Cobble Hill CSA Week One

Posted: June 3rd, 2009 | Author: miconian | Filed under: Miconian At Large | Tags: burdock, cobble hill, cooking, CSA | Comments

So I recently joined the Cobble Hill CSA. Basically, I paid about $500 so that, throughout the summer and autumn, I could get weekly shares of a local farmer’s harvest. Yesterday was the first pickup day of the season, so I headed to Christ Church, about a five minute walk for me. All the produce was in bins, arranged down one side of the sanctuary.

At the near end of the table was a note, explaining what was available.

Each item was already portioned out into bags or bunches. This surprised me; I was expecting large piles of loose food that we would have to pick through.

Here’s Farmer Bill (that’s how he introduced himself). The woman talking to him is a long-time CSA member. She’s describing a leafy vegetable that he once delivered in 2006. This conversation lasted for about ten minutes. She even took out a piece of paper and sketched what she was describing. Farmer Bill listened patiently and took some guesses.

As you can see, Farmer Bill was not thrilled about having his picture taken. I was going to tell him that it was for my blog, but then I overheard him say that he doesn’t use email, so I decided to just say nothing.

Outside the church, there was a truck selling fresh meat, and a few other things. It seemed to be a separate business from the CSA. The truck guy probably found out about the CSA, and realized that this was the perfect weekly time and place to find people in the market for farm-fresh stuff. No competition with Farmer Bill, as Bill’s money is already in the bank, and Bill isn’t selling meat. I bought a small container of maple syrup from this guy. Had some on my oatmeal this morning, and it was declicious. Note to lettuce-sketching lady: I’m not stalking you.

Part of the bounty was black beans, arranged in paper bags. I thought that was a little weird. Did beans really count as fresh produce? But when I got home, I opened the bag, and I understood.

These beans are still in the pod. I’m not sure if that actually means anything qualitative, since they still have to be hydrated and cooked, but it’s interesting to see them in their natural state, one more step removed from their destiny on my plate, with rice and salsa.

Here it is, all laid out on my table. The first week of what you get as part of the Cobble Hill CSA. I was a bit disappointed in the quantity, but one of the regulars assured me that this was typical of the early weeks, and that later will come “the abundance.”

Asparagus is wrapped in plastic on the upper left. The paper bag is full of beans; I just put a few out on the table next to it. The item wrapped in plastic on the lower left is burdock. It looks a bit like fresh horseradish from the outside. It tastes kind of like a combination of a carrot and a radish.

I should have taken a picture of what it looked like after it was chopped up and sauteed, but I was hungry. The burdock made it into the nickel-plated cast-iron skillet, along with shallots, onions, some of the farm-fresh asparagus, and chicken faux-breaded with nutritional yeast, in chicken broth over basmati rice.

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