Categories
*In the box

Winter Shares, Week 4 (2/20/14)

The snow hasn’t stopped our farmers from getting our share boxes put together. As always, pickup is at Sunnyside Community Services from 5pm-8pm. Please don’t come early, the volunteers need time to set up.

Golden Earthworm:
Watermelon Radish (2 lbs)
White or Yellow Potatoes (2 lbs)
Carrots (5 lbs)
Rutabaga (4 lbs)
Beets (4 lbs)
Leeks (3 pcs)
No sweet potatoes this delivery. They’ll be in the last delivery in March.

Need an idea for your leeks? I am in love with Nom Nom Paleo’s Slow Cooker Chicken recipe. The cookbook version varies a bit–instead of onions, use 3 leeks (white part only), and throw in a tablespoon of fish sauce for extra umami. I didn’t have tomato paste on hand the last time I made it, so I doubled up the fish sauce and it tasted delicious. I kind of wanted to pour the gravy on everything in sight, like boiled carrots and cheese fries and scrambled eggs.

Winter Sun:
Sweet Corn
Green Beans
Butternut
Broccoli
Blueberries
Pea Shoots
Tomato Puree

Village Fishmonger:
Longfin squid

And as always you can pick up your apple, cider, and beer shares.

Sign-ups for 2014 are open for returning members. Click here to lock in your spot.

Categories
Recipes

Baked Rutabaga “Fries”

Ingredients:

1 medium rutabaga
1 TSp Garlic powder
1 teaspoon pprika
salt and pepper
2 tablespoons oil

For the rest of the recipe, click here.

HT: Tara Wood.

Categories
Recipes

Beet Chips

Ingredients:

2 medium beets
1 teaspoon extra-virgin olive oil

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees, with racks in upper and lower thirds. Peel beets and slice 1/16 inch thick with a mandoline. In a large bowl, toss beets with extra-virgin olive oil.

Click here for the rest.

HT: Tara Wood.

Categories
Recipes

Creamy Smoky Whipped Rutabaga

Ingredients:

3 1/2 to 4 pounds rutabagas (two small or one large vegetable)
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
4 garlic cloves, peeled and roughly chopped
1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
1 cup whole milk
4 ounces cream cheese, cut into small chunks
2 tablespoons smoked olive oil
2 teaspoons smoked paprika
Freshly ground black pepper

Find the rest of the recipe here.

HT: Tara Wood.

Categories
*In the box Lewis Waite Farms

Winter Shares, Week 3

Join us on Tuesday, February 4th from 7pm-9pm for our first annual Open House at Sunnyside Community Services.

Bring your checkbook to sign up for your 2014 share, bring some mad money for a raffle ticket to win a fruit share courtesy of Briermere Farms, and bring your taste buds to sample offerings from our expanded list of vendors–including beer, wine, kombucha, fish, milk, a la carte veggies, and, of course, our dearly beloved Lewis Waite and Golden Earthworm Farm.

And if you haven’t already, please fill out our annual survey by 1/31. We’ll be discussing the results at the Open House on Tuesday night.

GEOF-beets
Beets! Image via Golden Earthworm

Golden Earthworm Share
Watermelon Radish
White or Yellow Potatoes
Carrots
Rutabaga
Beets
Sweet Potatoes

Winter Sun Share
Sweet Corn
Blueberries
Broccoli
Cauliflower
Butternut Squash Puree
Pea Shoots
Tomato Puree

Village Fishmonger Fish Share
Porgy

Big aLICe Beer Share
Bremiere Apple Share
Bremiere Cider Share

Categories
Events

Sunnyside CSA Annual Open House

Happy 2014 Sunnyside CSA! Tune in and get ready for the 2014 Summer/Autumn season!

CSA News, Food & Sign-Ups

Our new 2014 Open House is not your average share sign-up soiree. It’s a news, food and sign-ups happening! Plus, a great opportunity to really get to know your CSA:

News: Share your feedback about the season, hear from the core group about the work we did this year, and help determine the direction for next season.

Food: We are excited to host our special product vendors with samples of things you could sign up for this year (if the demand is there)…  and… drumroll please…

Sign-Ups for 2014 Summer/Autumn season! This will be the only in-person sign-up this year- check out our 2014 Summer Share contract here. Sign-ups are on a first-come-first-serve basis, but if you can’t make it to the Open House, we will have online sign-ups soon. Plus, we have more special products coming this summer, like dairy, fish and more— those will be conducted in a separate sign-up later on.

Sunnyside CSA 2014 Open House

Date: Tuesday, February 4th
Time: 7-9 pm
Location: Sunnyside Community Services

With the following vendors confirmed (and others still TBA):

Golden Earthworm Farm
No open house would be complete without our beloved veggie farmers who provide us with amazing vegetables all year round. Hear about their 2013 adventures, give them feedback, and find out what’s in store for 2014!

Enlightenment Wine
Check out wine samples for a potential wine share in 2014!

Big Alice Brewing
If you missed out on our winter beer share, here’s your chance to taste what you missed!

Village Fishmonger
Try their ceviche samples and consider a fish share for 2014!

Booch
Local kombucha and pickles in your CSA? That’s right!

Lewis Waite
Our wonderful partners will have a selection of cheese, bread, raspberry jam, hummus, brittle, ruby sauerkraut, apple bubbly and beef kielbasa, all available through the CSA.

Farmigo
Their year-round, a la carte webstore would give Sunnyside CSA’ers access to year-round veggies and more!

Milk Not Jails
Try their dairy samples and find out about their shares!

A few topics to be covered at the meeting:
– Golden Earthworm Organic Farm update
– Special products update and Lewis Waite product tasting
– Share your thoughts on the CSA and ideas for next season
– Learn about the Subsidized Share Program
– Year-end recap about the CSA’s finances, programs, and policies

We look forward to seeing you there!

Thank you for your feedback!

The results of the 2013 survey—and the future of our CSA—will be discussed at our big Open House meeting on Tuesday, February 4, from 7-9 pm (see above).

 

Categories
Archives

Annual Survey for Sunnyside CSA’ers

We want to hear from you! Really, everyone interested in participating in the Sunnyside CSA—long-time and new members, folks who buy special products or folk who might order food through us next year. Please take our survey and tell us what you want to see! Help shape this CSA by providing feedback!

Ready? Take our annual survey!

You might have noticed that, over the years, we’ve evolved from offering 26 weeks’ worth of vegetables to offering a variety of foods all year round. The more food we’ve introduced into our rotation, the less dependent we’ve become on shopping at traditional supermarkets… and we seem to be headed towards a time when we can meet all of our basic food needs through food deliveries every week, all year round—and almost never need to use a supermarket again.

For some of us, that’s a really exciting goal—but we need to figure out how many of you agree. Are you just interested in getting some summer vegetables and no more? Or do you dream of picking up all sorts of basic and exotic items, all locally-sourced and sustainably-raised, every week of the year?

Whatever your level of interest, tell us via our end-of-the-year survey, which is open to everyone, from seasoned members to folks who have yet to order anything from the CSA. The survey is designed to feed you only the questions that are relevant to your situation, so please, everyone, read it and fill it out asap. Feel free to pass it on to anyone in the neighborhood who is seriously interested in this kind of eating—we want to hear from you all!

Help shape Sunnyside CSA. Take our annual survey!

The results of this survey- and the future of our CSA- will be discussed at our big Town Hall meeting on Tuesday, February 4, from 7-9 pm.

Categories
*In the box

Winter Shares, Week 2

Sweet-Potatoes
Sweet Potatoes! Image via GEOF

Happy New Year Everyone! Here’s what to expect at pick-up this evening, plus we’ve got some fun stuff going on this month—scroll down!

Golden Earthworm Share
Sweet Potatoes (2 lbs)
Watermelon Radish (3 lbs)
White Potatoes (2 lbs)
Beets (2 lbs)
Carrots (5 lbs)
Rutabaga (2 lbs)
Fennel (1 piece)

Bremiere Apple Share
1 mixed bag of Golden Delicious and Macoun apples

Bremiere Cider Share

Winter Sun Share
Sweet Corn
Broccoli
Butternut Squash
Edamame
Blueberries
Tomato Puree
Pea Shoots

Village Fishmonger Fish Share
Rainbow Trout

Big aLICe Beer Share
First pickup! (if you signed up for a beer share)

A few friendly reminders & updates:

Fruit Share Raffle
Briermere Farms has generously donated us a Summer Fruit Share for the upcoming season–that’s a $140 value! The fruit share runs for 16 or more weeks, usually beginning in July. Members receive 1-2 kinds of fruit a week from Briermere Farms, including a variety of berries, apples, pears, & peaches.

We’ll be selling tickets during this week’s pickup (1/9) and the following pickup (1/30). Tickets are $5 for 1, $10 for 3, and $20 for 10. Please bring cash. All ticket sales support our subsidy program, which offers reduced-cost CSA shares for families who want to eat healthily but could use a little financial help. For more info on summer fruit shares, check out our website.

Upcoming Member Items
The Annual Member Survey will be distributed via email soon. Please take the time to give feedback! Remember, it’s OUR CSA!

Town Hall Meeting ~ Save the Date ~ February 4th
Sign-ups for returning members will start at the Town Hall.

Categories
Archives

Winter Sun & Acorn Farms À La Carte Items

You can now order many individual items from our partners at Winter Sun Farms and Acorn Hill Farms! À la carte items are priced and ordered separately from the regular Winter Shares, so just add a few more to your veggie delivery and maybe skip the grocery altogether! Winter Sun has frozen veggies, eggs, meats and other items (see list below). Acorn Hill specializes in cheese, fudge and soap made from goats milk.

Pick-up will be during our regular Winter Vegetable Share time: 5-8pm on December 19, January 9, January 30,February 20, March 13.

How to Order À La Carte Items from Winter Sun:
~ Veggies, Meats, Eggs ~

  1. Visit the ordering website Farmingo
  2. Scroll down and select Sunnyside as your location
  3. Hit NEXT
  4. Add the GUEST WEBSTORE ACCESS option (it’s the only thing you can add) and hit NEXT
  5. If you want to be part of their Egg Share, this is the point where you can join. It’s $5.75 for a dozen eggs (free range, antibotic & hormone-free), and you’re getting 1 carton at each of our 5 delivery dates. Please note: You can always order eggs from Lewis Waite Farm, too (they offer 100% organic eggs that are a little more expensive and free-range eggs (just like these) that are a bit lower in price.) We’re not endorsing either one, just offering you more options- pick whatever works best for you!
  6. Choose what payment plan you want (in full, or in two payments) and hit NEXT
  7. Create or login to your account.  Please note: Winter Sun Farms uses a site called Farmigo to run their store. Farmigo happens to be what Village Fishmonger uses for the fish share, too. If you already have a Farmigo account (either through the fish share or some other place) you don’t need to create a new account, just log in- however, you can’t access your Village Fishmonger account through your Winter Suns account or vice versa. So you have one master Farmigo account, but you log into different food vendors separately. Makes sense?
  8. Once you’ve created your account and paid up (there’s no fee if you’re just adding access to their webstore; you only have to pay if you’re electing the Egg Share) you should find yourself on their main page. If you want to actually go to their webstore and order items, you have to click on the tiny green Web Store link on the upper right-hand corner next to your name. See it? Click it!
  9. You can now add any products they offer, which will vary from pickup to pickup. (Scroll to the bottom of the email for a full list.) The order deadline is always 3 days before delivery- so order by the 16th for our December 19th date!

 

How to Order À La Carte Items from Winter Sun:
~ Goat Cheese, Goat Fudge & Goat Soap ~

Yes, that’s right, goat soap! It’s all from Acorn Hill Farms. They deliver through WinterSun Farms, but they have their own ordering process:

  1. Go to the Acorn Hill Farms ordering page
  2. Read and follow the specific ordering instructions 
  3. Click to their product page and read all about their goat milk products: cheese, fudge, and soap! They also offer different cuts of Chevon! 
  4. Order all you want, proceed to their pay pal checkout (you don’t need a pay pal account) and remember to note what CSA location and Date you are ordering for (as indicated in their ordering instructions.) ORDER DEADLINES are five days before the delivery date. If you miss the deadline, you won’t get the order processed in time!

 

Winter Sun Food À La Carte Products Menu

Local Meats (from Hudson Valley Harvest, which sources strictly local meat.)
Ground Beef (from pasture-raised cows)
Nitrate-free bacon*
Sweet Italian Sausage*
Chorizo*
Pork Chops*
(*All heritage breed, pastured)

Frozen Veggies
Green beans
Tomato Puree
Strawberries – a 10 lb. box!
Broccoli
Cauliflower
Butternut Squash Puree
Sweet Corn

Other Items
Maple Syrup
Applesauce

Categories
Archives

Beer Shares, from Big Alice Brewing

beer
Big aLICe Brewing Beer Shares!

Years in the making, we have finally found a way to bring you the very-exciting new Sunnyside Beer Share! That’s right! Joan, our Special Products Coordinator, has been working overtime to bring more food options to our CSA. And, while she’s not done yet, she’s started a hopefully-long-lasting relationship with the good folks at Big Alice Brewing in Long Island City. They’re an exciting new nano-brewery specializing in really unique, limited-run batches that are currently only available in a few places- one of which is now through us!

HOW IT WORKS
Each share gets you one 750 ml bottle per pickup. We have 4 pickups (Jan. 9th, Jan. 30th, Feb. 20th, and Mar. 13th, from 5:00-8:00 pm at Sunnyside Community Services) and the cost is $65 for the four bottles (They retail for $18 each at the brewery.) These are the same pickup dates as our Winter Vegetable Share pickups.

The brewers need to taste test each batch before release, so it’s impossible to predict what we’re going to get, but they’ve promised to give us a good mix of flavors, colors, and styles. Here is a list of what’s scheduled to brew during that time:

Gunpowder Tea Rye Ale, Ginger Oatmeal Raisin Stout, Dandelion Fennel IPA, Birch Brown Ale, Sour Dark Beer w/ Hibiscus, Sour Ale w/ Bitter Orange Peel, Coffee White Stout, White Ash Aged Black Ale, Hickory Aged Super Saison, Hard Maple Aged Sour Rye Stout, Cherry Wood Aged Smoked Chocolate Stout, Yellow Birch Aged Barleywine, Rooibos Grand Cru, Purple Sweet Potato Farmhouse Ale. Wow!

We’re treating this as a test run. If things go well, we will continue the Beer Share throughout the summer CSA season (either weekly or bi-weekly, depending on how things go) so if beer is your passion, make sure you support this share or it might not continue!

READY TO SIGN UP? GREAT!
Sign Up Now…

You can pay with a check or via pay pal (which we prefer, but either is fine.) Just make sure you read and follow the payment directions! Please sign up as soon as possible so that we can gauge interest, but the official deadline is December 31, 2013!

AND DON’T FORGET…
You can still sign up for our Winter Fish Share, and order a variety of vegetables, meat, cheese, and more through our many food partners! Read more…

Please make sure to join the Sunnyside CSA Yahoo group, to stay informed of important news and updates! Just send an email to “sunnysidecsa-subscribe@yahoogroups.com” to join.

Questions? Contact Us!