CSA, at last!

Friday, 6 April 2012, 7:37 a.m. PDT: The beginning of a new era. Today we awoke to find a box of freshly picked fruits and vegetables waiting on our front porch, our very first CSA (community supported agriculture) delivery. Christmas on Good Friday!

Cosmo checks out our first CSA trove--turns out he fancies arugula!

The sight of a humble cardboard box full of fruits and vegetables sitting outside the door might not seem like much to some folks, but to me it means several things, all of them positive:

It means less for me to lug home from the farmers’ market. I’ll still go, of course, but I can cross some things off the list and focus on bringing home others.

It means someone in the know is handing me an item I might not buy very often and saying, “Here, give this a try. It’s good.” I seldom pick up arugula, but I have a bunch of it in the crisper drawer now. And I’ll find a way to use it. We may decide we like it so much we can’t imagine doing without. And if we don’t, that’s okay, too.

It means supporting local growers by saying, “I value what you do, and I’m willing to sign up, so you know in advance that you can count on my money to help you feed me well.”

It means an assortment of food that is all organically grown. I don’t have to wander the produce section of the neighborhood gigantomart puzzling over the labels and wondering if the companies behind each of them can be trusted.

It means a significantly smaller carbon footprint is made when we buy locally grown produce, because it’s not being shipped from across the country–or worse, from another continent entirely. And food that travels only a few miles to get to your table will be picked when it’s ripe, which means the flavor and texture will be better. No case of the mealies and the lacklusters to disappoint us.

Mainly, for me it’s a step toward the way I grew up on the farm, with an abundance of fresh food. Of course we didn’t grow oranges, lemons and avocados on our Tennessee farm, but most of our food was available to us by stepping out the back door, or reaching into the pantry for something we’d picked and put up in August to eat in mid-winter. CSAs draw on the bounty of the neighborhood. You can fill in the rest however you like.

If you’re not taking advantage of a CSA and you want to know more about community supported agriculture, visit Local Harvest’s website. There’s a place to enter your zip code and see which CSA is closest to you.

Welcome to the San Fernando Valley, CSA! We’re very happy to have you here.