A letter from Lola Milholland
I’ve made a hard choice. After this season, Umi will no longer have a booth at the farmers markets. We launched Umi at the Hollywood Farmers Market in the summer of 2016 with a custom wooden counter my friend Peter built where I dreamed people would pull up to slurp noodles, signage Gary designed, cloth napkins Cynthia had sewn, a menu that changed every week, and a single product to take home: organic ramen noodles.
Cynthia and Amanda at the first Umi market booth with our beautiful, heavy custom table that Peter built.
Twice, I lit my bangs on fire trying to light our massive propane turkey fryer. We would arrive to the market hours early to boil the largest pot of water I’d ever filled, and it would take us just as long to pack up, waiting for the now gelatinous water, thickened by the tapioca starch we coat our noodles with, to cool. At Hollywood, a couple ran a sausage booth called Buns on the Run, and after the market closed, they would pull out camping chairs and sit awhile before packing. Those first markets, even after they sat for half an hour, Buns on the Run would still manage to leave before us. I vowed that one day we would beat Buns on the Run. It took us months before I looked out the rearview window of the van and saw Buns on the Run still placidly sitting, resting their buns.
When I got home after those first markets, after washing dishes at the Portland Mercado commissary kitchen and then unloading Peter’s impossibly heavy table into my garage, I would drink an entire milkshake and then fall into bed for the kind of nap that left me feeling like old wet fabric. But I did love the work. I felt proud of the food we made and excited about the community we were joining. I fell in love with eating Khadro of Alleamin’s sambusas—my first taste of the Somalian version of what I’ve always called a samosa. I met Aaron of Stoneboat Farm and grew accustomed to his happy, easy laugh. Every Saturday, a man would order an extra-large bowl of our noodles with two pairs of chopsticks. One market, he was suddenly holding an infant, and I realized he’d been feeding our noodles to three people—himself, his partner, and his newborn still in the womb! We’d helped make a baby, I decided, and felt plum about it.
The following season we joined King Market, in my neighborhood. I loved it immediately. There were always parades of dogs and little kids stumbling over dogs. We started to make sauces—miso sesame and bibim, and sometimes a pesto made with shiso or cilantro or wasabi leaves or whatever we decided. We refined our menu, making it a direct expression of the market. We used whatever seasonal stuff we could buy, pickling it, roasting it, putting it all on top of our noodles tossed in our new sauces to show customers that honest-to-god any vegetable cooked almost any way is good on top of our noodles. Once, we roasted small Nantes carrots from Wintergreen and they came out looking like cocktail wieners, which felt weird to serve at market but the point remained: this too tasted (although did not look) good on top of our noodles.
A classic Umi noodle bowl: Our noodles tossed in miso pesto, Ota fried tofu, a jammy egg, radicchio salad, pickled carrots and radishes, Hot Mama’s smoky coffee chili oil, and some homemade gomashio.
At King, we met Elan of Temptress Truffles, Nikki of Hot Mama’s Salsa, Ana of Winters Market, and later, Nick and Alex of Rangoon Bistro. One day, my friend Sarah, a regular whose son grew from a tadpole to a hair-flipping, scooter-racing real boy before my eyes, brought me a dessert from Rangoon Bistro as a gift: a piece of white bread hidden in a bath of sweetened coconut milk with fresh market berries, sticky rice, pandan noodles, cubes of sweetened soymilk, and pink tapioca balls made of fresh berry juice that mimicked the marion and boysenberries they nestled between. Now that I know this dessert exists, I will never be the same.
And now I am thinking about that time Patrick took the piece of paper I’d written “APRON” on to remind myself not to forget aprons again and wore it around as an apron. The first time I saw Dino warm a Small Baking Co. chocolate chip cookie on our griddle so the chocolate melted. The tanginess of our miso sesame noodles for breakfast, first thing in the morning. The satisfaction of our yakisoba, with that seasoned griddle flavor, after the market ends. When the King market let us set up our noodle luge right down the center aisle!
Kyoko’s daughter Shiso practices her chopstick skills at our noodle luge.
I’m thinking of the time I listened to the playoffs on a little radio at market as CJ hit the shot to beat Denver. Going to Choi’s to pick up gochujang from Matt and hanging around for a while, catching up and asking each other questions about our businesses. Risa of Lepage Food and Drink taking over our hot food and putting roasted chickpeas and Campfire farms roasted pork on our noodles! My dad portioning noodles. My dad helping set up in the morning. My dad bringing our staff hot pancakes with little bits of butter still melting on them from his apartment one block away. Patrick, Dino, Amanda, Cynthia, Robyn, Claire, Emily, Katelyn, Meg, Roxy, Tracy, Jodie, Leigh, Enya, Stephen, Alley, Jess, Kacy, Chris, Zak, Ayla, my mom, my dad, Corey, and so many others who have held the other side of the cooler with me, shown up to the kitchen before the sun rises, watched the noodle water thicken, eaten a bowl of noodles after a long market day.
I’m thinking of the customer who described making our noodles for a best friend after an injury because she wanted to show him her love in the fullest way she could. The barter economy, which makes me feel like the richest person in the world, carrying home boxes emptied of noodles and now filled with the most beautiful produce: Melons and melons and melons, tomatoes and tomatoes and tomatoes. Lettuce! Nectarines! Romanesco! Radicchio!
A market haul of delicious food from King Market, all received in trade for our noodles!
I’m also thinking about days that were murkier and harder. Hefting coolers of unsold noodles into the van. The old woman who told me that she cut one pack of our noodles into quarters and then boiled one quarter at a time for hours, happy with her cooking method as my eyes teared up in sorrow. Standing in the brutal sun because somehow the tent never provided any shade that day. Standing in the very center of the tent because the rain was coming in on every side like the wind was blowing in 360 degrees. Quiet, cold days, working the market alone, and no one was shopping, and time didn’t make any sense. Cleaning up in the kitchen afterwards, so physically tired the only thing to do was drink a milkshake and sleep.
Later, we joined PSU and Montavilla markets in the winters. I’ve always felt total wonder and gratitude to the market managers, staff, and volunteers at all these places—people who build the skeleton of a village for vendors to fill, arriving before we do, chalking our name on the pavement: UMI. Stone Barns. Amylk. Our fellow vendors start their mornings the same as us, loading vans and hefting heavy objects with their tired bodies, only to unload them and build a temporary home for their business—the same as us but sometimes earlier, farther away, heavier, more. Over the years at markets, I made new, close friends with people who I worked alongside. I also got my first white hairs. I learned how to pare down my efforts to their essence—we’re ending this last season with one menu item, our yakisoba on the griddle, served every week, and honestly yes you should get all the toppings! I learned where I want to put in extra effort: ginger pickled in our homemade shiso vinegar. And where I want to highlight someone else’s artistry: Ota fried tofu, Hot Mama’s chili oil, local Yamaki katsuobushi, and Kewpie, the god of mayonnaise!
A bowl of our yakisoba, cooked at market, with all my favorite toppings.
When COVID came, I donned my first mask at market—I put it on upside down, not realizing the metal nose piece was around my chin. We faced a bizarre spitty snowstorm in March. Patrick encouraged us to move to a sliding scale model so people could pay what they could afford. When we did, something clicked for me about why I am in business and what I care about. Every year we donated to the farmers market fund so people on SNAP could have their money matched. Every year, this too expressed who we are and who we want to be. The markets made us a better business.
I love the markets. I don’t love how physical and emotional the work can be, but I love the way I feel part of something larger than myself. I am feeding into an ecosystem. I can feel a shared heartbeat. Not everyone feels it but those who do can look each other in the eyes and feel that thump-thump together. Thump-thump. Your life gives me life. Thump-thump. My life gives you life. This is a place where we really believe that and try to enact it.
Why are we leaving the markets? There are many reasons, honestly. One is financial. As a small-scale food business, right now everything costs more—ingredients, freight, warehousing, staff—and we refuse to squeeze the farmers or pay our staff less. The markets have always been a break-even endeavor for us. Now, they’ve started to become an expense. Without sampling, we sell less sauce. Without raising our prices beyond what feels reasonable, we make less margin. It’s hard to rent our commissary during all the hours we don’t need it. We want to pay our market staff more because the cost of living has risen so much, but we can’t afford to, and that feels wrong. Another reason is about focus. For us, the water has been flowing in the direction of public school lunches and new retail products. This takes a lot of time and intention.
November will be our last month at Hollywood and King, and your last chance to come eat our yakisoba on the griddle, buy a bibim or miso sesame sauce, try to steal one of the beach rocks I collect to hold down the corners of our tablecloth, and hang out with Patrick, Dino, Leigh, and me in this particular way.
Our business is changing, and sometimes change can feel sad, but that’s not the main emotion I feel. I lived it up at the markets. Umi would not exist in its form today without it. I value the people who’ve worked with me more than I can say. The lessons I’ve learned stay with me, as do the friendships and the experiences of care. When we did it, we did it with intention and oomph. We are evolving, striving as we always have to serve our community in the best ways we can. I feel excited about what it means to pour my energy in new and familiar directions. We’re still at local groceries! Please pick up a pack of noodles! Our whole grain noodles are being served in public schools and restaurants! And we’re launching new organic products, including a brand-new yakisoba sauce, into retail! We would still love your support. We may no longer be standing under a ten-by-ten-foot tent winking at you, but we’re not so far from that. Trust me, the staff and I will be there in the aisles shopping with you, excited to meet the new business that fills our corner of pavement. And we’re also only one phone call or email away. Please reach out. Ask for noodle donations for your events. Tell us how you cooked the noodles and for whom. Ask us questions about new dishes, new sauces, shelf life, ingredients. This feels like the end of one era and the beginning of another. Your life gives us life. Thump-thump. We hope ours does the same for you!
Go Blazers! Maybe one day we’ll hear an announcer cry out, “That’s the Alley Umi Oop of the game!”