As is typically the case when I’m about to go on vacation, life becomes incredibly busy.  Between the job that pays the bills and conquering my fear of scuba diving with Pan Aqua (2 nights down, 1 to go before I’ve completed the confined dives and am able to take the open water part!), I’m really looking forward to the warm breezes and amazing food in St. Martin.  But in the midst of all the emails, I was pleased to see a prompt to re-subscribe to my CSA, Cream of the Crop.  Yet another sure sign that fresh veggies are just around the corner!  Even though I haven’t had time to try any new recipes or drink ideas lately, I happily took the few minutes to sign up.

Since I had such an amazing experience last season — as evidenced from all of my veggie posts, I thought I’d also take this opportunity to again urge you to sign up for your local CSA.  Now is the best time to do so, before memberships fill up and when you can choose between different CSAs and decide on what shares you want.  As an example, after some research I confirmed that my CSAs prices are much lower than some of the other local options, the portions are fairly large and their distribution period lasts longer.  (So I apparently got extremely lucky last year even though I signed up very late.)

Although Cream of the Crop offers shares for veggies, fruit, meat, milk and other dairy products, as well as specialty products (as do many other CSAs), you can easily pick and choose what shares you want and have the option to add additional shares for most of the season.  It’s fairly flexible and fun.  This year, in addition to my weekly small veggie share that is usually more than enough for 2, I’m looking forward to a weekly aged cheese share (and it still includes fresh mozzarella).  Maybe I’ll even order half a lamb…  At least now I can have something to look forward to when I come back from vacation, even if I have to wait till June for it to start.