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Counting, weighing, and sharing

Hello CSA!

We hope you have been enjoying your produce and your CSA experience. So far things seems to have been working fairly well: the produce and extras have been beautiful; the trucks have been showing up (mostly) on time; rain has been minimal on Tuesdays; Abrons has added some music to our distribution; there have been few volunteer cancellations, and they’ve been manageable.

We have had a problem running short on certain items, which many of you might not even know about, since it affects only the members who show up toward the end of distribution. Nevertheless, it’s a major problem for the members who get shortchanged, and therefore something we are taking very seriously. 

Knowing that there is a margin of error weighing produce at the farm and at distribution, both Woodbridge Farm and Breezy Hill Orchard routinely oversupply us with any produce that needs to be weighed out. Nevertheless, for certain vegetables, the error has been larger than the supply. So we’ve asked Heather, from Woodbridge, to increase the oversupply amount she adds to our order each week. 
Here’s where it gets tricky — it’s actually impossible for Heather to add anything to our distribution, because we (and our sister CSA in Brooklyn) already receive absolutely everything the farm harvests on Tuesday. So, in practice, what really happens is that the amount each member is allotted is decreased to make sure that no one misses out (e.g. when there might be just enough for everyone to get 8 oz., we will instead list 7.5 oz as the share). Even though that sounds lousy, it’s the best way to make sure that all our members are being treated equally, no matter what time they get off work.
Additionally, there have been a few instances — most notably last week with the season’s first tomatoes and zucchini — when inexact scales are not the culprit. Items that are distributed in whole numbers should not run dry at all … but they did.
So we’re asking everyone to review the guidelines below:
– Check the large white board and the signs on each bin to make sure you take the amount that’s appropriate for your size share.
– Note that, sometimes, a full share will get an item that a half share won’t get any of (and, occasionally, vice versa).
– Make sure that your scale is properly tared — that is, zeroed out with an empty bowl. (Check out the video!)
– Weigh carefully, and don’t sneak a few extra ounces/items.
– Don’t strip the waste (lettuce core, brocoli leaves, etc.) before you weigh
– Watch your children to make sure they treat the produce with care.
One last thing, which has been a little unclear to members: each week, Heather also brings us a bin or two of extra produce, which we keep off to the side. This is stuff that was picked on Friday and not sold at their farm over the weekend. It’s not part of anyone’s official share, it’s just there for all of us to share. Feel free to take a little something, but please don’t get greedy.
We know that distribution can be chaotic, and that it’s the end of a long day, so please take a bit of extra time to make sure you’re taking your share. And many thanks to the members who have been affected for their patience and understanding.
See you soon!
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Notes from Woodbridge: Fruits and Flowers

Farmer Heather writes on Woodbridge Farm’s Facebook page:

Our fields are now full of bright flowers: the snowy white dusting of pea flowers, tiny yellow stars on dark green tomato vines, and brilliant splaying orange on the zucchini and summer squash. The sunset-orange-colored zucchini blossoms are bigger than my hand!

And flowers… mean fruit! We have an abundant crop of peas flowing in, tomatoes and peppers just beginning to form, and zucchinis stretching out from the base of those fantastic blossoms.

Today’s shares should include:

lettuce
salad greens
peas
kale
swiss chard
basil
scallions

and possibly:
garlic scapes
salad turnips

There’s also a scary story about a pesky groundhog.

See you later!

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Week 4: Notes from Woodbridge Farm

Here’s what Woodbridge Farm’s Facebook page tells us today:

Shares this week will include:
lettuce
salad greens
garlic scapes
napa cabbage
sugar snap peas
and herbs (dill and oregano most likely)

There was a request to share more about what varieties we grow of different crops, what you’re looking at in your shares. Since there is sometimes a mix, we’ll just share some information here you can maybe match to what you’re seeing at home!

The peas are sugar snap peas, they can be eaten raw or cooked in a stir fry, they are sweet and juicy.

Salad greens are a mix of a dozen or so lettuce and mustard green varieties, including things like romaine, red leaf lettuce, kale, tatsoi, mizuna, and many others.

We grow German White and German Red garlic, so that’s where our scapes are coming from.

We’ll have napa cabbage this week from two different varieties (though they are quite similar): Rubicon and Bilko, the Bilko is a slightly darker green, while the Rubicon is supposed to have a slightly sharper tang. Napa cabbage is what is traditionally used to make kimchi, and will store just above freezing with high humidity for a month or two.

Find out more about lettuce varieties on Facebook.

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Free Performance Tuesday at 6:30 — ETHEL at Abrons Amphitheater

Jennifer Choi (violin), Cornelius Dufallo (violin),
Ralph Farris (viola), and Dorothy Lawson (cello)

You know that balcony at Abrons our kids are not allowed to play on? Well, apparently if you’re a member of ETHEL — “America’s premier postclassical string quartet” — you are allowed to play up there, this Tuesday at 6:30pm.

ETHEL is an exciting group, primarily performing music composed in the past twenty years. They’ve toured the world, won a MAP Fund grant, and now, thanks to the Carnegie Hall Neighborhood Concert Series and the citywide music festival Make Music New York, they’re coming to a CSA distribution site near you.

Tomorrow’s program: (subject to change):
Marcello Zarvos, Arrival
Cornelius Dufallo, Lighthouse
Dorothy Lawson, Chai
Ralph Farris, 2fer
John Cage, 4’33”
Daniel Felsenfeld, You, Have No.Idea
Terry Riley, Sunrise of The Planetary Dream Collector
Huang Ruo, The Flag Project
Mark Stewart, To Whom it May Concern: Thank You

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Food Drive and Just Food Visit

On the second Tuesday of each month, we try to do something a little special at distribution. This month we have two small but highly relevant events:

OLS Food Drive
Our Lady of Sorrows food pantry is a full partner in our CSA — each week, any food left unclaimed by members gets collected by OLS volunteers to be distributed at their food pantry the next morning. They help ensure that none of our fresh food goes to waste.

Many emergency food organizations are dealing with cuts in funding and donations at the same time that even more families rely on their services. Please clean out your pantry of non-perishable food items and help us fill a box to complement our leftover veggies. We’ll have a box set up near the front of the amphitheater. If you’d like to add something to your shopping cart to donate, here is a list of suggested items:

brown/white rice, dried beans, cereal, oatmeal, peanut butter, canned meat or fish

Just Food Visit

Just Food is the non-profit that helped get us started — over the years, they’ve helped over 100 NYC neighborhoods connect with local farmers to create an extensive network of CSA throughout the city. They also take on issues of food justice, and help promote affordable, fresh foods in a variety of other ways.
This year, they’re formalizing their relationship with all the CSA members who have benefitted from their help by creating an CSA Network that each one of us contributes to — $5 of your membership fee goes to Just Food to help them build new CSAs and promote their mission, for a total of $580 from Grand Street CSA.

Just Food staff members Paula Lukats and Jessica Cortes will be joining us at our distribution this Tuesday to meet members, talk more about Just Food and answer questions about the new Just Food CSA Network. Be sure to take a minute to say hi when you pick up your share.

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News from Woodbridge Farm

Everyone came together this weekend to put all of our tomatoes, eggplant, peppers, summer squash, cucumbers, winter squash, and basil into the ground! We had several volunteers, and everyone had an important piece of the puzzle! Making deep holes over and over again crouched down with a trowel or planting cosmos and zinnias to mark the borders of each different variety of crops. Someone was pounding 8 foot stakes into the ground to support the trellising (not an easy task for some shorties like us! but we’re ambitious about how big those crops will be this year!) and others following a dirt-smudged map to sort our 19 different varieties of tomatoes, peppers, and eggplant into their places. We trellised tomatoes, laid big black blankets of tarping down for winter squash, watered watered watered, breathed in the sweet summer smell of basil in our hands, and tenderly untangled eager cucumbers from each other as we put them in the ground. We are ready for summer!!

Read more on Woodbridge Farm’s Facebook Notes.

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Distribution Notes for June 7

Greetings CSA! A few announcements and reminders before our second distribution:

As everyone who has stuck around here since 2009 knows, our early summer berries are very sensitive to rain. This year, our fruit is getting a late start and will NOT yet be available for us tomorrow. What this means: fruit, egg, and pasta shares are delivered together, so none of those extras will be available tomorrow. It’s actually not as much of a tragedy as it sounds … fruit, egg, and pasta shares are priced for 21 weeks, while our vegetable and cheese shares are priced for 23 weeks. Normally, fruit starts a week later than vegetables and takes a week off around the beginning of July; it looks like this year we’ll just get started two weeks later and run straight through to the end of the season.

CHEESE, however, is available, since this comes to us from Woodbridge Farm, the same lovely people who grow our vegetables. We ask that you sign in for cheese (actually all your extras, when they start coming in) separately from your vegetables. If you’re not sure where we’re hiding your cheese, please ask.

SYRUP will be available Tuesday for those who have signed up for it. If you didn’t pay last week, please come prepared to pay this week, either with cash or a check made out to Grand Street CSA.

We have one cancellation for Tuesday’s closing shift (7:00 – 8:30). If you have not yet signed up for your work shifts, please snag this one: goo.gl/dBm3j .

And here’s a good time for a reminder to make sure your work shifts are marked down in your own personal calendars, so that you aren’t surprised by a conflict when your scheduled shift comes around.

Thanks!

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First Distribution Round-up

Great to see everyone — old members and new — back at Abrons today for CSA pick-up. The afternoon went off without a hitch, except we were a little short of dill there at the end. The farm usually sends us a little bit extra of everything, but please also make sure that you count and measure everything carefully so no one gets shorted.

The syrup tasting was a real treat, and for anyone who hasn’t yet signed up you can still order syrup online. All syrup orders will be fulfilled next week at distribution.

And next week our other extras will be in as well — fruit, eggs, and pasta. See you then!

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Vegetables for May 31

Heather is on the road … here’s what she’s bringing us today:


  Half Share  Full Share
Dill     4 sprigs  8 large sprigs
Lettuce heads  1 head   2 heads
Mustard greens  3.5 oz   7 oz
Kale     14 oz  28 oz
Radishes  1 bunch  2 bunches