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December 16-22, 2019
As this is the last distribution of 2019, it’s again time to thank you for your loyalty to good food, and please know that I am sincere. Knowing you are excited about gathering your family’s sustenance for the week, along with being at the right place at the right time for collecting your share amidst your hectic schedule, motivates us to come through for you in every way that we can. We harvested and distributed more nutritious food in 2019 than ever before, and for that we are grateful. Many of you make a lot of your meals with Elmwood Stock Farm ingredients and we are honored. Some of you are in the 90th percentile on the percent of your diet that comes from Elmwood. Wow, we love to hear such stories!
The idea of the CSA business model was just coming into vogue at the start of this decade, and ten short years later it has evolved into customizable shares. Eighty-two percent of you adjusted the farmers choice share this week. Whether you adjust or receive the share the farm chooses, we think it’s awesome that so many of you plan your week around local organic food. With the software interface between us, these days you almost get a personal virtual tour of the farm as you evaluate the week’s offerings.
Each week of the season, you could probably see the effects of the record setting heat/drought in September, or the impact of relentless rains back in the spring. You saw the ebb and flow of produce as cool season crops transgressed into summer, then back to cool. Seasoned shareholders have learned to read weather patterns and capture the essence of seasonal eating when the time is right.
In order to determine a week’s offerings, we walk the fields to survey what’s ready for picking, identifying so much of this, a little of that. We determine how many shares of each crop are available for you to choose from. This is the trickiest part for us, since we have to decide several days out to give you time to login in and adjust, and us time to pick and pack and deliver to you. Some weeks the offerings may vary from day to day as the crops can change rapidly, and while not easy to manage, this allows us to fully utilize each planting, and handle surprise weather situations.
The fascinating thing we see from y’all picking and choosing each week is that the numbers usually come out even. When we post 30 bags of baby kale for instance, there is a pretty good chance some of you will choose two or more, and then we would be short. But invariably, enough of you opt for the salad mix or curly kale instead, making your baby kale for others. The predictability of a population of people is mind boggling.
We scored well on our food safety audit earlier this fall and passed our organic inspection with good marks this past week, neither of which came easy, but maintaining certification and third-party verification is the right thing to do. To have trained knowledgeable people come onto the farm and look at each miniscule aspect of what we do is intimidating to some degree. However, we came to realize long ago, that such scrutiny helps us to be better farmers and marketers. It forces all of us to keep good records which helps us make better decisions.
As we close out 2019, I think it seems like it was a pretty good year. As a CSA member, you got first choice for amazing tasting foods that promote good health while improving the planet. We got to invest in growing more good food for people that care. Thank you for the opportunity to do so. Plans are well under way for 2020 and looking back we have come a long way. From all the farmers and farming/marketing team at Elmwood Stock Farm, thank you for your support. – Mac Stone
Check out our Pinterest board for this week’s recipes!
https://www.pinterest.com/elmwoodstockfar/recipes-2019-fall-csa/
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