Community, Connection and Really Good Food!

“Vote with your food dollars.”

“Keep your money in the local economy.”

“Know your farmer, know your food.”

Are you familiar with any of these phrases?  What about “Sign-Up Now?”  Or “Join now so you don’t miss out!”  Hey, those are my lines and we’ve been using them a lot as we are trying to encourage people to sign up for CSA shares before the season starts in three short weeks!  “Miss out on what?  It’s just vegetables, what’s the big deal about CSA anyway?"  Does any of this “support your local food system” talk even matter? 

Andrea B. sampling grapes  (photo from localthirty.com)

Earlier this year, my friend (ok, we’ve only met once, but she’s awesome) Andrea Bemis released a film called Local Thirty.  This was one of the main films featured at Fairshare CSA Coalition’s Food and Farms Film Fest this past March.  While many documentaries about our food system over the past 10-12 years have been very informative and brought important truths to light, some have been pretty heavy and intense!  This film was different.  It was about food, forming connections, and finding a sense of “home.”  It focused on exploring your local food system and the positive impact that can have on our lives and our meals.  It was a welcome relief to watch a film about our food system that made me laugh, chuckle, yet still pushed me to think about my own food choices.

Andrea B. is a real live farmer who grows vegetables at the base of Mt Hood in Oregon along with her husband, Taylor.  In addition to farming, Andrea B also writes a blog called Dishing Up the Dirt, which is also the title of her cookbook!  If you’ve followed my CookingWith the Box articles on our blog over the past few CSA seasons, you’ll likely recognize her blog as I have shared many of her recipes along the way.  It all started back in September 2018 when Andrea B, her husband Taylor, and their farm crew (Adam and Rachel) decided to challenge themselves to source all of their ingredients from within a 200 mile radius.  They had 10 cheat foods each (eg coffee, lemons, black pepper, etc), but aside from those foods they only ate the things they could source within 200 miles.  Why would anyone do something like this?  They didn’t really have an end goal or mission they were hoping to achieve.  They used this time as a framework for learning and discovering their local food system.  What treasures (both food and people) were they missing?  It was about finding more of a sense of “home.” 

Andrea B with a freshly caught tuna!
(photo from localthirty.com0

As they prepared for and lived out the month of September, they had to do their research to find some of the ingredients they didn’t produce themselves.  Research for Andrea B went beyond the internet, she actually left the farm to visit people she’d never met before so she could learn more about what they were doing.  She had the opportunity to stomp grapes at a vineyard, take a wild fishing trip off the coast to catch tuna, visit a dairy farm and drink milk right from the cow, forage for wild mushrooms and walk the pastures on a neighbor’s cattle ranch.  And what became of all of this?

The final producer meal (photo from localthirty.com)

Here is Andrea B’s conclusion in her own words:  “Eating locally for me is about discovering and celebrating what we have, not mourning what we don't. It's about strangers becoming friends, and learning more about our landscape and the place we call home. When we start looking around and talking to each other, it becomes evident that we just have so much……When I first set out on a month long challenge to only eat ingredients produced within 200 miles of my home I had no idea how transforming that experiment would be. Eating the foods I found and prepared rooted me deeper into my home. They were the flesh of plants I touched and animals I knew. This made me feel more alive, wild and human. I found out that eating locally is about discovering and celebrating a bounty that is all our own and letting it shape a little bit of who we are. It's about joy.”

So does it really matter if you know your farmer?  Does it matter if you eat food from local sources?  Does the story behind the food you eat mean anything?  Does being part of a CSA or shopping at the farmers’ market impact your life in any way that‘s different than shopping at the grocery store?  Well for some people, perhaps these things don’t really matter.  But for me…yes, it matters and yes, it’s important.  Andrea B. is right, it’s about joy and forming connections. 

Food is political, food is social justice and injustice, food is linked to our environment and our economy.  But food is also relational.  It’s a bridge to bring our lives together.  You just don’t know what treasures you might discover and what stories you will unveil when you take the time to look.  Connection.  Whether we know it or not, we all need connection.  Every time you learn a little more about your food sources, you’re allowing a little piece of someone else’s world to become part of yours. This does bring joy, appreciation, respect and understanding.  It causes you to think outside of yourself and your own experiences while at the same time, bringing some stinkin’ delicious food to your tables!  Yes, I’m convinced that food tastes better when you know the story about where it came from.

The fertile soil and beautiful fields of Harmony Valley Farm

So back to the original question, does any of this “support your local food system” talk even matter?  I believe the answer is “Yes.”  At the very least, if you like to eat good food I guarantee you’ll find some of your best ingredients when you look locally.  The other part of this “Yes” is the community piece.  CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture, but this isn’t a one-way concept.  We need the community to support our farm, but the community also needs to be supported by those producing food!  In the end, we all have a part in this thing we call our local food system, or in Andrea B’s words, the place we call home. 

In closing, I’ll leave you with one last message.  Our deliveries start in just three short weeks, so Join Now So You Don’t Miss Out!  If you’re looking to add a new dimension as well as some joy and really great food to your meals, we hope you’ll not only join us for the 2019 CSA season but encourage you to see what other treasures you can find within your local food system this year.

---Farmer/Chef Andrea

NOTE:  Go to  www.localthirty.com for more information about Andrea Bemis’s documentary and how to watch the whole thing.  It’s only 46 minutes long, so make some snacks and kick back to watch it this weekend!

Making A Connection

By Farmer Richard

CSA Members enjoying the scenery of
'their'  farm during our Harvest Party!

     It is now official, reported in major and minor news outlets across the country…CSA farmers are losing members faster than they are being replaced with new members. We started to see a decline in our CSA membership around 2009, and unfortunately we aren’t the only farm that has seen numbers slowly slide each year.  Many thought it was the economic downturn, but overall sales of organic foods is still consistently continuing to grow each year.  More and more people are concerned about the health of their family and turning to organic.  So why the decline in CSA membership?
     We, and other CSA farmers, have been asking this question and trying to figure out what’s going on for the past few years.  One reason may be supersaturation of CSA farms offering shares.  During the past 6 to 8 years the number of new CSA farms has grown faster than the rate of new members interested in joining a CSA.  Most of the growth in CSA farms has been beginning farmers with little experience.  We have long understood that CSA farming is “graduate level” farming, not for beginners.  Growing a wide variety of crops to fill boxes over a full season requires skill and experience.  Many consumers have been alienated forever by a poor CSA experience, “All we got was kale!”  Certainly not true, but a perception from “new” CSA customers who were also new to eating “in season.”

A picture of a summer CSA box contents from Harmony Valley Farm

     Organic food has also become more available at almost all supermarkets, mostly shipped in from distant growers. The advantage for customers is they can stop in and buy a few items of their choosing for dinner without the commitment of the whole box of CSA vegetables. It is good that more acres somewhere in the world are being farmed organic, without toxic chemistry, but what about eating locally and eating in season?
     Another contributing factor to the decline in CSA may be attributed to the growth we’ve seen in farmers’ markets.  The USDA estimates farmers’ markets have doubled over the past 10 years.  While it may be convenient for customers to shop at their small neighborhood markets, this growth has not been as good for farmers.  In addition to pulling members away from choosing a CSA share, farmers are also seeing their sales at each market become diluted.  Many farmers now have to go to several markets per week to sell the same amount of produce that they used to sell at a larger, once-a-week market!

Farmer Richard digging Sweet Potatoes with CSA Members.

     Finally, as times have changed we’ve seen an influx of home delivery services that will deliver not just vegetables, but everything to your door and only what you order!  If you want to break it down even further, there are now meal delivery services that will deliver everything you need for a meal or two in one package.  It may not be “organic” and you have to ignore all the excess packaging for the service, but if you only cook a couple meals a week it may seem like a good option.
     As you can see, there are now lots of options for where and how you can purchase food!  Unfortunately some families have less time to plan and cook meals, thus they opt for choices with the highest level of convenience.  So where does CSA fit into the current picture?
Well, despite the decrease we’ve seen in our own membership over the past seven years, we still consider CSA to be beneficial to our business and the part of our business we enjoy the most.  We’re not ready to “give-up” on our CSA and don’t believe CSA is going out of style.  Despite the changes we’ve seen in the food supply over the past 7-10 years, the concept of CSA remains the same.  CSA still stands for “Community Supported Agriculture” and offers one of the most holistic approaches to sourcing food for your family.  Yes, you are supporting our farm by purchasing shares with us for the season, but it’s so much more than that.  We are part of the same community and we support each other.  As CSA members, you have direct access to your farm and the land where your food is grown. We talk to you each week through our newsletters and email communications and you can talk to us any time you’d like.  You are welcome to come to the valley where your food is grown…breathe the air, walk in the soil and experience not only the food we’re producing, but the land and area in which it is grown.  Last week Bobbie reminded us all just how special and unique our region is and we want to share this experience with you as well.

Farmer Richard showing a CSA member how to 'drive' a tractor!

     When you participate in a CSA, you have an opportunity to connect with the people and places where your food comes from.  You learn what it means to eat with the rhythms of nature and embrace the seasonality of eating.  When melons are in their peak (as they are this week), you eat melon several times a day!  In the spring you long for anything green and in the fall we can’t wait to eat rich winter squash and sweet potatoes.    
     We have seen and heard so many positive stories from members about how CSA has changed and made a positive impact on their lives.  We have many members who joined our CSA when their children were little, twenty years ago.  These kids had the opportunity to grow up as “CSA kids.”  They are now healthy adults seeking out their own CSAs and continue to ask “where does my food come from?”  For many of these kids, their first taste of vegetables was something from our farm.  Many of them visited our farm when they were youngsters.   They camped in the meadow and played in the creek, fed the animals, got to sit on the tractors, gorged on warm strawberries in the field, picked peas right off the plant and built lasting memories of their farm.   They know what “real” food tastes like, understand how to eat with the seasons, and know how to cook and prepare whole foods!  We’ve heard many stories about picky eaters who, after a visit to the farm, will now eat vegetables…but only vegetables from “their farm!”  Other members have told us they eat more vegetables and have seen positive health benefits as a result of eating out of a CSA box.  Yes, eating out of a CSA box requires time and cooking, but it also gives you an opportunity to learn new things about food, build culinary skills and gives you an opportunity to spend invaluable time cooking and eating with your family.

Farmer' Richard and Andrea with Captain Jack the dog!

     We value the connection we have with you through our partnership in CSA.  There are so many benefits beyond the actual box that come along with the CSA experience.  This is something special and unique that a supermarket or home delivery service will never be able to match