From the Journal of HortScience:

Study: Conventionally Grown Vegetables Have Lower Nutrient Value Than Organics and Days of Old.

Some customers have inquired about a CSA, and I’ve decided to do one this year.  I’m not making an “official” announcement until I’ve got my land leases finalized so I can determine how many shares I can offer, but right now, the plan is to do a CSA.

“What’s a CSA?”

I may be jumping ahead of myself.  “CSA” stands for Community Supported Agriculture.  There are many, many different approaches, but the basic idea is that it’s a farm subscription.  Participants pay a fee at the beginning of the season and then receive a bag of produce (or meat or eggs or whatever the farm offers) every week for the duration of the subscription period.  This is a great deal for farmers because it gives us the money up front, right when we most need it to invest in seed, land, equipment, and so on, and the customer is assuming some of the risk with us. If there’s a bumper crop of something, the customer receives more; but if something comes up short, it’s understood that the customer will receive less.  Generally speaking, most CSAs are a little lean in the spring and overflowing in late summer.

CSA subscribers see it as a good deal for them for a variety of reasons.  People I’ve talked with have cited convenience, a desire to support local farmers, wanting to know where their food comes from, the adventure of trying new things they wouldn’t have picked out themselves, and the “eat your veggies” reminder that comes from having a varied bag of seasonal produce to deal with every week.

I mentioned different approaches.  Some CSAs require their members to put in so many hours of labor on the farm.  Others don’t, but offer members an opportunity to “work off” some portion of their subscription cost.  Some offer sliding scale fees to include people who otherwise couldn’t participate, while others set their fees deliberately high to ensure they only have members who are really committed.  Subscriptions can be for anywhere from three months to all year long.  Some farms offer separate summer and winter CSA plans.  Others have various subscription levels, priced differently depending on what you want in your bag (meat, milk, etc.) or on how supportive you want to be.  Some require payment all up front, others allow installments.  There’s a lot of room for flexibility.

I haven’t worked out all the details, but I know I definitely want to do this.  I want to make it as convenient as possible for the customers while still allowing maximum participation by those who want to be involved with production or distribution.  I feel it’s important for people to be involved in the origination of their food, but I’m disinclined to take any sort of coercive approach to that end.  Basically, I’d like to set it up so those who want to work in the fields beside me or package orders and meet other members can do so, while those who don’t want to be bothered with it can still get access to locally grown food.

While this is mainly about produce, I’d also like to afford members the opportunity to have eggs and/or chicken included in their share, at the same time acknowledging that many subscribers wouldn’t be interested.  I can see giving CSA customers priority on eggs and select cuts of chicken to the point that I may end up not having any eggs or chicken breasts to sell at the farmers markets.

While this is not an “official” announcement (I’m not taking subscriptions yet), I did want to give you a heads up.  I’m also interested in your suggestions on what to grow this year.  Even if you aren’t interested in a seasonal subscription and just want to keep buying from me at the farmers market, I’d like to know what you’d be interested in buying.  Following is a list of seeds I have on hand to grow this year:

Arugula:  Rocket, Rocket Salad

Beets:  Early Wonder Tall Top, Choggia, Bull’s Blood

Bok Choy (Pak Choi):  White Stem, Pechay

Cabbage:  Golden Acre, Orient Express (Chinese)

Cantaloupe:  Prescott Fond Blanc

Carrots:  Scarlet Nantes

Cucumber:  Marketmore 76 (slicing variety)

Dry Beans:  Black Turtle

Green Beans:  Kentucky Wonder

Kale:  Redbor, Red Russian, Dwarf Blue Curled

Lettuce:  Parris Island Cos (Romaine), several other as-yet-undetermined varieties

Onions:  Copra

Ornamental/Field Corn:  Painted Mountain

Popcorn:  Pennsylvania Dutch Butter Flavored

Radishes:  Crimson Giant, Cherry Belle, Watermelon, Rudolf

Snow Peas:  Mammoth Melting Sugar, Oregon Giant

Spinach:  Space Hybrid, Bloomsdale Long Standing

Sweet Corn:  Spring Treat (yellow), Tuxedo (yellow), Golden Bantam (yellow), Kandy Korn (yellow)

Swiss Chard:  Bright Lights

Watermelon:  Sugarbaby, Sunsweet

Winter Squash: Butternut, probably also a small pie variety of pumpkin

Yellow Squash:  Early Summer Yellow Crookneck, Gentry

Zucchini:  Raven

I’ll also be growing several varieties of tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants, but I haven’t purchased the seeds yet.  I’d like to grow some potatoes and sweet potatoes, but seed potatoes are expensive, so I don’t want to invest in these until I sell some shares.

I’ll be growing black oil sunflowers, amaranth, flax, and possibly quinoa for chicken feed, but I may offer some of this for sale as well, particularly the amaranth leaves, which are eaten like spinach.  I’ll also be growing mung beans, adzuki beans, and buckwheat for winter sprouts.  I’m thinking of growing edamame, too.

I’ll be doing several herbs, but haven’t decided what all to grow yet.  We have some seeds (probably crossed) from last year’s Sweet and Genovese Basil.  I’ll also probably do some sort of mint.

What else would you like me to grow this year?  I’m open to hybrids and non-organic seed, but I won’t do genetically modified varieties. (Frankenfood pollen blowing in the wind is bad.)  I prefer growing heirloom varieties.  Regardless of the seed, I grow them using organic methods (compost, no synthetics, etc.).  Even if you aren’t interested in signing up for a CSA share, I’m interested in hearing what you’d like to buy at the market this year.