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Adventures in CSA (week 8): The Final Tally

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First off, I have to apologize for the delay. I had planned to post this last week, and then NATURE happened in a big, bad way and that threw off just about everything. For, though it was only late October, Mother Nature decided that it was high time we had a nor’easter all up in this joint. We lost power, and with the power went the heat. We could have dealt easily without the power, but the heat was an issue when the temps were forecasted to dip into the teens (F) overnight. We managed a night in the house like that, and then the next night we spent at a friend’s house. Thankfully, our power was out for only 48hrs, but it was enough to throw everything into disarray and the rest of the week was all about trying to get things back on track.

Second, the winter CSA has begun. In what I think is a bit of a bungle in timing, the final Fall veggie box was delivered on a Friday (October 28) and the first Winter veggie box was delivered the following Tuesday (November 1). Given that the weekend was a complete mess from the storm, all the veggies from the first box were still in the house when the veggies from the second box arrived. AUGH!! Thankfully, the CSA-powers-that-be decided to make the Winter share an every-other-week deal, so we have a brief respite until we get inundated with produce again.

Third, the final tally (and the results for the final Fall veggie box) can be found below. We did come in under this week, and my guess is that this is partially due to the more mundane contents (carrots, garlic, etc.) and partially due to the inability to find a perfect comparable for the purple potatoes (which they just don’t carry in my store). I’d be surprised if they went for the same price as the red potatoes – the closest equivalent – but I don’t know that the price difference would make up the gap, either.

Week 8 CSA
Weight (lb) Grocery Store Unit Price
(per lb)		 Grocery Store Total Item Cost
Buttercup Squash 2.87 $0.99 $2.84
Cranberries 0.54 $3.99 $2.15
Yellow Onions 1.09 $1.49 $1.62
Carrots 1.30 $0.99 $1.28
Parsnips 1.16 $2.49 $2.88
Empire Apples 2.21 $1.59 $3.52
Purple Potatoes* 0.88 $1.49 $1.32
Cabbage 3.21 $0.50 $1.61
Garlic 0.08 $2.99 $0.23
Rainbow Chard 0.38 $2.99 $1.12
Grocery Store Total Cost $18.56
Week 8 Savings (Deficit) ($1.44)
Program-to-Date Savings (Deficit) $18.95
Notes:
* Items were not available; closest equivalent was used.

Some final thoughts about the Fall CSA:

1) It basically worked out to 8 veggie boxes for the price of 7. That’s not a bad deal. Since I went into this program to experiment with price, as well as variety/quality, this is an important thing for me to see.

2) We definitely branched out and tried new things; we also picked up some new favorites (like Bok-os). Again, this is hitting on one of my stated goals/desired outcomes.

3) There’s a downside to the CSA: what do you do when you get stuff you don’t like and/or stuff that you already have overflowing in your house? I’m still working on finding a new home for the parsnips, since it’s now fairly clear that I’m the only one who likes them (but they don’t appear to get along well with my stomach). On the other side of that coin, our fridge is overrun with apples, since we went apple picking AND we’ve gotten apples in every box throughout the entire run of the Fall CSA. I’d say that we could make apple crisp with them, but we’ve got leftover birthday cake in the house from dd’s kiddo party and we’re gearing up to make yet another cake because her family party is this coming weekend. I know, I know, first-world problem to be sure. BUT, a fridge full of apples is also one where you can’t store other things. Like more cake.

I already knew the upsides: getting us to eat more fresh produce, incorporating new foods, branching out our cooking…and all of that has happened. Would I do it again? Most definitely. I’m not yet sure about the Winter share; we’ll have to see how the next eight weeks goes. I predict I’ll be trying to find a lot of ways to use winter squash…

Adventures in CSA (week 8): Fall CSA days come to a close

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Amazingly enough, I just brought home the last Fall CSA box. (Fear not! The Winter CSA starts up – improbably – this coming Tuesday, so we’ll be under a deluge of fruit and vegetables by Wednesday.) This last Fall box had an interesting variety of items, most of which I expect to find at the grocery store. The purple potatoes are questionable – that may be more of a specialty item, but the rest are pretty mainstream.

I also have to make a confession: we’re giving away the parsnips. I KNOW, I KNOW! BAD MONKEY! But, here’s why: dh isn’t too enthused about them, and I think my stomach woes from the other weekend were related to having too many parsnips with dinner. While I understand that just eating fewer might be the solution to that particular problem, it’s a little harder to accomplish if you’re the only one in the house that will eat them. Thankfully, one of my co-workers admitted her love for ‘snips, so I brought them home to weigh them and then they’ll head back to work to be handed over to a loving home.

Looking at the box, I’m somewhat at a loss as to what I’m going to do – we have red and new and sweet potatoes already in the house, so what on earth do we do with the purple potatoes?! I got cranberries. I’m used to those arriving in liquid form, often mixed with grape juice and bearing the “Ocean Spray” label. So, once I have a moment, I need to go digging through my cookbooks and see if I can come up with some inspiration for what to do with this bounty.

 

Week 8 CSA

YUM and YUM some more

 

This week’s box contained:

  • Buttercup Squash
  • Cranberries
  • Parsnips
  • Apples
  • Yellow Onions
  • Purple Potatoes
  • Cabbage
  • Garlic
  • Carrots
  • Rainbow Chard

The apples present a slight conundrum in that I’m just not 100% sure which kind they are. Last time, I thought I had macouns but they may have been empire. Some of these resemble the empires from last week, but others are so deeply purple that I’m not sure WHAT they are. Then again, I refuse to feel badly about this. At a conference this week, I was discussing the varieties of apples grown locally with one of the attendees who’d traveled up to Massachusetts from Florida, and his eyes got wider as I kept naming more and more types of apples. Then again, his idea of “fresh whole fruit” includes oranges year-round, so there’s something to be said for geographic variety.

Since we’re gearing up for snow (before Hallowe’en? for reals?!), it’s unlikely that we’ll want to grill anything this weekend. Still, as long as we have power to handle the thermostat, I can imagine that the buttercup squash may find a temporary home in the oven. And I think I can promise – without a shadow of a doubt – that the cabbage will be used in some fashion OTHER THAN cabbage and corned beef. I can’t describe a dish I feel more ~meh~ about than that one. That doesn’t mean it won’t go into the crock pot; I can just promise it won’t be with corned beef.

Back in a day or so with the pricing, as well as the overall assessment of the Fall CSA. I’m already looking forward to the Winter CSA, although I do fear being buried under an avalanche of potatoes and apples. Good thing we have a Pennsylvania Dutch cookbook around here somewhere…

Adventures in CSA (week 7): Just as I suspected…

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…this week’s box was definitely cheaper through the CSA than at the store. Some of that was clearly due to the contents (asian pears tend to have that effect, given that they cost $2 apiece at our store), but some of it was because there was just so much stuff in the box this week.

Week 7 CSA
Weight
(lb)		 Grocery Store Unit Price
(per lb)		 Grocery Store Total Item Cost
Bok Choi 2.88 $1.29 $3.71
Collard Greens 0.76 $0.99 $0.75
Radishes 2.00 $0.99 $1.98
Yellow Onions 0.45 $1.49 $0.68
Carrots 1.88 $0.99 $1.86
Parsnips 1.31 $2.49 $3.27
Empire Apples 1.77 $1.59 $2.82
Asian Pears 2.00 $2.00 $4.00
Acorn Squash 0.09 $0.99 $0.09
Italian Eggplant* 0.38 $1.79 $0.69
Sweet Potatoes 1.05 $1.29 $1.36
Red Potatoes 0.95 $1.49 $1.41
New Potatoes 0.93 $2.66 $2.47
Grocery Store Total Cost $25.09
Week 7 Savings (Deficit) $5.09
Program-to-Date Savings (Deficit) $20.39
Notes:
* Items were not available; closest equivalent was used.

At this point, given our current savings, we’re already ahead enough that I can see quite a lot of value from this particular CSA program – we’re getting local veggies for less than what we’d pay to buy them at the store (trucked in from farms both near and far). I’m not sure that we’ll see the same value from the winter CSA that kicks up in two weeks, but we’ll have to see. As a complete fluke of timing, the first box from that CSA will arrive only a few days after the last box from this current subscription. D’oh!!

Only a couple of the items on this list have been used up or are spoken for – the eggplant was used (recipe coming tomorrow!), the bok choi was half-used last night (another recipe coming!) and will get completely used up tomorrow, and we have some plans for the potatoes for tonight – probably just baking some potato crisps.

It also helps that a lot of the winter stuff *keeps*, so you don’t suffer massive loss if you don’t get to use everything up in a given week. Apples, potatoes, onions, etc. all generally can last for a while if kept properly, and that allows us to stretch things out a bit. It is a bit funny to plan this week’s meals (leaning heavily on the crock pot, since I’m at a conference four out of five days and dh has a big all-day meeting scheduled for two or three of the same days)…none of what we came up with really makes a dent in the CSA box. In other words, we still have a long way to go.

Some of it is also a cost issue – I can easily take carrots, parsnips and onions and toss them in a crock pot with a roast – but the roast would cost a ton more than the other ingredients. I cringe at the price of beef most days (not to mention the nutritional content), so I try to limit it. We do have pork roasts a few times a year, which is slightly cheaper, but it’s still another case of “holy cow is that expensive – and why is it so much fattier than I want?!” The one way that we found to save money on pork loins is to buy the big 10lb loin from BJ’s and then cut it into three equal parts, storing the one(s) we don’t need for the week in the freezer. It slashes the price of the meat and ensures that we have it in the house for when we need it (assuming we remember to take it out a few days early to thaw).

And again, we come back to the delicate balance between cost and nutrition. I can’t imagine making this my crusade; as one person, I feel like I have zero standing to yell at Big Farm, the USDA, and the FDA with enough authority that they’d actually listen. As a working mom, I wish it were easier; hopefully as I get more experience with CSA-based/influenced cooking, the entire process will be simpler and I’ll feel like I can do this balancing act without flailing my arms in the air all the time.