Warm Thoughts on a Winter CSA

A winter CSA requires a bit of imagination on the part of the member. You can’t go to a place. You can’t see the vegetables sprouting, you can’t pick them, and you can’t feel the sun on your back. The experience of picking up the share is unremarkable. It is a cold winter night, and I park my car just outside a gourmet food store in a neighboring town. Inside, I put my signature on a list of roughly 30 names – people who have committed to support New York agriculture through the winter months. I am quickly handed a bundle of frozen vegetables that includes broccoli florets, pureed butternut squash, winter greens and raspberries.

There’s no actual farm experience and the food is frozen. It’s not sexy, or evocative, but it infuses my winter cooking with the best of New York produce. The simply labeled packaging gets you to think about greens and bright colors and the farmers who tilled the soil at a time when one might rather be hibernating. Each package includes the name - the personal brand - of a specific farm. The broccoli florets come from Hepworth Farm in Milton, New York. Hepworth Farms grows certified organic produce, is a seventh generation family farm, and is a business owned and operated by women.

Winter Sun Farms has organized nearly 30 winter CSA shares in the Hudson Valley and New York City regions now through April. There’s a little bonus with every share – tender, sweet, pea sprouts – an infusion of fresh greens that I gobble up on a dark, winter night. It’s a harbinger of spring in January.

All these ideas and images move through my mind as I work in the kitchen. I’m able to think about the origin of the food and the farmer. Chef Rozanne Gold, author of the new book “Radically Simple” has some thought-provoking ideas on her blog about cooking in silence, and considering the people who brought you the food and those who will eat it. She says it makes the whole cooking experience more fulfilling.

Indeed, if I am to be more thoughtful about my ingredients, a healthy, wholesome recipe for brown rice with chicken and broccoli makes a delicious showcase for the produce from Hepworth Farm. I tinker with the recipe and add a little seasoning, and some organic chick peas. The frozen florets steam in the rice liquid until they are bright green and crisp-tender. The vivid flavor of the broccoli is evident.

All the discussion of eating local makes me smile. Does it work? Is it worth it? Will it last? The membership in Winter Sun Farms makes me a more thoughtful, conscious chef and eater - and that works for me.

©2011 T.W. Barritt All Rights Reserved