Food Junta

I wrote about my CSA back when it began, and I’ve mentioned it a few times since. So I thought it would be only fair to give you guys an end-of-season wrap-up. Especially because, by the end, I had some hesitation about whether the CSA had been right for me.

So in lieu of a regular contributor this week, my roommate and CSA-partner Alek wisely suggest we have a little informal conversation – a la David Brooks and Gail Collins – about our CSA experience, the pros and cons, and whether we’d do it again. I hope that you’ll find this interesting and, if you’re considering a CSA for next season, that it will help you decide whether it’s right for you.

And if you’re wondering which of us is Brooks and which Collins, I think I get to be Gail. I’m OK with that.

Kevin: So Alek: I really enjoyed our farm share and the opportunity to cook together on a regular basis. I think it was a good value and the produce we got was excellent for the most part. If I had it to do over again, however, I think I would rather take the same amount of money and spend at the farmer’s market over the course of the six months.

As the season progressed, the weekly influx of food actually began to feel burdensome. The composition of each week’s share was such that it was hard to make a real meal out of without supplementing, but the quantity of food we had and the money we’d spent on the share made me loath to purchase additional groceries for each meal.

I realize this is my own stupid problem, but as Red-Blooded Americans, aren’t we meant to make our purchasing decisions based on our own stupid problems?

Alek: Kevin, as you know, I’m well aware of some of your misgivings following our 6-month (?) (!) experiment. Yes, the physical and mental burden of fresh produce was often hard to manage. Would a week bring one beet or eight? How many potatoes can a refrigerator hold before it explodes? These are important questions, and ones we couldn’t avoid answering.

But, to begin with a small point—despite the unabashed trendiness of the CSA, there was something beautiful about cooking each week with ingredients that were a reflection of a sort of cycle that, as city-dwellers, we can certainly sense but rarely manifests itself. The cliché of there being “no seasons in the American supermarket” was something I understood conceptually, but never really felt until this year. Taking the produce and rendering it into (usually) edible form was an exciting process for me. And the unpredictable quality of our weekly quota only accentuated that sense.

Kevin: Oh, yes. The beauty of seasonal eating goes well beyond sustainability or social responsibility. Food that is in season tastes better, and absence makes the heart grow fonder. Tomatoes are lousy in winter, and the first fresh tomato of the season – enjoyed after 8 months of privation – is a veritable Proustian madeleine. Or whatever. It’s tasty.

But I am saying that I would have preferred over the past half-year to have gotten this seasonal produce from one of NYC’s wondrous greenmarkets. They reflect the same seasonality that our CSA did, but you can pick and choose and buy in reasonable amounts. My frustration with our CSA was trying to make a meal out of 4 radishes, a turnip, two carrots, a bell pepper, and bunch of cilantro. I actually think variety was the curse of our CSA: There was never enough of one thing to make a dish of.

I liked the CSA and would do one again, but I don’t think it was the right fit for my circumstances this time.

Alek: Is it possible to get through just one conversation without your bandying about Proust?

I have no real answer to your rejoinder, aside from my own ineptness. That is, before the summer, my cooking acumen was limited at best. Even now, the vast expanse of vegetables at any summer afternoon’s farmer’s market is alluring yet terrifying. And that’s not to mention wading through the permanently dawdling masses.

The CSA, though occasionally irksome functionally (lugging a 6 pound cauliflower 20 blocks uptown. the eternal apple-weighing-scale shortage), took all the decision making out of it. And decision making is probably my least favorite part everything, cooking included.

To be confronted with an inconsistent group of vegetables each week was often stymieing—what can you really do with 4 radishes and a bunch of cilantro?—but also exciting—cilantro radish stew! And, for me, the earnest novice, it offered a chance to slowly familiarize myself with a range of produce, much of which I might not have found on my own.

Kevin: No. It is not possible.

So perhaps the lesson here is just to be sure you know what you’re getting yourself into with a CSA. It turns out that I actually don’t like having someone else pick my produce for me. For me, wandering around the farmer’s market and deciding what to cook is a delight; trying to figure out what to do with 6 pounds of cauliflower feels like work. I guess it all comes down to personal preference.

So impetus/burden aside, what did you think of the value and quality of our CSA?

Alek: I’ll have to answer that with another uncertainty. I haven’t much to compare the CSA to, and, more than that, I found it useless after the first couple weeks to even try to keep track of what we were getting for the money. Having paid up front in the spring, it was a buried issue, which I also liked, as it enabled us to avoid the constant valuation and revaluation of how much a meal costs, or whether I should just buy a falafel instead of making something myself.

I suppose this is a bit dour—cooking through self coercion—but it, again, took all of the decision-making out of it. After this year, I can imagine wanting to go your proposed farmer’s market route, but I think that could get out of hand monetarily much more easily than the CSA ever threatened to. Additionally, getting a good deal and feeling like you’re getting a good deal are basically indistinguishable phenomena. The pre-CSA fee allowed me to submit my cheque to the potentially unruly fates of farm production, allowing me to be blithely awed by the 10 red onions we received in any week. What a steal!

As long as we’re asking questions: do you think you would have cooked as much—or as many vegetables—if we had gone the farmer’s market route?

Kevin: I do think I would have cooked as much – and probably as many vegetables – though I likely wouldn’t have eaten as many salads or made as many sides of greens, etc. I also probably would have gone another year without cooking with a tomatillo or eating a donut peach, and those two experiences alone were worth the cost of admission.

I’m right there with you on the self-coercion. In fact I’m a step ahead: I have this blog. One of the reasons I enjoy Food Junta so much is that it forces me to cook something new or try a new twist on something old at least once a week. So I don’t need that from a CSA and trying to use all of our CSA vegetables each week in addition to cooking for FJ started to feel like a bit too much.

But not everybody has a food blog and not everybody is so easily distressed by a few turnips. I still think CSAs are a great idea and will definitely do another in the future. I just think this wasn’t the year for me.

So to wrap up, two questions: (1) Who told you that you could spell “cheque” like a European? and (2) Would you do it again?

Alek: I’m glad I seemed to have tempered your previous regret into an unsure promise of a future CSA. I’d agree that in some ways, this perhaps wasn’t the best year for us to do it. A CSA (or a farm-share or whatever) is a city-dweller’s vicarious placing of roots, the closest one can get to feeling connected to the cultivation of food without a roof garden or a farm. It seems to involve a certain physical and mental stability, which, for us confused 20-somethings, was perhaps somewhat inappropriate.

I would do it again, but probably only once I’ve reached a point where that makes sense. But, having done this trial run, I know what would be involved, and what sort of circumstances would make it worthwhile. In all, though, I thought it was pretty great. And I’m hard to please.

Also, I kind of thought “cheque” and “check” were two different things. I guess I was wrong. Or perhaps it’s a stubborn holdout from my days as an adolescent anglophile.

Kevin: I sympathize with adolescent Anglophilia. I lost my 3rd grade spelling bee because I spelled the color as “grey” instead of “gray.” I am still bitter.

Finally, I just want to temper my feelings as being not so much “regret” as a realization in hindsight that – this year, at least – I would have preferred to set aside that CSA money as a discretionary farmer’s market fund. But I got far more satisfaction than suffering from our CSA. It was a good deal, and it did keep us cooking – and doing so creatively.

Thanks for sharing it with me and for having this conversation. I hope it gives people a sense of the pros and cons of a CSA and helps some 20-somethings decide whether or not they ought to cheque one out. So thank you for your time, and please save me a radish.

Kevin Roe <roe.kevin@gmail.com>

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CSA Musings 2
10 messages

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Kevin Roe <roe.kevin@gmail.com>	Mon, Nov 16, 2009 at 4:08 PM
To: Aleksandr Bierig <aleksandr.bierig@gmail.com>
I greatly enjoyed our farm share and the opportunity to cook together on a regular basis. It was a good value and the produce we got was excellent for the most part. If I had it to do over again, however, I would rather take the same amount of money and have it to spend at the farmer’s market. The weekly influx of food actually began to feel burdensome. The composition of each week’s share was such that it was hard to make a real meal out of without supplementing, but the quantity of food we had and the money we’d spent on the share made me loath to purchase additional groceries for each meal.

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Aleksandr Bierig <aleksandr.bierig@gmail.com>	Mon, Nov 16, 2009 at 4:32 PM
To: Kevin Roe <roe.kevin@gmail.com>
I am shifting this tone conversational-ward, a la Brooks and Collins, if that’s alright . . . Kevin, as you know, I’m well aware of some of your misgivings following our 6-month (?) (!) experiment. Yes, the physical and mental burden of fresh produce was often hard to manage. Would a week bring one beet or eight? How many potatoes can a refrigerator hold before it explodes? These are important questions, and ones we couldn’t avoid answering. But, to begin with a small point—despite the unabashed trendiness of the CSA, there was something beautiful about cooking each week with ingredients that were a reflection of a sort of cycle that, as city-dwellers, we can certainly sense but rarely manifests itself. The cliché of there being “no seasons in the American supermarket” was something I understood conceptually, but never really felt until this year. Taking the produce and rendering it into (usually) edible form was an exciting process for me. And the unpredictable quality of our weekly quota only accentuated that sense. [Quoted text hidden]

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Kevin Roe <roe.kevin@gmail.com>	Tue, Nov 17, 2009 at 4:43 PM
To: Aleksandr Bierig <aleksandr.bierig@gmail.com>
[Very good tonal shift. Thanks.] Oh, yes. The beauty of seasonal eating goes well beyond sustainability or social responsibility. Food that is in season tastes better, and absence makes the heart grow fonder. Tomatoes are lousy in winter, and the first fresh tomato of the season – enjoyed after 8 months of privation – is a veritable Proustian madeleine. Or whatever. It’s tasty. But I am saying that I would have preferred over the past half-year to have gotten this seasonal produce from one of NYC’s wondrous greenmarkets. They reflect the same seasonality that our CSA did, but you can pick and choose and buy in reasonable amounts. My frustration with our CSA was trying to make a meal out of 4 radishes, a turnip, two carrots, a bell pepper, and bunch of cilantro. I actually think variety was the curse of our CSA: There was never enough of one thing to make a dish of. I liked the CSA and would do one again, but I don’t think it was the right fit for my circumstances this time. [Quoted text hidden]

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Aleksandr Bierig <aleksandr.bierig@gmail.com>	Tue, Nov 17, 2009 at 5:01 PM
To: roe.kevin@gmail.com
5:01 PM Aleksandr: yo quick question if you’re there is book club at our house tonight?

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Aleksandr Bierig <aleksandr.bierig@gmail.com>	Wed, Nov 18, 2009 at 11:00 AM
To: Kevin Roe <roe.kevin@gmail.com>
[Jumping on this to avoid my real writing assignment.] Is it possible to get through just one conversation without your bandying about Proust? I have no real answer to your rejoinder, aside from my own ineptness. That is, before the summer, my cooking acumen was limited at best. Even now, the vast expanse of vegetables at any summer afternoon’s farmer’s market is alluring yet terrifying. And that’s not to mention wading through the permanently dawdling masses. The CSA, though occasionally irksome functionally (lugging a 6 pound cauliflower 20 blocks uptown. the eternal apple-weighing-scale shortage), took all the decision making out of it. And decision making is probably my least favorite part everything, cooking included. To be confronted with an inconsistent group of vegetables each week was often stymieing—what can you really do with 4 radishes and a bunch of cilantro?—but also exciting—cilantro radish stew! And, for me, the earnest novice, it offered a chance to slowly familiarize myself with a range of produce, much of which I might not have found on my own. [Quoted text hidden]

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Kevin Roe <roe.kevin@gmail.com>	Wed, Nov 18, 2009 at 1:49 PM
To: Aleksandr Bierig <aleksandr.bierig@gmail.com>
So perhaps the lesson here is just to be sure you know what you’re getting yourself into with a CSA. It turns out that I actually don’t like having someone else pick my produce for me. For me, wandering around the farmer’s market and deciding what to cook is a delight; trying to figure out what to do with 6 pounds of cauliflower feels like work. So impetus/burden aside, what did you think of the value and quality of our CSA? [Quoted text hidden]

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Aleksandr Bierig <aleksandr.bierig@gmail.com>	Wed, Nov 18, 2009 at 4:18 PM
To: Kevin Roe <roe.kevin@gmail.com>
I’ll have to answer that with another uncertainty. I haven’t much to compare the CSA to, and, more than that, I found it useless after the first couple weeks to even try to keep track of what we were getting for the money. Having paid up front in the spring, it was a buried issue, which I also liked, as it enabled us to avoid the constant valuation and revaluation of how much a meal costs, or whether i should just buy a falafel instead of making something myself. I suppose this is a bit dour—cooking through self coercion—but it, again, took all of the decision-making out of it. After this year, I can imagine wanting to go your proposed farmer’s market route, but I think that could get out of hand monetarily much more easily than the CSA ever threatened to. Additionally, getting a good deal and feeling like you’re getting a good deal are basically indistinguishable phenomena. The pre-CSA fee allowed me to submit my cheque to the potentially unruly fates of farm production, allowing me to be blithely awed by the 10 red onions we received in any week. What a steal! As long as we’re asking questions: do you think you would have cooked as much—or as many vegetables—if we had gone the farmer’s market route? [Quoted text hidden]

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Kevin Roe <roe.kevin@gmail.com>	Wed, Nov 18, 2009 at 10:25 PM
To: Aleksandr Bierig <aleksandr.bierig@gmail.com>
I do think I would have cooked as much – and probably as many vegetables – though I likely wouldn’t have eaten as many salads or made as many sides of greens, etc. I also probably would have gone another year without cooking with a tomatillo or eating a donut peach, and those two experiences alone were worth the cost of admission. I’m right there with you on the self-coercion. In fact I’m a step ahead: I have this blog. One of the reasons I enjoy Food Junta so much is that it forces me to cook something new or try a new twist on something old at least once a week. So I don’t need that from a CSA and trying to use all of our CSA vegetables each week in addition to cooking for FJ started to feel like a bit too much. But not everybody has a food blog and not everybody is so easily distressed by a few turnips. I still think CSAs are a great idea and will definitely do another in the future. I just think this wasn’t the year for me. So to wrap up, two questions: (1) Who told you that you could spell “cheque” like a European? and (2) Would you do it again? [Quoted text hidden]

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Aleksandr Bierig <aleksandr.bierig@gmail.com>	Thu, Nov 19, 2009 at 11:55 AM
To: Kevin Roe <roe.kevin@gmail.com>
I’m glad I seemed to have tempered your previous regret into a unsure promise of a future CSA. I’d agree that in some ways, this perhaps wasn’t the best year for us to do it. A CSA (or a farm-share or whatever) is a city-dweller’s vicarious placing of roots, the closest one can get to feeling connected to the cultivation of food without a roof garden or a farm. It seems to involve a certain physical and mental stability, which, for us confused 20-somethings, was perhaps somewhat inappropriate. I would do it again, but probably only once I’ve reached a point where that makes sense. But, having done this trial run, I know what would be involved, and what sort of circumstances would make it worthwhile. In all, though, I thought it was pretty great. And I’m hard to please. Also, I kind of thought “cheque” and “check” were two different things. I guess I was wrong. Or perhaps it’s a stubborn holdout from my days as an adolescent anglophile. [Quoted text hidden]

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Kevin Roe <roe.kevin@gmail.com>	Thu, Nov 19, 2009 at 12:35 PM
To: Aleksandr Bierig <aleksandr.bierig@gmail.com>
I sympathize with adolescent Anglophilia. I lost my 3rd grade spelling bee because I spelled the color as “grey” instead of “gray.” I am still bitter. Finally I just want to temper my feelings as being not so much “regret” as a realization in hindsight that – this year, at least – I would have preferred to set aside that CSA money as a discretionary farmer’s market fund. But I got more satisfaction that suffering from our CSA. It was a good deal, and it did keep us cooking – and doing so creatively. So thanks for sharing it with me and for having this conversation. I hope it gives people a sense of the pros and cons of a CSA and helps some 20-somethings decide whether or not they ought to cheque one out. [Fin] I’m going to go back through and make sure this reads well. I’ll send you a final draft in a bit. Thank you, sir. -K [Quoted text hidden]

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Tags: CSA, dialogue