CSA FAQs

Members Marian and Ned posing with an early spring veggie share

THIS PAGE ISN’T UP TO DATE! It has information about our normal CSA program, which we’re not offering in 2019 or 2020. But if you’re into this website this deep already, you might just enjoy poking around here…have fun!

 

Q: How much food should I expect each week?

A: Each week you’ll receive 10-15 items in your share (an item is like a head of lettuce, a pound of potatoes, a bulb of garlic, etc.). In the beginning, this is enough food for a giant salad that will feed you several meals through the week, and a couple of stirfries. As the season goes on, your bounty will get heavier and heartier, providing enough food for several vegetable-based meals a week. The regular CSA share is good for families, couples who eat many meals at home, and single folks/couples who eat out a lot but share with friends. The half share is good for single people or couples and families who eat out a lot and/or don’t eat a lot of vegetables. There’s always an abundance of some things, and some things we wish we had more of. Every season is different, and that’s part of the fun!
Q: Where and when are the pickups? Do you deliver?
A: The pickup is Tuesday evenings from 4-6ish pm. Pickup will be at the farm space we share with Draggin’ Wing Farm, in the Collister neighborhood near the intersection of Hill Rd and Castle Drive. We also offer bicycle delivery of your share to homes or offices in our delivery area.
Q: Do I get to choose what’s in my share?
A: No, you don’t. In an increasingly competitive CSA market, we can appear downright old-fashioned by not budging on this aspect of the CSA. Though you do occasionally get to choose between two items, and can certainly help yourself to as much or as little as you want of others (like tomatoes), for the most part, you put yourself at our mercy when it comes to choosing what’s in your share each week, based on what we have in the garden. Casey is especially staunch about this point because of her own evolution into eating the way she now does, which came about as a result of joining another CSA back in the day. She didn’t know what anything in her share was when she went to pick up her first week’s food! She was scared of everything in it, certain she had made a mistake, but had to figure out how to cook everything she got, since she’d already paid for it. This radically changed the way she ate! Given the choice, she wouldn’t ever have chosen items, like kale, that she now eats nearly every day, and so would never truly have transformed her diet and culinary lifestyle. That is one of the biggest benefits of a CSA, in our opinion. By giving up the ability to choose exactly what you eat each week, you actually open yourself up to a much greater diversity in food choice than you would have by selecting your own!
Q: How does the cost compare to the grocery store?
A: It’s tough to calculate exactly because many of the things we grow aren’t found in grocery stores as a rule, and certainly are of a higher nutritional quality, having been grown organically and picked the morning you receive them. For the most part, the early spring shares are pretty comparable to the same items purchased in a grocery store, but once the warmer weather comes, the majority of the CSA is a steal of a deal in comparison. For example, one organic heirloom tomato can cost $5 in the grocery store, and you might get 4-5 a week or more, plus ten or twelve other items! The summer shares provide you with a bounty at a fraction of the cost in the grocery store! The level cost of a share is one of the many ways the CSA model benefits farmers, who are in dire need of cash in the spring when their crops don’t generally fetch high prices, while benefiting eaters like you in the summer, when we share our abundance with you!
Q: It seems like kind of a hassle. Why should I join a CSA rather than buying whatever I want from the store or the farmer’s market?
A: We’re glad you asked! Maybe you want to truly connect with agriculture or farmers in your community, and you want the one-on-one personalized interaction with them that our CSA provides. Maybe you’re ready to branch out in your eating and/or your cooking, and you want some guidance. Our weekly newsletter gives you the skinny on what’s in your share, how to cook it, and why you’re such a bad ass for being a member of a CSA farm. Part pat on the back, part advice column, part inspiration sandwich! Maybe you want to eat local food but find the farmer’s market a crazy zoo you’d just as soon avoid and the grocery store an impersonal fluorescent buffet–we’re with you there! Maybe you want to introduce your kids to the wacko new generation of urban farmers to give them some alternative perspectives on what’s possible with their creative energy. Maybe you like watching a garden evolve from spring to fall and don’t have the space, time, or energy to have your own. And maybe you just want to be as helpful as possible in our local economy and local food system–by joining a CSA, your money goes directly into the hands of actual farmers, with ZERO middlemen taking a cut! No grocery stores, no farmer’s market booth fees, nothing to stand between you and your local farmer except a table full of yummy veggies…and we’ll even walk around that to give you a hug when you need one!
Q: OK already, I’m ready to join a CSA. What’s so special about yours? Why should I choose you?
A: There’s a few things that make our farm unique in the valley. For one, we are first and foremost a CSA farm. Many other farms offer a CSA as one component of their sales. They sell at farmers market, to many restaurants, or to grocery stores in addition to their CSA, which means their high-value crops like berries or sugar snap peas make their way into their members’ shares less often. All the food we grow goes to our members first, and as our seed production has ramped up, we’ve taken fewer members, so you get the same abundance of high-quality food we’ve always been known for. Also, we make every effort to reduce the amount of petroleum we consume in our farm’s operations. We transport ourselves, our veggies, our tools, chickens, and other farm necessities largely by bicycle. Perhaps most importantly, we’re on the forefront of creating a diverse and locally-adapted seed supply in the valley by growing and saving many of our own varieties of seeds (we saved over 100 varieties last year!) and making them available to other farmers and home gardeners. By supporting the CSA, you also support this crucial work. Also, our wacky, unique newsletter is much beloved by our members. Lastly, we’re pretty decent guys and gals–we hope you’ll enjoy getting to know us through the weeks of the CSA! Ooh! And members get discounts on our gardening classes as well…what more reason do you need?

The 2016 farm crew