Our Food Summer Plans: trying to eat fresh, local, sustainable and healthy.

This summer we are trying to do things differently as far as food goes. We want our food to be fresher. We want our food to be local and sustainable when possible. We want to skip the supermarket. We want to make as much food from scratch as we can.
We are taking several steps in this direction:

1. We joined a CSA called Green Earth Farm for the summer; 
2. We joined a CSF (Community Supported Fishery) called Sitka Salmon Shares for 7 months starting in May;
3. We are trying the local meat from a farm called Riemer Family Farm;
4. We are getting milk and eggs delivered from Oberweis;
5. We are getting organic fruit delivered from Door to Door Organics;
6. We are getting cheese, honey and other miscellaneous things from our wonderful local farmers' market, the Woodstock Farmers Market;
7. We are making our own yogurt, vilii and bread;

As you can see we had to compromise on some fronts.

The fish we are getting is definitely not local, but it is sustainable. Fresh fish is an unparalleled source of healthy, lean protein as well as Omega 3s and we simply love eating fish. So we decided to at least try to find a sustainable source for it and one that would have the fish come as directly as possible to us. We live in the Midwest, very far from any ocean, so there was no way for us to limit our fish consumption to local fish.

The fruit from Door to Door Organics is not local either. In the Midwest fruit is available for a very short time, and with very limited varieties. We will get local fruit from the local farmers' market when available, but fruit is such a great snack for our kids that we cannot just rely on local sources to feed two growing boys on it. 

The milk and the eggs from Oberweis are not organic but they are local and their bottles are all made of glass and reusable ( you return them to Oberweis and they refund you a bottle deposit) thus reducing waste immensely. Their milk is also gently pasteurized, unlike most organic milk available at the store that is Ultra-pasteurized. This means that more beneficial nutrients are available in it and we found it also means better yogurt (we make our own, remember?).

The meat is not organic either but it is local. Reimer Family Farm offers a CSA as well as some sampler boxes. We are not sure we consume enough meat for a monthly box, so we decided to give the sampler a try and then go from there.

I will be posting about our experiences in this blog as well as recipes that I develop with the ingredients that we are given. Let the summer of freshness begin!

I am looking for a way to get other stuff locally as well, particularly flour and grains. I will update you if I find any.