Hoist a locally grown organic carrot in celebration, you avid foodies, gourmands and epicureans: A minor renaissance of farmers’ markets is taking root in the valley. Next month, a new weekly indoor farmers’ market launches downtown; meanwhile, the beloved Bet on the Farm also plans to revive its popular weekly market, this time at the Springs Preserve.

This issue is about DEALicious Meals — the mega-caloric, hyperglycemic fun starts on page 26! — but you know the old saw about too much of a good thing. Here’s the problem: Tens of thousands of Las Vegans live in “food deserts.

Most of the attention during the 2011 Legislature was focused either on the legislative building or across the tree-lined courtyard at the state Capitol, where Gov. Brian Sandoval works in an expansive office.

Editor’s note: In Discomfort Zone, we urge teetotalers to have a drink, wallflowers to go to nightclubs and — in our first installment here — convince humanists to attend apocalyptic religious rallies. To riff and ridicule? No, to open their minds by taking them out of their comfort zone — and putting them in the Discomfort Zone.

Foster kid Heather Wilder had been through counselors, therapists and case workers. But what might really save her? Writing “This is a story about me and my hurts.

Ditching the gluten? Local restaurants have a crop of safe eats Gluten: It’s a sticky protein compound in wheat and other grains — and the latest nutritional villain. Once thought of as only a culprit in causing celiac disease (imagine indigestion with a superiority complex), some recent studies have found that up to 6 percent of the U.

I miss cigarettes. I’ve been thinking about them quite a bit since tavern lobbyists cough cough ahem I mean lawmakers voted to roll back the wide-ranging smoking ban that Nevadans called for in 2006.

Project Dinner Table Various locations projectdinnertable.com Project Dinner Table is like a do-gooder foodie flash mob, its signature long white table popping up everywhere from Gilcrease Orchard to Town Square to the World Market Center.

Hope you’re hungry. Because it’s time to strap on your bib, loosen your belt and dig in to our compendium of the best cheap eats across the valley, from deep-dish pizza to bubble gum crepes to a Korean dish called, ominously and accurately enough, “fire chicken.

‘We’ll have asparagus out the wing-wang.’ Arugula, oregano, tarragon … “Really, everything grows in the desert, as long as you start with good soil and have enough water,” says Marilyn Yamamoto, founder of Organic Edibles.