Fertile Ground USA...Celebrating the people behind the plow

October 9

    We picked kale covered in ice on Tuesday morning.  The first real cold snap of the season whooshed in on Sunday night, and left us shivering at home and bundling into hats, fleece jackets, and gloves for an early morning harvest on Tuesday.  It’s remarkable to think that it was only a few weeks ago that I felt I would be eternally grouchy due to the oppressive heat and humidity here in the Valley.  But fall is in full swing here, as if the brilliant rusts and golds of the sugar maples didn’t tell me so themselves.  
    There’s something miraculous about plants that can continue to grow under the stress of a heavy frost.  Kale and collards, two of the heartiest greens, keep on trucking, producing their big, floppy leaves well into the coldest months of the late fall.  And just when I’m beginning to mourn the loss of abundant lettuces, zucchinis, and tomatoes, I find a new satisfaction in the sweetness from the addition of frosted kale to most of the dishes in my kitchen.  
    But the slow down of the farming season presents a real challenge. As advocates of sustainable agriculture and local food systems charge ahead in promoting their cause, residents of the northeast find themselves wondering- how do I walk the walk during the winter and early spring months?
    Winter CSAs are popping up quickly in the northeast, providing subscribers with a bounty of winter squash, storage carrots, parsnips, onions, and some hearty greens.  But even the best of them only supplies until January or February. What about that gap between the end of CSA season and the renewed marketing months of May and June?
    Even I, a dedicated consumer of local produce, find myself slinking into the produce section of Whole Foods, reluctantly purchasing an avocado from Mexico here, an eggplant from California there.  Not only do I crave something other than starchy roots from time to time, but I don’t have an adequate storage system (rental apartments tend not to come equipped with a root cellar and sharing a tiny freezer with 3 other roommates doesn’t exactly facilitate freezing as a method of putting food by) or enough storage crops to last me through the long months during which northeastern farms aren’t dispatching their goods. As the temperature drops and I look at the 7 month gap between now and time farms in this area will be selling again, my shelf of canned tomatoes seems pretty measly.
    It’s during these months that I find myself resenting California, Texas, and Louisiana and their eternal growing seasons.  And perhaps most directly, I find myself seething with jealousy for the Bay Area.  Of course the liberal Mecca can advertise itself as a model of sustainable agriculture and local foods- they have a 12 month growing season! It’d be easy for New York, Boston, DC, or Philly to do the same if we didn’t spend months with the ground frozen solid and, in some places, feet of snow to impede photosynthesis on the ground. We in the Northeast don’t even have green, growing grass in the colder months.
    So my choices seem to be thus- move to the Bay Area, where things are freer and easier; find the money to buy or rent a place where I’ll be permanent enough to invest in a chest freezer and the construction of a root cellar; or sheepishly pay my valuable dollars for food that’s been shipped cross country in a refrigerated truck only to arrive on my plate a bit wilted, not particularly flavorful, and with a heaping dose of guilt.
    But here’s what I think. I pay my dues in time and sweat during the growing season.  Until my means improve so that I can preserve enough food to feed myself through the winter, I’ve got to do the best I can. And that means making the best choices with the resources I’ve got available.
    Yes, I’d choose local over organic from California (controversial to many, I know). But when local isn’t an option, I turn to the giant state on the other side of the continent for my food supply.  As my envy continues and I continue to be situated in less-than-ideal communal housing, I think I’ll try to cut the guilt a little bit.  Hey, even a proselytizer of local and organic food has gotta eat.

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