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Virgin Islands CSA Organic produce from Ridge to Reef Farm, VI Feb 22,23, & 26: 2012 CSA Week 1   Welcome to your CSA! Lettuce eat our way to something better   Lately, it seems the Virgin Islands have been reflecting with growing intensity the larger story of the world -a painful fall of unsustainable industries, governments, and widespread unrest. Yet these things are not to dread. Instead, they harken an inevitable return to the realities many have forgotten -especially when it comes to food.  Community Supported Agriculture is an evolution of thinking. You are no longer a "consumer" in your relationship with this food. With your investment you have pledged to be an integral part of your food system, showing your trust and commitment to us farmers, and to the nature that sustains us all. You are healing humanity and the earth by the way you eat, one season, one week, one meal at a time.  The weekly bags of food we deliver won't feed you for the entire week. They are meant to augment your local food supply and inspire you to eat foods that are organic with a high life-force energy. We have selected the best organic crops to give you a variety of raw and cooking options. This variety will expand throughout the season, and we are so excited you will get to enjoy it as the season unfolds. Thanks again for taking part in the VI CSA WInter Season. As we dial in our delivery process, please feel free to leave feedback and come see us at the farm! ~Nate Olive, Director    WTF (What's That Food)?  This week's strange food item: Chaya Also known as "mexican" or "tree" spinach, Chaya was listed by the National Academy of Sciences as one of the most "underexploited" food plants in the world. This native to central america and the caribbean has very high levels of protein, calcium, iron, and carotene, & Vitamins A, C, & B. It is also easy to grow and can resist drought (iguanas, however, are a different story). It cooks like collards and can be used like spinach after being boiled. Add your favorite spices  after boiling, draining, and chopping into strips -Nate recommends turmeric & curry! So why has this not become a major crop? Echonet.org explains, "One consideration with chaya is that it should not be eaten raw. It contains cyanogenic glycosides, which can lead to cyanide poisoning. These are inactivated and released as a gas by frying or boiling for 10 minutes. (We discard the cooking water, but that is not essential.) Brief stir-frying is not adequate cooking." read more about Chaya **Chaya must be cooked for 10-15 minutes before it can be eaten!!**  ·In a study completed by USDA, chaya leaves were found to contain substantially greater amounts of nutrients than spinach.  Chaya: A year-round high-nutrient food supply for the tropics The Week's Harvest Cucumbers Lettuce Radishes Carrots Arugula Chaya** Green Bananas Green Papaya Basil Thyme Turmeric Oregano Welcome gift (CSA bag) **IMPORTANT: Please refer to the WTF section of the newsletter for cooking instructions!   Farm Recipes Chaya-Papaya-Pan by Patrick You need: Bag of Chaya (NEVER EAT RAW), 1 green papaya, 1 onion, 1 garlic head, oil, a pinch of salt, pepper & paprika (hot pepper) Boil Chaya in hot water for 10 to 15 minutes! Peel and slice papaya, onion and garlic. Saute garlic, onions and papaya in oil. Add seasoning and chopped chaya when papaya is soft and cook for a few more minutes.    VI Banana Fries  by Shelli  You need: Green bananas, frying oil, Salt & Chili Powder/Paprika/ Nutritional Yeast    Peel bananas off with your hands. If not possible cut them off with a knife. Start heating the oil to fry the bananas and slice the bananas. Add your favorite seasoning and enjoy! THANK YOU HOSTS! Polly's at the Pier Frederiksted, St. Croix 3:30-5:30pm Wed's Barefoot Buddha Charlotte Amalie, St. Thomas 11:30am-1:30 pm Thurs Miriam's Restaurant Christiansted, St. Croix 4 -5:30pm Sun   Meet the Farmers... Ellen E. Nettles  Ellen's vibrant spirit arrived on St. Croix 11/3/11 as an intern to help us launch our CSA this winter. She already had made farming experiences and she had a vision that sharing community sustainable agriculture practices are key to realizing a peaceful, cooperative, abundant, and enlightened society. When we lost the connection to her physical body through the Annaly tide pools on December 8th, a strengthened spirit of community and purpose awakened for many of us, unifying our vision at Ridge to Reef Farm and in our local Frederiksted community.  She taught us to appreciate each moment in life. This first CSA delivery is manifestation of that shared vision and a lot of hard work. Ellen planted many of the seeds you will enjoy and her spirit lives strong. We dedicate this year of CSA to Ellen Elizabeth Nettles. Saba, Shelli, Nadja, & Ellen at Ridge to Reef Farm  From the Field...  It is impossible to describe the sensory explosion that greets you upon arrival at Ridge to Reef Farm. What a place! I arrived on the island a month ago but it feels like much longer. Having come from a small CSA in Connecticut before departing for warmer soils, I was expecting the usual hum and buzz that comes with living on a working farm. But nothing could prepare me for the experience and learning during my stay within this beautifully and intentionally designed landscape.   First of all, did you know that papayas can be eaten while they are still green? Or that coconut water is delicious in soups? If you aren’t already amazed listening to this: banana plants are actually grasses, and their squishy light, yellow peels are edible! Every day I discover something new. Time at the farm seems to slow down if not stop entirely, although the work certainly doesn’t!    I am part of the Ridge to Reef Empowering Community Pathays program which is a month long intensive training on a diversity of topics relating to cultivating food, sustainability and empowering community. In total we are 6 people helping to care for our crops, animals and landscape. The shared labor and the good company keep the jokes coming and the laughs rolling. ~Julia Meurice, Ridge to Reef Pathways Program  PO Box 2903 - Frederiksted USVI 00841 - www.visfi.org -  220-0466   CSA Bag Re-use As a bonus in the CSA, each member receives a free reusable CSA tote bag to keep at the end of the CSA. It is important that you return your bag clean each week to the CSA pick-up representative, so we can re-use. This allows us to minimize waste and avoid using cheap plastic grocery bags that have a habit of ending up in the ocean. The reclaimed nylon material will last for years! Forget your bag? We will still give you another one, although there is a $10 fee for lost bags. And yes, you can also buy extra, as they make great gifts while supporting organic food in the USVI! The all-new Ridge to Reef Bag Wish List Got some things laying around we can re-use in the CSA? -egg cartons -shallow, sturdy plastic trays for upcoming tomato harvest -milk crates -coolers -zip-locks -popsicle sticks -tarps -any working garden tools -generator, chainsaw, weed-eater -massages:) -carpentry -sign-making -your CSA bags! Ridge to Reef Farm @ the Virgin Islands Sustainable Farm Institute

 

Hello St. Croix CSA member %%user-name%%!   (PLEASE NOTE IMPORTANT CHANGES IN PICK UP TIMES/DATES)

   As you probably know, all of our limited shares are sold out! Thanks to you for making this possible! Now we are doing our final logistics in getting your produce to you in the most fresh and healthy condition possible.  After seeing where all the shareholders live, we found that an immediate change in delivery places and times was needed in order to operate the CSA with the best efficiency.

We have moved the harvest and pick-up day for Christiansted from Wednesday to Sunday and the pick-up for Frederiksted from Sunday to Wednesdays. This is necessary so that we can split the harvest needs in half during each week to ensure the best produce possible.

    The reasons for the change are the difference in the number of shares going to Christiansted and Frederiksted, and also as a result of the destructive fire at BBC out west, which altered our Sunday sales plans. This change will allow us to harvest from our fields evenly twice a week, and therefore give you the best selections.

   Therefore, Frederiksted pickups will start on Wednesday, Feb 22nd and end on Wednesday, May 9th, while Christiansted pick-ups will start on Sunday, Feb 26 and end Monday, May 13th. 

 

St. Croix Winter CSA Final Schedule:   

Frederiksted:  Wednesdays  3:30 - 5:30pm, at Polly's at the Pier

Christiansted: Sundays  4:00 - 5:30pm, at Miriam's (Hospital Street, on the turn to Gallows Bay coming from downtown)

 Please let us know if you need any assistance with this schedule change. Also, if you have not sent in your payment, please do so before Monday Feb 20th to lock in your spot for the season! Memberships not paid by monday will be released to the waiting list.

     

    Thanks or growing with us,

 

            Nate & the amazing Ridge to Reef Farm Crew!

 

   

 

 

    

Small farms today are direct marketers and as such are in the business of relationship marketing with each customer that buys products from the farm. The customer is not at the CSA pickup, farmer's market,  or on-farm market because it is easiest or cheapest food source -- they are there because they respect the farmer, want to support the local economy, and feel that their dollars are spent on a worthwhile endeavor. Every chance you get as a farm to interact with your customers should reinforce the connection to the land and make the customer feel like they are doing a good thing by patronizing your business. This is a very difficult task for a busy farmer. I challenge you to take your relationship marketing into the 21st century and start a blog on your farm website.

I'm sure some of you are unclear on the meaning of the term "blog". It is a rather fluid term that is a shortened version of "weblog." In my mind, it signifies a webpage that displays content of varying lengths in chronological order and invites readers to interact in the form of comments. Often, blog postings are categorized or tagged by topic so that users can navigate through related blog entries by the tags, such as "farming challenges" or "farmer's market." Blogs take many different forms from personal, public diaries to political commentary to blogs that are published by businesses themselves. This is the most popular form of content generation and information retrieval on the Internet today and the very website you are looking at right now, Small Farm Central, is a blog-style site. If you have heard of the term "Web 2.0", blogs are big part of the Web 2.0 movement.

Your farm should blog because it is an easy and time-effective way for you to get your story out to customers. Repeat customers come to you because of the relationship that they have with you and a blog is a perfect way for you to start and augment the real-world interaction that you have with the customer. Granted it does take some time, energy, and thought to produce effective blog posts that communicate the farm experience, but that post will easily be read 100s or 1000s of times over the life of your blog. That works out to be an extremely time-efficient way to build a consistent and faithful customer base. Customers that read your blog will be more understanding of blemishes or crop shortages because you can explain the exact cause of the problems. This becomes a story that they can take home with their produce and they will feel more connected to the farm and the food if they know some of the challenges that went into growing it.

The complaint I hear the most is that farmers don't have time to be writers as well as producers. Steve Sando of Rancho Gordo dedicates one afternoon every two weeks to writing six blog articles. He then releases one each Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday. There are other techniques of course too: get a trusted intern to write an article each week, find a very enthusiastic and involved customer who will volunteer to write a blog article every once and a while, or just commit to posting a short update once each week. There is no right way to write or schedule your blog, but post on a regular schedule and write with passion because passion is infectious.

At this point, if you are considering a farm blog, start reading a few established farm blogs and get some general advice on how to write blogs. I have discussed some aspects of blogging at Small Farm Central in Farm blogging isn't always literature, but this is and What I learned during an interview with Steve Sando of Rancho Gordo. Blogging will be a topic that I come back to over the next few months because I believe it is the core of any modern farm web marketing strategy.

Some farm blogs to get you started:

• Eat Well Farm Blog : recently discussing problems with the Med Fly and how they are certifying their packing shed as Med Fly-free.
• Life of Farm Blog : this blog is sponsored by the Mahindra tractor company. Perhaps the writer got a free tractor for writing the blog?
• Tiny Farm Blog : wonderful photos and at least a post a day.
• Rancho Gordo Blog : this popular blog receives 300-500 unique visitors a day (which is impressive for a farm website) and even helped the author secure a book deal.

Read about the process of writing a blog and more:

• Blogging Your Way Into a Business
• Business Blog Case Study: Stonyfield Farm
• Blogging for your customers versus blogging for your business
• How to Write Great Blog Content : Great advice from the #1 blogger.

Spend the next few weeks reading farm blogs and exploring some of the resources listed above. Then when you think you know enough about blogging to start, you will probably want to go back to Hosting Options to get your blog online. Not coincidentally, the Small Farm Central software contains all the features you need to get your blog (and farm website) up and running within a few days. I know that not very many farms are taking blogging seriously as a marketing tool, but I have a strong feeling that every serious farm will have a blog in five years.

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