mainline with weary legs and feet, we were looking forward to going home. But, as fireworks climbed into the darkness of the night sky around the moving train, we were a little gladdened that for once, we hadn’t stayed local.

Locally-pressed Wyken Moonshine

Wyken Vineyards at Stanton (9 miles north from Bury St Edmunds) has been described as ‘one of the pleasantest places to dine in the English countryside’, and although I’ve been there to eat before, our morning visit there today was for the farmers’ market.

As well as a seven acre vineyard producing wine and beer, the Wyken Hall Estate boasts a picturesque Elizabethan manor house, orchards and gardens of all kinds, a farm, and a medieval barn in which the most delicious food is served.

Every Saturday from 9am to 1pm, the farmers’ market in the ramshackle open sheds and barns is a haven of local produce, with fresh bread, cheese, fish, herbs, meat and vegetables all jostling for your attention and taste buds.

Free advice is offered, too; I found out that yellowing basil leaves are a sign of poor nutrition, while coriander and parsley are two of the most problematic herbs to grow, as I had suspected.

A particularly nice morning, we enjoyed tea and coffee while we gazed at the rare sheep and llamas which grazed in the nearby meadows, and vowed to return, not only to explore the bewildering number of exotic and traditional gardens, but to also visit the Leaping Hare Vineyard Restaurant to experience the expensive, but expansive seasonal food menus.