Our farm experience...

I am so excited because we have a new CSA this year!  For those of you who don't know, a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) is when you buy a share of a farm and every week during the summer and fall, you get freshly harvested local (and in our case, organic!) produce.  We started doing this last year with a well-known farm but I felt they were too expensive and I became bored with what was in my box.  I ended up going to our local farmer's market and meeting a new organic farmer and I supplemented what was coming to me every week.  I bought a huge grocery store bag of basil for $4 and whipped up five batches of pesto sauce and stuck them in the freezer.  The spinach was amazing.  I bought 50 pounds of organic potatoes from the farm at the end of fall and we consumed them throughout the winter. 


The farm had an open house on Memorial Day.  So with a few good friends, we packed into the van and drove a little more than an hour north.  As we get closer, we see little girls in dresses and bonnets as well as little boys in pants and suspenders, playing in the fields and wavinging to each car as they passed by. 

I forgot it was an Amish farm.  :)

When we arrived, our farmer took us on a tour (after I had to stop in the outhouse for some business) and we got to see the cows and the horses.  My littlest one thought a small cat was the most entertaining feature of the farm; he kept trying to pick him up by his tail and back legs  and would respond with such ferocious laughter, it was hard to tell him to put the kitty down.  ;) 

The entire farm is farmed by horses so we went on a hayride and got to see where our kale, corn, tomatoes and peas are growing.  After the hayride, we went over to the Amish family's personal garden and were invited to eat raw asparagus that we plucked right out of the ground.  NEVER have I EVER eaten asparagus like this...sweet, crisp...you could eat the whole stem.  We ate spicy radishes and tender strawberries.  After our garden experience, we sat on the porch and ate popcorn and drank pink lemondae with the Amish family.

Our farmer that comes to market is more of the PR person of the farmer; she does help harvest but truly, she brings the farm to the farmer's market.  She and I have been working with the head farmer and this year, they are going to harvest dried beans for me.  Last week I bought six pounds of dried black beans and I felt a little frustrated and disappointed because they were the same price as Whole Foods but there were a lot of debris in the bags.  But once I saw the farm, I realized that my few dollars probably makes a bigger impact on this family rather than Whole Foods.  So I look forward to my garbanzo beans too.


The experience was extraordinary.  It was really neat to see another way of life and to see where and how our food is being grown. 

BUY LOCAL.  BUY ORGANIC. 
To find a local farmer's market or CSA near you, go to www.localharvest.org!  :)