Farm Fresh Summer 2010
A growing list of community-supported agriculture programs offer a different kind of "fast food"
Written by Sue Sanders • Photographed by Maggie Wood
Shortly after being plucked from the field and washed, the arugula is boxed, loaded on pallets, then placed in refrigerated boxes on Golden Earthworm Farm's truck. The greens are driven for about 90 minutes, from eastern Long Island to St. Mark's Church in Jackson Heights. At the church, the truck is unloaded and boxes are set up for neighborhood residents to pick up. Later that evening, Farm Spot coordinator Sonya Gropman drizzles some of the arugula with olive oil and red wine vinegar, if anything. "It's so fresh it doesn't really need any dressing," she insists. Twenty-four hours from farm to fork, for less than what she'd pay at a supermarket. For Gropman, a healthy meal is as easy as CSA.
The letters stand for community-supported agriculture, and while programs like Gropman's Farm Spot have been growing as quickly as asparagus, many Queens residents are still mystified by what they are. CSA programs offer a direct farm-to-customer relationship, eliminating the middlemen. A neighborhood CSA is usually farm-specific when it comes to vegetables. A customer plunks down cash upfront to purchase a "share" in this farm for a full growing season (usually June through October). Prices vary, but $550 is typically the high end for a share, working out to around $21 per week for enough vegetables to feed a family of four. Farm-fresh produce is delivered weekly to a neighborhood distribution site, and in return the farmer is guaranteed a seasonal income. It's a basic economic model, so simple it works.
Queens CSAs get their produce from Long Island, the Hudson Valley and farther upstate, as well as New Jersey and even Vermont. Each week's haul consists only of what can be grown locally and seasonally. At peak harvest times, members can find themselves with more produce than they know what to do with, often looking to nonmember friends to take their surplus. It's not just garden-variety fruits and veggies either: Golden Earthworm Farm grows everything from mild, citrusy Sun Jewel melons to the slightly bitter, slightly sweet leaf vegetable guy lon (otherwise known as Chinese broccoli).
"Sure, we grow the 'regular' things like carrots and potatoes, but also a lot of the more unusual stuff," says Golden Earthworm co-owner Maggie Kurek. "There's definitely far more diversity than what you'd find in the supermarket."
The Queens CSA movement has seen exponential growth in the last decade. In 2002, Just Food, a nonprofit that has helped start more than 80 CSAs in New York City, contacted Golden Earthworm Farm to see if it was interested in working with the newly formed Forest Hills CSA. Eight years later, the farm provides produce to more than half of the CSAs in Queens, including Astoria, Forest Hills, Jackson Heights and Sunnyside.
"We really like the borough," says Kurek. "We have a personal relationship with our CSA members; they know us and visit our farm, and they send us recipes." Indeed, Golden Earthworm's website is ripe with recipes, offering CSA members tips for how to handle the more unusual bounty, like those mysterious-looking but flavorful garlic scapes.
Most CSA farms grow produce that's organic or minimally sprayed, so CSA shares aren't only filled with greens; they are green. Supporting local farms also helps protect open land, ensuring the greenbelt of farmland around New York City doesn't buckle to real estate overdevelopment.
Lisa DiClerico, a core member of the Long Island City CSA, originally joined for the fresh local vegetables but quickly discovered many other benefits. "I love being involved in my community, getting to know my neighbors and educating them about food." The newly formed CSA offers specially priced shares to low-income members and distributes in the Queensbridge Houses, the country's largest public housing development. The Long Island City CSA partners with two nonprofits, Hunger Action Network and NYC Coalition Against Hunger, so it can offer its memberships on a sliding scale. Last year, a half share, more than enough for two people, ranged in price from $75 (with food stamps) to $280 for the highest income bracket. Even at the highest rate, a half share costs less than $13 a week for produce that would be several times that at the supermarket.
Many CSAs also provide the option to add in fruit, meat, eggs and even beer and wine. Jackson Heights's Farm Spot CSA partners with Long Island's Briermere Farm for its fruit share, but also provides pre-ordered meat, eggs, cheese and bread, collected from a consortium of small upstate farms. Farm Spot also works with neighborhood bakeries and espresso dealers, turning distribution day into a community market. Last year, it collaborated with the nonprofit Hot Bread Kitchen, a social-purpose bakery. According to Gropman, who's Farm Spot's coordinator, "Our members get freshly made corn tortillas, granola and other tasty bread treats, and Hot Bread Kitchen uses the money to help newly immigrated women learn new skills." Definitely a winning combination, and just one additional way that CSAs are not only good for you—they do good too.
FIND YOUR LOCAL CSA
Astoria (Arrow Community Center): www.astoriacsa.com
Astoria (Harvest Astoria): www.harvestastoria.com
Astoria (Hellgate): www.hellgatecsa.com
Douglaston: 718-229-4000 x212
Far Rockaway: 347-321-0423 or [email protected]
Forest Hills:718-459-1037 or www.foresthillscsa.com
Forest Hills Tuv Ha'Aretz: 718-263-7000 x250 or [email protected]
Glendale: 718-459-0792 or www.glendalecsa.com
Jackson Heights: 718-512-5097 or www.farmspot.org
Long Island City: 212-825-0028 x201 or www.liccsa.wordpress.com
Ozone Park: 718.323.0793 or [email protected]
Sunnyside: 718-670-7354 or www.sunnysidecsa.com
Woodside: www.woodsidecsa.blogspot.com