more on community supported agriculture

organic reed avocados
Originally uploaded by bluepupae.

after some research, i found quite a bit of general information about community supported agriculture programs and mixed reviews from people with first hand experience. upside benefits include supporting small, local farmers and getting fresh, organic produce that is better for you and the environment. sure, i could get organic produce from whole foods as i've been doing, but not all of it is local, and they buy from industrial organic farms which put the small farms out of business. if you want to know more about that, read michael pollan's book The Omnivore's Dilemma or you can peruse his essay here.

we do have a local farmer's market here in long beach every sunday, and i often shop there, but we can't always get out there on a sunday, and there are only a few vendors who sell organic produce. granted, locally grown produce may be better than organic produce from industrial organic farms trying to lower the restrictions of what can be labeled organic, and not all farms go through the process of getting certified even though they do engage in organic farming. participating in a community supported agriculture program is a commitment i'm wanting to make.

no control over what comes each week could be a downside if you're a control freak like me. yet, tapping into my creative culinary repertoire would be a bonus. it also appears that quality and variety can vary from region to region and farm to farm. luckily, i live in california, the land of perennial (mostly) sunshine, so i'm hoping for some happy produce.

sifting through the many and bewildering options this weekend made my head spin. spud, which stands for small potatoes urban delivery, offers home delivery of organic produce in addition to a variety of other things you might need from the grocery store and espouses supporting local farms, represented by a tally of food miles for each item, incentives for buying locally produced items and being able to indicate that you want all your produce sourced locally versus locally whenever possible. being able to enter preferences on what goes into your produce box, specifying the regularity of your deliveries (weekly, bi-weekly or monthly), plus plenty of customization and additions/deletions to your standing order are all pluses.

unfortunately, and to add to the confusion, closer inspection revealed that prices tended a little high compared to whole foods and many of the farms represented were the same large industrial organic farms. i don't think it's necessarily a bad thing. it would be preferable if more people bought organic produce from whole foods or spud than food from non-organic industrial farms via one of the chain grocery stores or worse, processed chemically treated foods. for most people, i think the convenience of spud would be great. for me, i want to support a local farmer.

so i went back to tanaka farms and found out that they do deliver to long beach. my concern before was that they are based in irvine, and their website only mentions delivering to that area. i work two days a week in the area, but not on one of the delivery days, so it would be an extra out of the way trip, which means more gas and time. i found out from the farm that they partner with rockview farms for home delivery, and it was a snap getting set up. since there's only two of us, i opted for the bi-weekly delivery as their boxes are purported to be enough food for 3-4 people for a week.

rockview farms doesn't have a fancy website like spud, but they do offer other items like milk and eggs along with your box of produce. the friendly woman i spoke to told me they usually deliver in the wee morning hours (2am - 6am)--just like the milkmen in the olden days--before we even get up so if you work regular hours, you don't have to worry about not being home to pull in your order. pricing of their milk is on par with some of the more expensive organic milks at the store, but it comes farm fresh and not ultrapasteurized (ultrapasteurization basically kills everything that's good for you in milk).

i couldn't believe she didn't even ask for my credit card. believing in honesty, they leave you an invoice, which you can pay by leaving a check for the next delivery, but you can pay by credit card if that is more convenient. her optimism made me all warm and fuzzy inside, so i made the plunge and am excited about my first box, which comes this friday.