Monday, May 27, 2019

Vegetable Shares

Veggie Shares ebb and flow. If you are a part of our veggie share, or if you have been thinking about joining, let me try to frame up the best way to get the most from your share. Getting a share of the harvest each week gives you a connection to your local farming ecosystem. In our supermarket/global food system society, we quickly become used to the idea of having any fruit or veggie whenever we want. Tomatoes in February, sure. Of course, it is good business for supermarkets to provide those things, because we will buy them. The negative side effect is that we become disconnected from the natural cycles of the world that surrounds us. By opting into a veggie share program you instinctual learn that greens are prevalent in the spring, but that soon gives way to the more dense summer crops like corn and tomatoes. Eating seasonally is both more delicious and more healthy because the crops are at their peak of both nutrition and taste when freshly picked and delivered. Of course, packing a weekly share of only organically grown local produce can be a challenge some weeks. I'm not sure how others do this, but I keep an internal points system. If I am an item or two short of what I would like to put in the share I keep those points for a future week. Then I use them when there are highly desirable fruits or veggies. For Example: we had a few weeks where share members got 2 quarts of the most delicious strawberries. Other weeks may not be as robust, but you are eating from what the local ecosystem of farms has to provide that particular week. So before you judge positively or negatively if the share system is a good fit for you, evaluate is over the course of several weeks. And lastly, the most important way to make sure you get the best use of your veggie share is to be open-minded and flexible. The people that enjoy the share the most are those that look at it as a way to expand their culinary experiences. They open the share each week and try to be creative in how they can use all that the local farms have provided. If you haven't already, expand your horizons and your palate by clicking here to join our veggie share, you can choose weekly or bi-weekly. You will likely instantly feel more connected to the seasonal growing world around you.