After so long without a CSA, it’s actually fairly difficult getting back into the swing of things – making sure that we plan meals around what we got and building in the time needed to make the CSA worth its weight. We’ve had a minor amount of spoilage over the past few weeks, but we’ve tried to make things work as best as we can. The corn went the first night, and we have an idea for something to do with the turnips, beets and potatoes (the only downside being that it requires using the oven and it’s a KAJILLION DEGREES outside, so the last place I want more heat is INSIDE my air-conditioned house).
So, here’s how things shook out for this week:
| Year 2 – Summer Week 4 | |||||
| Weight (lb) |
Grocery Store Unit Price (per lb) |
Grocery Store Total Item Cost | |||
| Blueberries (pint) | 1.00 | $4.99 | $4.99 | ||
| Red Potatoes | 1.65 | $1.49 | $2.46 | ||
| Fancy Squash | 1.73 | $1.99 | $3.45 | ||
| Cucumbers | 1.86 | $1.99 | $3.70 | ||
| Baby Turnips | 0.58 | $2.49 | $1.44 | ||
| Beets (bunch) | 1.00 | $2.99 | $2.99 | ||
| Mustard Greens (bunch) | 1.00 | $1.29 | $1.29 | ||
| Corn (ears) | 6.00 | $0.50 | $3.00 | ||
| Carrots | 0.45 | $0.99 | $0.45 | ||
| Grocery Store Total Cost | $23.77 | ||||
| Year 2 Summer Week 4 Savings (Deficit) | $1.77 | ||||
All in all, it’s not a huge savings, and the odds are that we won’t have some massive shift that suddenly gets us in the black for the remainder of the CSA season. Still, that’s not the only point, so consider this only one variable in the overall equation.
Hopefully the summer CSA boxes will yield more recipes, too; guess I have some experimentation in the kitchen to get on about…
It may not seem like a huge savings in one sense but think about the food miles that you saved! No greenhouse gas emissions for travel and storage. Local $ going to your local farms where they’ll spend it back in your local economy! All good.
Tammy, I totally agree! I picked up the veggies at the farmstand on the way home from picking up the kids from camp & day care, and the farm is in my town, a centerpiece of our community. (It’s also the home for our local 4-H.) Between buying the CSA box from the farm and buying milk from our local dairy, I feel SO INCREDIBLY LUCKY to live where I do. I didn’t grow up with this type of setup when I lived in the DC-area, so having it now that I live in an outer suburb near Boston is just BRILLIANT. 🙂
I’m having a lot of fun with new recipes and meal planning for my family with the CSA boxes that we have been getting. I actually find that it is slightly more expensive but well worth it.