Side Notes on Nutrition

Here are a couple of ideas for increasing the nutrition in your life.

1. Join a CSA! CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture. Basically it is a contract between you and a local farm/farmer. You commit to buying regularly throughout the season, usually by slapping down a one time fee, and the farm/farmer commits to giving you freshly picked produce as it comes into season.

Not only does this setup support your local farmers, but it teaches you and your family when produce comes into season. AND, it teaches the value of eating in season. EVERYTHING tastes better when eaten in season. Otherwise, the produce you eat is trucked to you. Therefore, it is harvested prior to being ripe so that it can ripen en route to you. You might get a tomato in January, but is it a really a tomato? Just ask Barbara Kingsolver if you really want to know. Her book "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle" touts the value of eating local, and in season.

2. Buy fruits in season and freeze them. I dare you to find a single frozen bagged strawberry that has the color of these local, in season, strawberries I bought from my local farmer. The price was cut because they were so ripe. And a word of advice, you might think that the goopy looking ones shouldn't make the cut... but those are the BEST ones! They have the most flavor, and while the texture is not so great, it doesn't matter because you are freezing them.

3. Grow a garden. After joining a local CSA I looked down their harvest schedule and then planted my own garden full of the items they do not provide. Not only am I ensuring that my food is organically grown, but putting my hands in the soil regularly keeps me much more grounded and thankful for the food I eat. Oh, and also once you put in your initial money for the garden you are done. The produce then comes to you and you can take the vegetable allotment out of your grocery budget.