We picked up our first CSA last night

We joined the Rosie Creek Farm Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) group this summer. I wrote to them in February to sign up and was placed on a waiting list, and then got word on Monday that our first pick up was Tuesday!

For those of you who don't know how CSA works, you basically buy a "share" for the run of the CSA (here it's 11-13 weeks) and every week you pick up lovely locally grown organic produce -- whatever is freshest and ready to be picked. Here's a sampling of what they offer: Salad Greens, Braising Greens, Radishes, Scallions, Lettuce, Broccoli, Beets, Summer quash, Cauliflower, Snap Beans, Carrots, Peas, Potatoes, Onions, Pumpkins, Garlic, Winter Squash and Tomatoes.

It's fun...it's like a Russian roulette of fresh yummy veggies. The best part is that you usually get so much produce you can save some by canning or freezing. Yes, not as fresh, but still...I like to support local agriculture and the organic is really important to me. It's tough to find in military commissaries. The price was good -- $375 for 12 weeks of mounds of fresh organic stuff is pretty comparable or even favorable to the prices of the grocery store and the quality is better.

So last night we picked up our first week of produce. We got two gorgeous Bok Choy, two heads of lettuce (I believe romaine and butter?), a big bag of spring greens with edible flowers, and some really nice broccoli raab. We had BLTs for lunch, I'm making Charlie a chef salad for lunch tomorrow since I'm going to be downtown, we're having stir-fried garlic and broccoli raab with our salmon, spinach pie and red pepper-rice pilaf for dinner tonight. Then tomorrow night we're going to have fresh tomato linguine and a wilted lettuce salad.

I think I might shift my menu planning and shopping to Wednesday so I can make some plans for my fresh produce. I'll let you know how this goes for the rest of the summer, but so far we are really enjoying this...feeling good about supporting local agriculture, giving our money to an organic farm rather than a large corporation, and getting lovely food to boot.