Transitioning to Summer Eating

Ever since we joined our first CSA half a decade ago, we've been eating differently.  CSA's have a lot to recommend them, as ways to support local farmers, but most of all I think their value comes in changing our relationship to food and how we eat.

When I am part of a CSA, I go down to the market once a week and they hand me a bag of veggies.  Who knows what will be in it - whatever is in season, whatever they've grown plenty of.



I've had to learn to cook with strange new vegetables (kohlrabi, anyone?), but it's not just the new types that have changed the way we eat.  It's also that we eat with the seasons, that we can't plan weeks in advance, and that we are encouraged to experiment.

The CSA season is 25 weeks long, and it has just begun.  My first week's share had rhubarb, onions, beet greens, carrots, chard, and chives.

In the summer we eat more salads, stir frys, and vegetable soups.  We grill more often, as well.  In the summer we buy fruit and meat at the market also, and sometimes our cheese as well.

So it's time to set the cookbooks aside, forget the long-term meal planning.  It's time to find and wash out the popcicle molds and the salad dressing shaker.  The seasons shift, and how we live shifts too.