Local and organic

I have been sick and managed to miss the organic farmer's market near my house on Wednesday and the one a short (for these parts) drive away on Thursday. I was somewhat concerned because I had recently decided to switch over entirely to locally grown produce. This is a bit of an experiment--I have been easing into it, but have decided to see if I can make it to Thanksgiving without getting grocery store produce. The decision had been a long time coming. In the Northeast, I had belonged to a CSA, way back before they were easy to find or all that common. I loved my CSA, though I grew to dislike kale, and even after I stopped going out to pick up a share, got lots of my vegetables at a farmer's market. Since moving here, I have never gotten back on the local food ball. So, like much of the rest of the country, I read Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver, Steven Hopp, and Camille Kingsolver and decided to give it a try.

One of my decisions (and I am fairly sad about this, really) is that I do not think it makes sense for me to join a CSA right now. There are lots of reasons, but mostly, I have been away for at least a month out of every summer that I have lived here. I suspect that, at least this coming summer, that trend will continue. Almost everyone I love lives in the Northeast and between visiting them and going on research trips, I am probably not going to be in town enough to use a CSA. Also, I am only one person. In my previous CSA lives, I have always had a roommate of some sort, who was part of the project to a certain degree. I cannot feasibly consume a weekly CSA share. In addition, I do not really have the freezer space to store more CSA produce.

So it is farmer's markets for me. They are less economical--since you are not buying into the risk, you pay more for the product. But you get more control of what you eat and it costs me about the same amount a share would. I get fewer veggies, but fewer of them rot as well. I hope that in my next home, I can have a garden and a few (3 to 5) chickens, a big freezer, and a cool root cellar. But for now, I am going to remember that it is about batting averages.

Part of the reason that the local food thing is an experiment rather than a commitment is that I do lack storage facilities. I cannot put up some of the things that I will want in the winter. Also, because of time and budget constraints, I am unwilling to simply decide to cook what I can get. But I will do what I can and shift my food patterns as I can. Again, batting averages.

I started the post by saying that I had missed 2 farmers markets this week and was concerned, but when I got to school, there was a sustainablity fair--all the vendors were there. Sadly, there is not going to be a weekly farmer's market on campus, but this week I got a lot of yummy stuff. For about $25 dollars, I got all of this.



What you can't see in the picture is that the apples and onions both go all the way down. Also, there are 2 little eggplants and 3 pears.

Of course, then I placed my totally unlocal coffee order, getting Peets shipped to me from California.