Last week at the farmers’ market, I was chatting with our farmers Siri and Jason when a man came to their stall looking for salad mix. Siri sold him a bag of Local Roots’ delicious spicy salad greens. A few minutes later, the man returned with the bag of greens. He pointed out that some of the leaves in the bag had tiny bug holes in them, and asked for his money back. I had never seen that happen before, and neither had Siri. She told him that the greens had some bug holes because they hadn’t been sprayed with pesticides, and asked why the holes were a problem for him. He didn’t really have an answer, and wasn’t interested in discussing his expectations about how food should look, versus how it should be grown. How it would taste was obviously of little interest, either.
How sad.
This week’s CSA box from Local Roots Farm contained:
- Bunch of beets with greens
- Head of lettuce
- Several yellow tomatoes
- Bunch of rainbow chard
- Head of cauliflower
- Head of red cabbage
- Zucchini
Perhaps there were a few little holes in the beet greens and chard. I’ll take those over pesticide residue any day.
Tags: community-supported agriculture · Local Roots Farm3 Comments
3 responses so far ↓
I’m not sure why, but lettuces are not a popular offering at the farmers’ markets here. Too bad, because I’d take some fresh leaves with bug holes any day. Is that a big stripey yellow tomato? Do you know what variety it is? It looks yummy.
That story says so much. I’ve heard from several growers here that the big supermarket, Wegmans, makes it clear that how the produce tastes isn’t as important as how it looks.
Shoot I’m always pleased as punch to see a healthy worm in my broccoli.
Nice site…I especially like the name of your blog…I can totally relate. Music and cats are the stuff of life, in EITHER order. I prefer my music classical but any music is OK except for REALLY bad rock or Gangsta style rap. As far as cats go….I love ‘em all, big cats & little cats alike.
I love CSA & home grown produce…fortunately we have lots of that around here in my adopted state Tennessee, and it’s really great. We save $ on self-picked produce and fruits. I have gardened a lot in the past & love home-grown stuff, bug-holes and all. Sounds like that man needed an education about food production. If he was so negative about a few bug holes he ought to visit a slaughterhouse, a monster-size feed lot or a chicken house where they are crammed into tiny crates by the thousands. Hopefully he would never eat that kind of meat again.
I blog about health, environment, Tennessee and Florida stuff in general. I recently moved from FL 6 months ago, and live near Chattanooga. Keep up the great work!