Week two of our CSA subscription.

TomatoesWe’re in our second week of being supplied with fresh fruits and vegetables, having signed up with Horse and Buggy Produce, a local community supported agriculture (CSA) program. (Courtesy cvillenews.com readers.) From now through fall we’ll receive a bounty of produce, which we pick up in town each Friday.

Last week we got a phenomenal amount of green leaf lettuce and Boston butter lettuce, along with beets, sugar snap peas, tomatoes, a dozen enormous eggs, collard greens, and broccoli. The eggs have bright-yellow yolks, and are of an impressive variety of colors. And never before have I seen such a large head of lettuce. We’ve just about polished everything off, just in time for this week’s haul.

Cherries

This week we’ve gotten squash, the two varieties of lettuce, cabbage, cauliflower, three pounds of tomatoes, cherries, a dozen eggs, spring onions, and beets. We’ve already put the spring onions and tomatoes to work — they’re on a pizza, baking in the oven right now. The cherries will constitute dessert. Lettuce

The trick with all of this is to actually eat it all. Thankfully, we’re splitting our share with my in-laws, so while I’m not about to eat beets, they will. We have no idea of what’s coming until we pick up our share on Friday, so meal planning has to be premised on the foods with which we’re provided. It’s definitely a different approach to eating, but to get so much fresh produce for so little cost makes it well worth it.

Pizza’s done.

Published by Waldo Jaquith

Waldo Jaquith (JAKE-with) is an open government technologist who lives near Char­lottes­­ville, VA, USA. more »

7 replies on “Week two of our CSA subscription.”

  1. Janis, I can understand your delight with Waldo eating vegetables. Living out here in the country, we’ve been picking peas, broccoli, lettuce and onions while digging red potatoes from our own garden. Amazingly, my boys are not really complaining about eating vegetables this year either. But, working in the garden is another story in itself. : )

  2. This sounds like something someone should do in this area. I have been aware of these since living in California, but hadn’t seen any around this area.

    I live for the great veggies from our garden every year. Nothing else compares.

  3. Waldo, have you ever tried roasting beets? After they’re scrubbed and trimmed, cut them into 1 to 1 1/2 inch chunks, toss them with olive oil and salt and pepper, and slide them into a 450 oven for about 30 minutes, stirring at least once, until they’re tender.

    For some reason, the drier “skin” that roasting puts on veggies makes them taste really yummy to me, so, you might want to try it before completely abandoning beets.

    Now to see if I can track down a CSA in Pittsylvania…

    … But what do you do for veggies/salads during the winter?

    — R’cat
    http://www.CatHouseChat.com

  4. I’ve never tried doing anything with beets, to be honest, other than turning up my nose at them. :) You’re the second person to recommend roasting them, though, so I believe I’ll have to try that.

    But what do you do for veggies/salads during the winter?

    You buy ’em from the store, who gets them from California or Mexico or wherever, if you want to eat things out of season. CSA’s are a purely in-season phenom — you get food as long as it’s being grown, and come fall, that’s the end until spring, if you want to sign up again.

    Eating food in-season only is a tricky proposal. It’s entirely doable (mankind has been doing so for millennia), and has the added bonus of making you appreciate spring all the more. But the reality of keeping everybody in the family happy, particularly if you have picky young eaters, can easily make such ideals go out the window. :)

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