I am by no means the tree-hugger type.

I know, that is a weird way to start but my topic for today is supporting locally grown food. More to the point, my family purchased a share from a local farm - Pennypack Farm. Pennypack Farm is part of the growing Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) movement. What is CSA? Well, the Pennypack website calls it:

CSA is defined as a mutually beneficial partnership between a farm and the people who consume the food produced there.

which is as good a definition as any.

I was pretty skeptical about “joining a farm”. It isn’t like the grocery is lacking food, or anything. Far from it, actually. It seems like added work to me - going to yet another place to buy food. I am inherently lazy about everything. I hate going out of my way to buy things, or clean things, or whatever. I expect convenience. I pay extra for it. And I’m happy to do so.

But we joined anyway because, let’s face it, my spouse controls these things.

And, you know, I love it. I really do. I have never eaten Swiss Chard before, and it turns out that it is really good. I don’t care much for collards, but that’s okay. I’m really interested in what kohlrabi tastes like. It is such a strange looking vegetable. Wikipedia says that it has a “Sputnik-like shape” which it does. How cool is that?

My kids really like seeing the chickens are picking strawberries. Peas were somehow not as much fun - probably because they don’t taste as sweet when you eat them in the field.

After picking up our share from the farm, I felt so granola that I opened up a bottle of organic wine (2006 Emiliana Natura Cabernet Sauvignon). And you know what? I didn’t really care for it. It probably could stand a bit more time to breathe, but it was kind of bland. Not much to it, really. I was disappointed. Maybe I’m not ready for the organic wine scene.

Oh well. At least the farm was great. And next time - we’re drinking local.