In 2017 I joined a CSA at a local farm, called "Deercrest". In case you are not familiar with the term, CSA stands for "Community Sponsored Agriculture." It's a way to continually get seasonal, local, fresh food while helping your local farmer. One pays up front, and each week you get a box or bag of produce. In total we spend about $25/week. What you get varies from farm to farm, and if the weather is not cooperative the quality will not be as you hoped! However, it's an "investment" in your local farm. Since we are always trying to help our local businesses, it's perfect for us. If we have too much food or are on vacation (LOL, no vacation this year!), John is always happy to take on some fresh produce. Easy.
We like Deercrest a lot because they always have some fruit in the box. They're also really friendly. They also occasionally include fresh apple cider as we move into late summer. Peter and John both have a fondness for real, unfiltered, unpasteurized apple cider.
Last year I decided to try a different farm, one that was a bit closer. It wasn't as good, even though it is an excellent farm. Too many greens and hardly any fruit. We missed the variety.....so now we are back at Deercrest!
Last week we got our first CSA box with broccoli rabe, regular broccoli, dandelion greens, radishes, baby salad greens, and strawberries!
Doing a CSA often requires a bit of research. My farm will provide recipes on its website, but I usually just Google things on my own. How the heck does one cook dandelion greens, for example? Well, I found a recipe. It involved simmering the greens in salted water for a few minutes, which supposedly gets a good part of the bitterness out. Then they went into the skillet with some sauteed onions and spices. We ate it all!
Here is our second CSA box, which I picked up this morning:
Broccoli, cauliflower, turnip greens, field greens, strawberries, and apple cider vinegar!
I have a recipe for the turnip greens, which also uses the vinegar, and I will try it tonight in my "Instant Pot."
