There are two versions of food shopping.

One involves remembering you need milk, grabbing a trolley and spending 20 minutes wondering why you came home with £63 worth of shopping but nothing that actually makes a meal.

The other involves pies, farm shops, butchers, cake and the possibility of lunch while you're there.

We know which version we'd rather write about.

Here are five Peterborough-area stops where buying food can become part of the outing.

Peterborough City Market: build dinner while you're already in town

You don't necessarily need to leave Peterborough to escape the supermarket aisles.

Peterborough City Market on Bridge Street has a food hall with independent traders including butchers, a fishmonger and delicatessen.

That's particularly handy when you don't know exactly what dinner is yet.

Have a look around. See what catches your eye. Ask what's good. Build the meal backwards from what you find.

It's also easy to combine with everything else you're doing in the city centre rather than making food shopping a separate expedition.

Location: Bridge Street, Peterborough

Peterborough City Market

Moor Farm Shop: go for the meat, accidentally stay for tea

Moor Farm Shop on Decoy Road in Newborough concentrates on traceable meat, homemade pies and locally sourced groceries.

And then there's the tearoom.

Which creates the classic farm-shop problem.

You went out for something for Sunday lunch.

You came home with meat, a pie, several things nobody remembers putting in the basket and the knowledge that you've already eaten cake.

The shop also advertises meat packs, making it worth checking if you're filling the freezer rather than buying for one meal.

Location: Decoy Road, Newborough

Moor Farm Shop

Harvest Barn: the farm shop that can occupy the children too

Harvest Barn in Farcet combines a farm shop with a kitchen, animal paddocks and play space.

That changes the proposition completely.

This isn't simply somewhere to dash into for a bag of vegetables.

You can shop for locally sourced food, get something to eat and give younger members of the family something more interesting to do than ask how much longer you're going to be.

For a weekend food trip with children, that's quite a persuasive combination.

Location: Ramsey Road, Farcet

Harvest Barn

Ferry Meadows: buy something local, then go for a walk

The Ferry Meadows Visitor Centre includes a shop stocking locally and regionally sourced food.

Of course, the unfair advantage here is Ferry Meadows itself.

You can browse the shop and then you're already in Nene Park.

Walk first and reward yourself afterwards. Shop first and take something home. Or simply use food as the excuse for getting out for an hour.

This is less “Where shall we do the food shopping?” and more “Where can we go this afternoon that happens to involve food?”

Taste Trail definitely has room for both.

Location: Ferry Meadows, Nene Park

Ferry Meadows Visitor Centre

Willow Brook: butcher, farm shop and café in one trip

Out towards Helpston Heath, Willow Brook Farm Shop & Traditional Butchers gives you another reason to turn shopping into lunch.

There's the traditional butcher and farm-shop range, while the associated Granary café uses ingredients from the farm shop, including the business's farm-reared beef.

That's a particularly nice circle:

see the produce, eat some of it, then decide what you're taking home.

This is the one for somebody who enjoys choosing ingredients almost as much as eating them.

Location: Scotsman Lodge, Stamford Road, Helpston Heath

Willow Brook Farm Shop

Now give us the one we've missed

The interesting thing about farm shops, village butchers, delis and producers is that the best recommendation is often something very specific.

Not:

“It's a nice shop.”

But:

“Buy their sausages.”

“Don't leave without one of the pies.”

“The cake in the café is ridiculous.”

That's what we want.

Tell us the Peterborough-area farm shop, market, butcher, bakery or food producer you make a special journey for and the one thing we should buy when we get there.