Where Cambrian's Saturday Farmers Market Went, and Who Runs It

The Saturday farmers market that set up at Cambrian Park Plaza beginning in 2019 still runs, under the same operator, at Leigh High School. CHAMP Farmer Markets runs it at 5210 Leigh Avenue, just off Blossom Hill Road, every Saturday from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., all year. Santa Clara County's list of certified farmers markets shows the same day, hours, address and operator.

The move fits in a single line on CHAMP's history page. One operator runs this market, he got his start as a vendor, and at 82 he is back behind a booth selling his own produce.

The 2025 line in the operator's own timeline

CHAMP's chronology moves fast. It opened a marketplace in downtown Salinas in 2002. Over the next decade it ran markets for the City of Salinas, two school districts, two shopping centers, and the cities of Seaside, Gonzales and Hercules. It began operating in San Jose in 2013, including a market at the Almaden / Via Valiente Plaza shopping center. In 2019, two South San Jose markets opened in the same year, one at Cambrian Park Plaza and one at Princeton Plaza Mall.

The 2025 entry reads in full: "CHAMP closes Cambrian Park location and opens a new location at Leigh High School in San Jose."

The page gives no reason for the move, so this post won't guess at one. What matters for a Saturday morning is that the market kept its operator, its day and its hours. It simply moved to a school campus on Leigh Avenue. The current page for the Leigh market opens with "Welcome to our 2026 Season," so this is the market's second year at the new site.

A former Monterey fish vendor who now sells his own produce

CHAMP's contact page names Joe Aliotti as the person behind the markets. His history begins on the vendor side of the table. In the late 1990s he was a fresh fish vendor at the downtown Monterey farmers market, where he sold for 16 years. He also ran booths at the Live Oak and Walnut Creek markets for five years each. The history page says Monterey is where he got to know many of the fruit and vegetable vendors he still works with. From 1999 to 2002 he ran the Fish Peddler Fresh Fish Market and Deli in Watsonville, and CHAMP opened in Salinas after that.

His own page describes what he set out to build:

"He has designed his Farmer Markets to fit within each community and to be gathering places for people to shop, have fun and see friends along the way."

That line comes from CHAMP's history page. The next paragraph on the same page tells the newer part of the story. In 2025, at 82, Aliotti opened "The Farm" in Carmel Valley and became a vendor again, selling what the page calls "farm to table", pesticide free fruits, vegetables, avocados, artichokes and more. The Farm appears on the Leigh roster among the certified growers. At Leigh Avenue, the man who runs the market also has a booth in it.

Who is on the 2026 roster

CHAMP posts the Leigh lineup by category.

Certified growers

• Alberto Farms
• Avila Farms
• Hector's Organics
• Ibara Farm
• The Farm
• Ledesma Family Farms
• Valois Farm
• Lee Asian Farm
• Gomez Berry Farm
• Rojas Fruit
• Resendiz Fruit Farm
• Rocking Chair Fruit Farm

Honey and eggs

• Mango Blossom Honey
• Pasture Chick & Eggs

Bakeries, coffee and prepared food

• Asby Confections, Holly Crepes, Little Sky Bakery, Beckman's Bakery, California Bakeshop
• Strait Coffee, WhatCoffee & Bakery, Olga Cacao
• Empanada Love, Hummus Heaven, Deanna Jars, plus a chicken tamale stand

Other

• Buster Butler, Henry Bags, Homemade Bows

Several growers have public profiles elsewhere that show where the food comes from. Heart of the City Farmers Market, which also hosts the farm, describes Ledesma Family Farms as Javier Ledesma's operation in Gustine. Its listed certified-organic crops include artichokes, beets, broccoli, carrots, cauliflower, lettuces, raspberries, strawberries, tomatoes and potatoes. The Pacific Coast Farmers' Market Association places Gomez Berry Farm in Gilroy and leads with its strawberries, with blackberries and raspberries also mentioned. A LocalHarvest listing for Pasture Chick Ranch, last updated in January 2025, puts the ranch in Hollister's Santa Ana Valley. It says eggs and broilers are available year-round and turkeys in the fall before the holidays.

Add The Farm in Carmel Valley and the growers with known locations cover Gilroy, Hollister, Gustine and Carmel Valley. None of these sources lists what a particular stand will bring in a given October week. If a holiday turkey is on your list this fall, ask at the Pasture Chick booth early in the season.

Three market mornings a week from one operator

The Leigh market is one of two that CHAMP runs in this part of San Jose. The other, at Princeton Plaza, has run since 2019 and is also posting a 2026 season. Together they give the Cambrian and Blossom Hill area three market mornings a week from the same operator.

The year-round schedule is what sets these markets apart as the weather cools. On the same county list, the Saturday Berryessa market runs May 3 to November 15, and the Murphy Avenue market on Murphy Avenue in San Jose is closed for winter with its spring reopening date still pending. The Leigh market has no announced closing date. A Saturday shopper here can keep the same routine into December and past it.

Saturday, October 17, with a library book sale and a new bagel shop

This coming Saturday adds two stops around the market. The Friends of the Cambrian Branch Library hold a book sale on October 17 from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Cambrian Library, 1780 Hillsdale Avenue. The library's listing promises "a large selection of donated books, media, and specialty items," and the proceeds pay for library programs, books and supplies.

The book sale runs an hour past the market's 1 p.m. close, which allows an easy order for the morning:

1. Breakfast on Camden. The Posh Bagel opened in the Lucky Supermarket center at 2005 Camden Avenue. The Mercury News reported the opening on September 3, 2026. The shop opens daily at 6:30 a.m. and closes at 2:30 p.m.
2. The market at Leigh High School. The market is open from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.
3. The book sale on Hillsdale. It runs until 2 p.m., so the market produce can sit in the car while you browse the tables.

According to the Mercury News piece, the first thing customers see inside the Camden shop is a crepe-making station near the front door. The early favorites include the Meat and Cheddar eggwich, a lox-and-cream-cheese bagel, a California Club, and strawberry-and-fruit crepes. Bagel flavors go beyond the usual to asiago, pesto, marinara and jalapeño-cheddar. It is San Jose's second Posh Bagel, after the Almaden Valley shop, and part of a Bay Area group that started on Main Street in Los Altos in 1992. The paper also reported that afternoon hours might be extended later, given how much of the menu is sandwiches and crepes.

With Holly Crepes on the market roster, crepes are on the menu at two stops on the same Saturday morning.

What the market's pages don't say

CHAMP's pages, the county directory and the vendor profiles above cover the schedule, the address and the people. They leave some practical details out. None of these sources mentions parking at the school, whether the market takes EBT or offers Market Match, or a dog policy. No vendor has posted a weekly list of what it will bring. Holiday weekends could bring schedule changes that the "year-round" label doesn't cover. Princeton Plaza is the alternative on Sundays if a Saturday falls through.

For anything not posted, the contact page names Joe Aliotti as the person to reach.

At Yore & Van Zant, we keep close track of the places that set Cambrian Park's weekly routine, from the Saturday market on Leigh Avenue to the book sale on Hillsdale. If you've been thinking about what your Cambrian Park home is worth in today's market, we're glad to prepare a Free Market Analysis for you, with the same street-level attention.