Lightweight Eats

If you follow me on Twitter, you've probably noticed that I've mentioned getting produce from "our farm". No, we didn't buy a farm. Instead, we signed up for a CSA box!

"Our" farm

In Oakland, we tried a CSA share, but didn't find it worthwhile. Our local grocery store had better prices on local, organic produce and was half the distance (super important when you're biking up hills to pick up groceries). Heading out to Connecticut, I expected things to be a bit different, so I researched local organic farms.

Boy, was I wrong. Things here are WAY different than California. All of the vegetables in grocery stores look like caricatures of their original—the colors are too even, the shapes too regular, the flavor quite lacking and the prices astronomical. We could hardly afford vegetables, let alone organic veggies. Local was definitely out of the question—the going rate for ZUCCHINI, which grows like a weed, was $4/lb at our local market.

So in late spring, just a week before the first shares went out, we signed up for a seasonal CSA. It was a bit of a gamble, but it looked like a good group of guys running the farm, with a nice selection of vegetables.

And fortunately, I was oh-so-right!!

Visiting the farm!

Our CSA so far has been a marvelous experience. We pick up our box every Thursday about a mile from the rowing center. When I can, I like to ride my bike to pick up our veggies.

The farm is located about 20 minutes drive north of New Milford. It's a 30-acre, all organic farm. They grow a bunch of different things—greens, tomatoes, sunflowers, potatoes, radishes, beans, peas, blueberries and more! We get a nice variety in our box each week.

Coming from California, there haven't been any new vegetables. Still, it's been fun to get back some of the variety we'd had out West. Daikon and turnips have both made an appearance, as well as some fun shelling beans and very sweet snap peas.


Knowing that we eat a lot of veggies, we talked to the farmers and decided to get a full share instead of a half share. We could certainly eat fewer vegetables, but when we put our minds to it, we easily finish our full share each week.

In fact, we've also been supplementing our CSA share with veggies from our garden.


I'll write more about the GMS garden later, but we're slowly establishing a 30ft x 30ft vegetable garden just outside the house. So far, we've gotten a good harvest of mint, lettuces, zucchini, beans and cucumbers. It's definitely a work in progress, but it's fun making zucchini bread with veggies from the backyard!

Expect more updates through the late summer and fall, as we experience the full season of the CSA and continue to make progress in the garden.

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