Saturday, June 19, 2010

CSA Saturday! (Community Supported Agriculture)

Every saturday I go out, down the road to an organic farm that's in my 'hood - a farm that has a box of freshly picked organic veggies, herbs and fruit waiting for me! This year I was not able to get my own organic garden prepared fast enough to grow most of my own food, and I was lucky enough to remember that a few years ago at the Waynesville NC Farmers Market there was this awesome lady named Julie who was bringing boxes of food all the way from Hot Springs for her CSA members......
I totally called Mountain Harvest Organics up on da' phone and joined!


So here is how it works for me - since I am local instead of picking up my organic box of goodies at a market I go to the farm every saturday. I look forward to it all week long! I pull up to a barn, which has a second story that was converted into a house for the farm interns. (Neato, right? Right on...) Underneath that barn house are the freezers where my box is kept --- but before I show you that, check out their awesome greenhouses ... There are several greenhouses where food is being grown, to extend the seasons for their CSA members and their own kitchen table. This is in addition to the 4 acres of farmland they recently fenced in high enough to keep out the deer. There are also pigs and goats - which I hope to get to pics of another time for ya'll!

Inside this greenhouse is tomatoes - which I totally can not eat... the cool thing about a small organic CSA is that the owners Julie and Carl are kind enough to replace/substitute some other veggies for the shit I am allergic too...YAY!
I usually pick up some potted herbs and flowers too, for discounted prices - they said late in the season people don't buy them much at the market so I have been building an herb empire at the Luck Cabin for a very small fee --- herbs i use in cooking every single day.
After getting some live herbs, I go down under the barn house to the big industrial looking fridge to grab my box!
I buy the big box - there are two sizes and the big one is really for a family but since I cook every single meal from scratch every single day and rely heavily on vegetables as the part of my diet I CAN have - I pay $25 for the week of cornucopia. Pretty sweet deal when you realize how much you pay for all this in the store - I get things like bok choy, chinese cabbage, broccoli, onions, kale, lettuce, kohlrabi, radishes, turnips, squash, cucumbers..... and even had two weeks of the most DELICIOUS strawberries of my LIFE!!!
I stick my money in an envelope - for this farm, I pay either per week, per month, and I bet they wouldn't mind if you paid for the year too! ;)
BTW- my last name is kinda mis-spelled here .... it's pronounced REE_SHARD.
Thanks to Julie and Carl for making my life 100x's easier, better, and tastier!!!!!!!!!!
XOXO

5 comments:

  1. Real food Does rock!
    non-food called food (in stores) sucks!

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  2. Wow! How fortunate you are!

    xoxoxoxo

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  3. CSA is huge in Wisconsin, especially around Madison, which is a little more progressive than the rest of the state. It's interesting to see how different the farms are from the standard farm nowadays-much more diverse produce and in tune with nature, rather than constantly battling with it.

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  4. COsmic- I feel really thankful ... i think there are CSA's everywhere , near most any city if your are interesed you should check out your area. Make life alot easier. :)

    Mr Cheese!
    I like the diverse produce farms much better- the mass scale farming is really to our detriment on this planet - especially to human health. I totally think that mass scale farming the way we've done it in the last 50-70- 80 years plays a large role in causing genetic diseases like the one I have (Celiac SPrue)---- when the Mayo clinic did a study on blood from people in the 1950's and blood from people today the went from 1 in 800 to 1 in 150 people having auto immune reactions to gluten - they concluded that a major environmental factor had to have caused it, because a disease should not advance genetically on it's own like that.

    Did i digress?
    xoxo

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