Today, I shared a list of statements to help people assess their CSA-readiness, and I wanted to share my scores on this assessment if I had taken this test back in 2007. That was the year I joined my first CSA program, Farmers Fresh CSA.
Overall, I would have scored a fairly low 18. Clearly, I was not an ideal candidate, but I made it work. Keep this in mind as you consider joining a CSA program. Continue Reading »
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CSA program turnover is a problem: people get excited about the idea but don’t really know what’s required. So let’s look at the ideal CSA subscriber and see how close you get.
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Heard about the tanning and vegetables study? Basically, if you eat a bunch of vegetables chock-full of carotenoids, you look less pale. And this tanning effect is more attractive than one produced by the sun or booth, according to study participants.
The vegetables named in the article are carrots, tomatoes, sweet potatoes, bell peppers, spinach, kale, and cantaloupe. A little more research shows that beet greens, turnip greens, collards, cabbage, winter squash, and pumpkin also have high levels of beta-carotene. And according to Mother Earth News, the eggs of free-range chickens contain 7 times the beta-carotene of regular eggs. Beta-carotene is what causes the yolks to be that happy neon-orange color.
I’ve definitely been eating my share of greens, carrots, sweet potatoes, winter squash, and eggs lately.
See?
And I think I know what they’re talking about. The effect may be short-lived – only a day or two, but in the mirrors at the gym last week after eating the lunch pictured above, I noticed my skin tone looked more even than normal – like it does with a little sun. (This was at the beginning of a workout. At the end, I looked like a strawberry.) I also remember getting into the bath a couple of weeks ago and thinking my legs looked oddly not pale for the end of January.
I’m one of the paler people on the planet, so the effect may be more obvious on me. But I’m also eating a lot of these vegetables, and the ones I’m eating are more likely to have high amounts of nutrients, having been grown in good soil nearby.
It definitely doesn’t top my reasons for eating more local food, but it doesn’t hurt either!
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Last night we tried a new variation on the “Kale with raisins and pine nuts” recipe – Bordeaux spinach with dried figs and walnuts.
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This week I increased my peasant dish repertoire with Korean vegetable pancakes (Pa jun) suggested by Kitchen Kung Fu. There were many different recipes on line, and they all said pretty much the same thing: pretend you’re making blueberry pancakes and swap the blueberries for sliced vegetables. Well, that’s not quite what they said. Close, though.
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The overview
Here’s a photo of my third CSA delivery of 2011. (You can also take a look at the first and second.) Not pictured are the eggs and Jack cheese because I forgot recollect them from the fridge.
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The Freecycle Network is “a grassroots and entirely nonprofit movement of people who are giving (and getting) stuff for free in their own towns. It’s all about reuse and keeping good stuff out of landfills.”
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My first pre-season delivery came with surprise: a greenhouse-grown zucchini.
It really kind of threw me. I’ve gotten used to patterns of seasonal produce, so I picked up this January zucchini and blinked at it for a while. Then I remembered stir-fried squash.
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Walnuts have become a staple in my house after we bought an enormous bag at Sam’s so that I could make biscotti Christmas gifts. Even after all the baking, we still had a couple of pounds of shelled walnuts. Thinking, “We’ll never get through that many walnuts,” I’ve used them in everything I could think of this winter: with greens and pasta, in salads, oatmeal, and desserts. And last week, I scurried off to Sam’s to buy another enormous bag of walnuts.
Health nuts
Nuts are good for you. They’re high in unsaturated fats, Omega-3 fatty acids, and arginine. The Harvard School of Public Health touts the cardiovascular benefits of eating nuts, and The Mayo Clinic describes their part in healthy Mediterranean diets.
Nutty ideas
Here are some nutty dishes we love:
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This week, we’ve been eating peanut-butter sandwiches and apples for breakfast and the occasional afternoon snack.
Perspective alert: this is a salad plate. It’s not the world’s biggest apple and peanut-butter sandwich.
How long has it been since you’ve had a peanut-butter sandwich? It’s worth a trip down memory lane – especially if you have yummy honey-flax bread and local honey.
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thoughtful consumption 