Dutch treat
Forget cow-tipping. Dutch pranksters are all about car-tipping these days, dumping dozens of lightweight Smart cars into Amsterdam's canals. What tossers!

Image created by The Sun

Keep on truckin'
Giving the Weinermobile (R.I.P. Oscar) a run for its money, the Truck Farm is a CSA on wheels. Talk about teaching an old Dodge new tricks!

Cloudy with a chance of ice cream
I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice cream that teaches us about climate change and emerging nanotechnology.

Monkey business
Guard your gardenias, folks, seems guerilla gorilla gardening is on the rise.

Take that, Once-ler!
He is the Lorax; he speaks for the trees. And soon he'll be doing it in animated 3-D.

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Photo: Beth RankinThe Food Safety Enhancement Act of 2009 (FSEA) draft, was introduced in the House of Representatives by Congressman Waxman on May 26, 2009 and is expected to move quickly through the House.  Consumers, farmers, and manufacturers alike all appear to be for a food safety bill, so the question is not whether a bill will be approved, but whether it will make our food safer. 

Our food system is seriously broken in places, and at first glance, many elements of the FSEA are hard to argue with.  For example, the bill would provide the FDA with mandatory recall authority, allow for more frequent inspections and institute traceability requirements so that the source of tainted foods can be more easily tracked. These measures might have helped lessen the impact of recent cases like Peanut Corporation of America (PCA), in which salmonella contamination sickened close to 700 people and caused 10 deaths (although it should be noted that the bill does not require microbial testing for pathogens).

While there are glaring inspection, reporting and accountability problems that need to be firmly addressed, traceability alone will not necessarily protect consumers. In fact, the PCA case exemplifies one of the primary failings of our food system: centralization in which a single entity can sicken so many people so geographically dispersed so quickly. In most of the recent food scares, centralized processing and distribution have been found to be the source of the problem, not growing and harvesting.

Reforming our food system means creating systems that support decentralized food processing and distribution, as well as sustainable production methods like organic and regional and local food.

Michael Pollan eloquently stated the need for decentralization or re-regionalization of our food system in his October 12, 2008 New York Times Magazine letter to, then, President-Elect Obama:

"A decentralized food system offers a great many...benefits... Food eaten closer to where it is grown will be fresher and require less processing, making it more nutritious. Whatever may be lost in efficiency by localizing food production is gained in resilience: regional food systems can better withstand all kinds of shocks. When a single factory is grinding 20 million hamburger patties in a week or washing 25 million servings of salad, a single terrorist armed with a canister of toxins can, at a stroke, poison millions. Such a system is equally susceptible to accidental contamination: the bigger and more global the trade in food, the more vulnerable the system is to catastrophe. The best way to protect our food system against such threats is obvious: decentralize it."

Consumers are already seeking stronger connection to their food. The increased number of farmers’ markets and CSAs (Community Supported Agriculture) points to the renewed interest and value consumers place on buying fresh, local food directly from the producer. There is an implicit accountability for food safety in these direct transactions. 

While buying food directly is not feasible on a day-to-day basis for most consumers, they still deserve the same level of accountability for food safety. Small farmers and producers that sell to food cooperatives and other grocers have demonstrated such accountability. That is not to say that no regulation is needed for small farmers and producers, but rather the larger focus of regulation should be directed towards the biggest problem areas that have the widest reach.

In addition to helping foster local and regional food systems, regulation should also support the environmental and health benefits of sustainable and organic food systems and the benefits of biodiversity, which Pollan alluded to above.

Government regulations and requirements tend to be scaled to the largest farmers and producers.  In many cases, the fees and purchases required for compliance are prohibitive for small operators—many of whom implement practices superior to those required by the FDA—and threaten to put them out of business. Our systems need to support the small family farmers and producers who are already doing the right thing. Our approaches need to be scale neutral or at least scale appropriate, and promote biodiversity.

Consumers have the right to safe food.  We need a system that minimizes risks and maintains public confidence in our food supply.  And we need to make sure that whatever regulations we put in place are enforceable with appropriate resources allocated towards this end.  But, let’s be sure that the regulations we adopt focus on our biggest food safety problems and help foster, or at least do no harm, to the many good practices that exist in our food production system.

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ZJ Farms: Everyone's a farmhandI had the pleasure the other day of visiting ZJ Farms, the anchor of Local Harvest CSA, which is one of the biggest in the area. Farmer (and pillar of the local food scene hereabouts) Susan Jutz has been running this organic farm for all the years I've been buying food around here. A walk on her farm gives you an understanding of the paintings of Grant Wood.

In case you're unfamiliar, CSA means community-supported agriculture --a new name for what family-scale farming used to be. These days it works very much like a magazine subscription. You pay up front, usually in the late winter when the farmer really needs it, and in return you share in the bounty throughout the season. In these parts the season lasts roughly 20 weeks, so for each of those weeks we'll receive a box full of all the fresh goodness that's in season right then, usually picked that same morning.

Even though it's just me and my wife at home these days, I still buy a full "family share." I take what I want to cook with at home, and the rest goes to my restaurant, where my crew uses it for specials and such. Every Wednesday the cooks are always excited to see what's in the box - they unload it like kids on Christmas morning. The box, of course, gets returned to be used for the next week's bounty.

Laura Dowd of Local Foods Connection, left, and Susan Jutz of ZJ FarmsPhoto: Kurt Michael FrieseBuying a share of the bounty also means buying a share of the risk. It's been a cold wet spring here in Iowa, so many plants aren't even in the ground yet. I saw thousands of seedlings in Susan's hoop house, each one yearning to breathe free sometime after Mother's day - the traditional end of the danger of frost here. This means the season will start a little later this year, but all of us will gladly take that over last year's disastrous storms and floods. ZJ Farms was high and dry, but some savage straight winds did take out her 100-year-old barn, sheeps and pigs still inside.

That barn is still being cleaned up a year later, but volunteers from Local Foods Connection, an organization Susan helped create, have been helping out. LFC is a charity that helps get fresh wholesome food to needy families. Volunteers do work on area farms, and in return farmers give CSA shares to the charity, which in turn gives them to the families. There is also a wonderful educational component too. Families are encouraged to learn about the foods, and how to cook them. They earn points that can be redeemed for kitchen tools.

Families are also required to visit one of the farms. Often they are reluctant, but LFC founder and president Laura Dowd says that the only thing harder than getting them to visit the farms is getting them to leave. Many of the families have never had the opportunity to see a working farm up close, and that is intrinsically rewarding for anyone.

So now we await our first box, expected the week of the 18th. I'll be looking for asparagus, and radishes, and lots of baby greens. They'll probably all end up in a salad topped with Devotay's own balsamic vinaigrette.

Balsamic Vinaigrette
3 shallots
1/4 cup Boetje's Dutch mustard (a Rock Island original)
1/2 teaspoon fresh-ground black pepper
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup balsamic vinegar
1 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1 cup Iowa Natural Soy Oil (strictly non-GMO, & made right here in Iowa)

Mix the oils together. Place shallots, mustard, pepper and salt into food processor and chop fine. Add vinegar and pulse. While running the processor, slowly add the olive and soy oils to emulsify. It may not all fit, so mix in remaining oil in bowl with a whip.

Make plenty--this dressing will keep in the refrigerator for weeks.

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Umbra,

I have heard mention of community-supported agriculture programs but don't really know what they are. The name sounds very cool, but can you let me in on the specifics?

Bryties
Redding, Calif.

Dearest Bryties,

The springtime alarm is sounding, and your question is perfectly timed. Some of you might be experiencing hints of spring right now, some not (like me! I'm in a secret location where the all-time snowfall record is under threat) -- but regardless, it's the time of year for all of us to look into community-supported agriculture possibilities for the growing season.

Join a CSA and your kids could be this cute.

Photo: iStockphoto

Last August, we went over a few of the details of community-supported agriculture. The timing was off. Let's do a brief review -- I'll switch it up for those who do click back -- and then wade into serious proselytizing.

It costs money to run a farm. Farmers need cash to buy seeds, babies, fertilizer, compost; fix equipment, pay employees, pay the mortgage, etc., long before they will sell a single lettuce leaf or lamb. These investments are risky, in a way, because if there is a crop failure, the farmer can't recoup through sales, and risks going into debt or going broke. Community-supported agriculture is one solution to this inherent problem. In a CSA, consumers provide farmers with operating capital, in essence buying their food ahead of time and taking the risk of crop failure along with the grower.

How might this work in your actual life? This month, you would look around at your local food co-op, or online, and discover a few CSA farms in your area. Get their publicity materials, which could be a website or a small flyer. The materials will give a cost, an amount of food, and a description of the system by which you will get the food. For example, for $450 you might get a "full share" at a vegetable farm, enough veggies to feed a family of four on a regular basis. For a little less money, some farms will let you buy a half share, which is handy if you're a single person or smaller household. You would pay that money now -- this is the farmer's operating capital, up front. On a regular schedule -- say, every Wednesday from May to October -- the farm will harvest a box full of various veggies for every member, including you, and leave it at a drop site, which might be a house in your neighborhood, or a local store, or a farmers' market.

After paying money in March, the only thing you would need to do is pick up your veggies every week and eat them. Usually, though, you can participate much more if you like by working on the farm or going to parties and other farm-related events. The model I describe is just the basic one; there are many variants, and CSA is not only for vegetables.

Did I mention that CSA is a model used by fairly small farms? Often people just getting going on their veggie farm, who want to feel connected to their consumers and have a role to play in their communities, use CSA. I do know farms on the larger end of small that still use CSA as a steady income to help stabilize operations and have good community relations.

I've left no room for proselytizing. Well, CSA is GREAT. It's a real gift to a farmer to place faith in them, to give them cash to get the work done, and to participate with them in the joy of food. You get a special box full of amazingly yummy vegetables (or whatever they grow) every week, which forces you to eat creatively and healthily. I'm getting hungry just thinking about it.

OK, you're ready to go, right? Is everyone reminded about CSA sufficiently? Go read my other articles. The end of the first one gives directions for finding CSA on the web if your local natural foods store can't help, or if you don't have a natural foods store. The second talks about how to deal with unfamiliar foods, and I'll give the secret here: butter.

Broccoli rabely,
Umbra

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Hi Umbra!

I've held back from joining a CSA because 1) I live alone and am worried about wasting food, and 2) I'm worried I'll get so much oddball stuff, especially in the winter, that I won't know what to do with it. I figure I can overcome No. 1 by seeking out some sufficiently hip neighbors and seeing if they want to share (although someone cautioned me that it gets hard to split the choice stuff -- she mentioned an incident with six strawberries). But I'm more concerned about the second. I work a lot, and don't have a ton of time to research recipes or do lengthy food preparation. It seems so much easier to buy what I need at the farmers' market. But I'd like to support local farms more directly, and ideologically, I like the idea of CSA -- do you have any advice?

Tara
Sacramento, Calif.

Dearest Tara,

Let veggies into your life.

Photo: iStockphoto

Hmm. The farmers' market might be the better choice for you. No harm in that, either. CSA advice first, and then soothing remarks about farmers' markets.

Recently, we discovered that community-supported agriculture means joining one's eating fate to a particular farm by paying at the beginning of the season for weekly boxes of produce (the nuance-free description). Fighting over strawberries does sound tearful. One thing you could do is find a CSA that offers half-shares. They will divide the strawberries ahead of time, and you will still get to meet your sufficiently hip neighbors as you each pick up your box without rancor.

Farmers have to plan the harvest months in advance. Duh, right? This is to your advantage should you choose to join a CSA: you can ask what will be in your upcoming boxes. The farmer knows whether kohlrabi and rutabaga are en route. In fact, any experienced CSA farmer has seen enough confused members to have thought around the kohlrabi surprise. So as you look around for a CSA to join, you'll usually see a list of expected upcoming foods, and later, recipes for unfamiliar foods.

I've seen CSAs get around the I-don't-like-that issue by having members pick up their produce on the farm and pack their own boxes, directed by signs saying "take one broccoli or one rapini." You don't want rapini, you don't have to have it. An adventurous person accustomed to eating seasonally and excited about leaving broccoli behind them, by the way, would be a great candidate for supporting a beginning farmer. Remember, it's not just a financial transaction, it's community-supported agriculture.

A good cookbook might be another way to get around fear of the unusual. There are cookbooks out there for every specialty, and you need one on simple cooking with vegetables. I, of course, have advice on this point: Deborah Madison's Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone has a section organized by vegetable. Under "carrots" will be a list of simple suggestions for stuff that goes well with carrots (e.g., dill), and three to seven recipes ranging from glorified steamed carrots to something kind of special. Also, I'll give you a hot tip: almost everything is tasty steamed and served with butter, salt, and pepper. Join a CSA, get the box, find a simple recipe, gain confidence, look forward to new odd foods. It could happen to you.

That said, community-supported agriculture and farmers' markets are not necessarily systems in conflict. Farmers' market stands are either run by middlepeople, selling stuff other people grew, or run directly by the farmers themselves. (To find out which is which, inquire at the market organizer's tent, or at the booths if you are comfortable.) In the latter case, you are supporting a farm just as directly as with a CSA. The money goes right to the farmer. It's just a different model. If you shop often and faithfully, the farm will begin to feel assured of a certain amount of income each week at the market stand, and you could get a little closer to the CSA ideal while still controlling your produce choice.

Oh, here's my last CSA idea: just go for it, get a whole share, don't worry about the unfamiliar food. Find or make a cooking, adventurous friend. Give them the produce you can't or don't wish to cook. I bet they'll sometimes invite you over to eat it. Everyone wins.

Turniply,
Umbra

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Umbra,

Please illuminate CSAs for us, how they work, and how your readers can join one. Thanks! (And by the way, that photo of a peach in your recent column is an apricot.)

Bobbe
Santa Fe, N.M.

Dearest Bobbe,

Alas for stone-fruit misidentification. Hopefully corrected by the time this question hits the screen, but still. A fruit ignorance that community-supported agriculture might solve, if one lived where apricots and peaches grew.

Learn to share.

Courtesy of MACSAC

CSA is a way to get the freshest food, grown right near where you live or work, and to support small-scale farmers. In its traditional forms, CSA is a seasonal marriage in which eaters join with growers in the risks and benefits of farming.

There are a variety of ways to structure a CSA farm. The basics are: a farmer advertises for consumers to purchase a share of the season's harvest and become members. Members pay a lump sum at the start of the season for weekly boxes of mixed produce, which they pick up on the farm or at a drop spot. The farmer benefits by having operating capital to start the season, the members benefit from getting the freshest possible produce, usually picked the same day. The box is roughly the same size per week, often enough for a family of four, or two vegetarian adults, and a season might cost $300 to $700. There are both summer and winter CSAs.

Often members participate in non-financial ways as well, perhaps by working on the farm for part of their membership (this is how one might learn to identify an apricot in situ), or harvesting their own strawberries, or picking up all the shares at the farm and delivering them to an in-town drop spot. Members share in bumper crops and in crop failure (sickness and health), visit the farm for parties, and puzzle over unusual vegetables. Permutations include CSA for meat, eggs, flowers, and other crops; winter memberships; eaters who band together and seek out a farmer instead of vice versa; and sliding-scale memberships. Read an excellent longer, detailed description of the history and social implications at the National Sustainable Agriculture Information Service site.

Sometimes CSA is conflated with produce delivery services, but its cooperative aspects distinguish it from a simple goods-for-pay system. The point is to make a commitment to a local farm and a difference within the larger economic and social trends. It is community-supported agriculture, and there are many amazing stories about what a community will do to support a farmer, such as create a nonprofit organization and buy the farmland to save it from development so "their" farmer can keep on farming. Oh, it brings tears to my eyes.

I think CSA works for folks who cook at home, like vegetables, aren't picky eaters, and get jazzed about involvement in keeping small farms afloat. If you think that is you, dearest reader, by all means look into it. You can look now, especially if fall and winter vegetables exist in your area, or next spring -- we'll remind you.

If you regularly go to a farmers' market, ask there which farms also do a CSA, and pick up their brochures. If you're very lucky, an organization in your area compiles a guide. Failing that, try the Robyn Van En Center, Local Harvest, New Farm, or the Eat Well Guide. Try them all and marvel at the hidden world around you.

Supportively,
Umbra

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The local-food movement has reached an interesting juncture.

Through one lens, things are looking better than ever. According to a USDA report (PDF), the number of farmers' markets leapt 79 percent to 3,100 between 1994 and 2002. Community-supported agriculture programs -- wherein consumers buy a share of a farm's output before the season starts, sharing the risks and rewards of the harvest -- have followed a similar trajectory. According to one source, North America boasts 1,200 CSAs. Just 25 years ago, the concept didn't exist in these parts.

Tastes great, less shipping.

Photo: iStockphoto

All that growth aside, though, the overall market for local produce remains tiny. The USDA reckons that farmers' markets account for less than 2 percent of the more than $70 billion Americans spend on produce. And, as I've pointed out before, the overall income picture for small commercial farms is dismal. Key USDA stat: Farms with annual revenues between $10,000 and $99,000 -- which describes the vast majority of farmers' market vendors -- have an average operating profit margin of negative 24.5 percent.

Simply put, small farms lose money, and their losses are financed by the off-farm incomes of the families that run them. From this angle, so-called sustainable farming looks like a precarious enterprise.

Why, then, do farmers' markets and CSAs continue to grow and multiply? Why do people still farm? The local-food revival, it seems to me, runs on passion: people's desire for connection to the seasons, to the soil that feeds them, to powerful flavors that can't be manufactured with chemicals or preserved over 1,300-mile delivery hauls. Aside from the dot-com bubble of the 1990s, I can think of no great boom in American history built more on enthusiasm, and less on profit.

Yet passion has practical limits (as investors in, say, Pets.com learned in 2000). For local farms to supply significantly more than 2 percent of the nation's produce (or meat, dairy, and eggs, for that matter), small-scale farming will have to become an economically viable activity.

Some optimists argue that market forces are already quietly working to achieve that goal. The argument goes like this: surging consumer demand for local food -- coupled with rising energy costs -- has convinced the large supermarket companies to rethink their far-flung supply chains and seek out small-scale producers near individual retail outlets. These corporate buyers will pump cash into local farm economies across the nation, reviving the fortunes of small-scale farmers.

Certainly, evidence for this scenario abounds. The phrase "local is the new organic" has become commonplace. Having turned organic food into another consumer fetish drained of much of its original meaning, the big corporate retailers are setting their sights on "local" cache. Shoppers entering Whole Foods outlets can hardly grab a basket without reading "buy local" propaganda. One pamphlet that confronted me on a recent visit poses the question, "What is local?" The answer seems a bit lenient to me: produce labeled "local" must "travel no more than ... seven hours from the farm to our facility."

Still, Whole Foods has committed resources to local foodsheds. After a scrape with industrial-agriculture critic Michael Pollan, CEO John Mackey pledged $10 million per year in loans to small-scale farmers, among other initiatives.

Wal-Mart, too, claims to have found "buy local" religion, at least with regard to food. The Bentonville behemoth clawed its way to the top of the world's retail heap by undercutting local commerce near its ever-multiplying outlets. Now Wal-Mart execs are talking as earnestly as food co-op managers about minimizing "food miles" and supporting nearby farmers. Amanda Griscom Little, attending a Wal-Mart corporate retreat last month, reported in Grist that the company planned to move "away from selling monoculture produce at all stores to more diversity in produce based on region (instead of Yukon potatoes at every store, dozens of different potato varieties at different stores depending on what's local)."

Sincere though these efforts may be, however, I doubt whether they'll amount to much. The problem facing local food production isn't lack of demand; it's lack of infrastructure. To boost production to a level that might please the likes of Wal-Mart or Whole Foods, a given area's small-scale farms need access to capital -- to invest in farm equipment, composting capacity, washing and cooling facilities, and delivery trucks.

In the area where I farm, western North Carolina's High Country, every small-scale farm operation I know of, including my own, encounters bottlenecks every day caused by infrastructural gaps. If a corporate buyer appeared with a big order, it's hard to imagine how our area's farmers, or the buyer, would walk away happy.

Since small farms generally lose money, they can hardly be counted on to make those investments themselves, and few banks are eager to invest in businesses with negative operating margins. Nor can corporations, bound by law to maximize shareholder profit, be expected to fund the rebuilding of local foodsheds -- Whole Foods' pledge of $10 million per year aside.

Yet the situation need not be so bleak. The farmers who supply the nation's farmers' markets and CSAs, despite brutal economics, represent a huge asset. Communities, and the nation as a whole, should figure out ways to collectively leverage the passion of these growers. Not through direct payments -- as with the current $14.5 billion per year subsidy boondoggle -- but rather through strategic investments in food-production infrastructure.

As for individuals, the way forward is clear: seek out farmers' markets, CSAs, and restaurants that procure locally. And stifle your sticker shock. That two-dollar tomato will likely deliver an experience that can't be bought at any price at a supermarket. The cheap-food regime under which we feed ourselves, a topic I'll return to in this column, is really a costly scam.

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Dear Umbra,

I try to buy organic food where possible, but I notice that there is often a tradeoff with other factors. For example, organic food has often been shipped further and/or is more heavily packaged. How do I assess those tradeoffs?

Ellen
Watertown, Mass.

Dearest Ellen,

As I've mentioned before, the USDA national organic standards came into effect last month, an event that has caused both rejoicing and concern in the organic community. The involvement of the feds in the organic movement reflects the strong market growth of the organic sector, which has been around 20 percent per year. This growth in turn reflects choices consumers are making toward food that tastes better, seems better for their health, eases burden on the environment, supports local farms, is safe for farm workers, etc., etc.; and choices farmers are making to move away from chemicals, monoculture, and animal confinement. Excellent trends that all conservationists should celebrate.

To market, to market ...

Concern rises from the issues that you have noticed. The USDA sticker insures us against Thiabendazole and/or orthopenylphenol. It does not address farm size, shipping distances, fair prices for farmers or fair wages for workers, and has nothing to say about local economies. Although it addresses some of agriculture's most grievous, polluting trends, organic does nothing, per se, to address the corporatization of agriculture or the disappearance of the family meal.

So, and I hope this doesn't seem too strange, evaluating the tradeoffs may involve deciding that organic is not always the best choice. Think about your reasons for buying organic. What are you actually hoping for? It could be fewer externalized environmental costs such as shipping and packaging. It could be a vision of a nearby farm kept in business by your purchase. Perhaps you simply seek excellent flavor, better health, or a warm dinner table.

The Food Alliance label.
Photo: Food Alliance.

Like you, other organic proponents don't just want chemical-free food, they want food to be grown with care on nearby mall-free land by people they meet at the farm stand. So, as the feds join the party, the party is moving on, and we're seeing the rapid growth of creative marketing and farming niches. New non-governmental labels that further define food for consumers, often referred to as eco-labels, are part of the transformation of the organic movement from a movement defined by farming practices into one clarifying its focus on healthy farming systems and a healthy society. Eco-labels currently range from "locally grown in Western Massachusetts" to those put out by the Food Alliance, whose sustainability certification program includes farm-worker standards among its guidelines.

Although secondary labels add an excellent level of environmental and social information, they often still involve a middleperson. So if you're looking to give most of your money to the actual farmer, seek out farmers' markets in your area, or learn about community-supported agriculture (CSA), a direct marketing subscription service. Begin to eat foods that are seasonally appropriate for your climate, because bananas will always need to be shipped to Massachusetts (we hope). There are certainly folks near you, folks all over our fair nation, who are facilitating closer farm to shopper connections. If you have trouble finding any of these alternatives, call your state agriculture department, Cooperative Extension office, or health food store to ask them for leads.

Consumers are the most powerful agent of change in our current food system. Small and mid-size farmers won't be able to stay in business unless they find a market, and there isn't a market without the consumer. Demand the type of food you wish to eat. And in terms of the packaging -- to avoid the extra plastic wrap, you may need to spend more time with a cookbook at the stove. This column has often reflected our overriding concern with the combustion engine; food decisions should have similar weight in our minds. Happily, concentrating on our gastronomic impact will only bring us joy. Taking the bus can feel like a chore even if we know it is a better choice. But buying food from a farmer you have actually met will be nothing but a pleasure, comparable to eating a type of apple you've never eaten before, an apple that tastes like a Robert Frost poem -- once you have opened the door to these pleasures, you may never wish to shut it again.

Seriously,
Umbra

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It's an overcast day outside of Stoughton, Wis., the village that claims to have invented the "kaffee break." But a warm cup of java seems far, far away from Pleasant Hill Market Garden, where farmer Rob Baratz fights off the early morning, chilled wind with gritted teeth and a hand-rolled cigarette.

Baratz, up on the farm.

Brian Lavendel.

I find him out harvesting a few late strawberries, seemingly out of place on this early fall day. "It's been a hard season," he confesses, then quickly adds, "weatherwise, I mean."

Baratz, 40, lives on the farm with his wife and nine-year-old son. He says he's been challenged by a wet spring and droughty summer, but he knows he's got it better than most of the family farmers in Wisconsin. The state is losing an average of 1,000 family farms each year to historically low milk and crop prices and cut-rate competition from factory farms.

Baratz has been able to avoid the pitfalls many of his fellow farmers face because his produce has a guaranteed market: Baratz is a Community Supported Agriculture farmer. CSA might be best described as farming, and eating, by subscription. In the CSA model, families pay a membership fee in exchange for a share of the farm's production throughout the growing season.

Pleasant Hill Farm has 55 member families, or "shares," each of which pay him more than $400 in the spring. In exchange for their cash and a few hours of volunteer time, these member families receive a box of fresh produce each week.

For Baratz, it's a big change from a career as a floor trader on the Chicago Stock Exchange. What prompted the switch from stock tickers and shiny floors to muddy boots and tractor parts? "I used to walk to the train station to catch the 6:08 to Chicago," recalls Baratz. "But before I left, I liked to stand a minute looking at my garden. One day I decided I'd rather be doing that than getting on the train." So Baratz and his wife packed up and left Chicago-land to head for the green pastures of Wisconsin.

Pleasant Hill Farm is the happy result. Today, a harvest day, a crew of a half-dozen paid and volunteer workers collect the farm's bounty in crates and buckets. Once the harvest is in, Baratz determines how much of each item belongs to each share -- if 120 pounds of tomatoes are picked, for example, each member family will receive two pounds of tomatoes this week. The vegetables are delivered to a central neighborhood location where members pick up their shares. Because subscribers don't know what they're going to get, it's like vegetable Cracker Jack -- a surprise in every box.

You say tomato.

Brian Lavendel.

Families benefit from this arrangement because they get local, fresh, organic produce grown by people they know and trust. As one member put it, the freshness of the food is unbeatable, "no comparison to store-bought."

CSA members also get the opportunity to learn about where their food comes from, how it is grown, and what variables affect its production -- insects, weather, and the like.

Baratz is sometimes surprised by how poorly informed Americans are. "Too many people don't have a clue about where their food comes from," he says. He tells the story of one woman who was unsure whether lettuce heads grew above or below ground.

Baratz, who discovered CSA farming after selling his produce at the local farmer's market, is pleased with the approach. "With the CSA, you set it up, do your planning in winter, and by the time the season starts, you've got a home for your crops."

Full of beans.

Brian Lavendel.

Still, it took him a while to get the hang of things. He recalls his first year as a CSA farmer, in which he planted far too much squash for his members. "After three weeks, people were saying 'no more squash,'" he laughs. Every year, he's figuring out new farming techniques, he says. "The more you know, the more you realize how much you don't know." For instance, this year, the potato crop was hard hit by dry weather. Baratz says he'll be lucky to harvest half the quantity of potatoes he had hoped for.

But Baratz is quick to return to the advantages of the CSA model. "In any business, you're trying to craft your own destiny. CSA gives peace of mind," he says. Members help to absorb the risk from uncontrollable factors such as weather. If, for example, the farm experiences a particularly good or bad year, the shareholders simply receive more or less produce. In contrast, conventional farmers, such as those producing a cash crop for sale to a grain dealer, often shoulder the cost of crop failures.

But even with the support of his members, Baratz struggles with the economics of farming. Unlike his neighbors who farm hundreds or even a couple thousand acres and whose income is calculated in dollars per bushel, Baratz has a mere seven acres in production.

Getting down and dirty

Brian Lavendel.

"We don't have the economies of scale so we can't buy lots of equipment," says Baratz. The result is that most of the work, from planting to weeding to harvesting, is done by hand. And that means hours spent in the field. Asked how much he makes per hour, Baratz pauses for a moment, a handful of just-harvested beans in his hand. "Can't be more than $5 before taxes," he says. A harvester listening nearby laughs. "Before taxes?" But Baratz is serious.

He recalls meeting a fellow farmer at a CSA conference. "She said she made $5,000 or $6,000. I thought that was per acre. She said no, that was total. It broke my heart. Most consumers not only take food for granted, they take cheap food for granted," says Baratz. "I ran the numbers and found that I'd have to charge $725 a share to make a decent living."

Nonetheless, Baratz is hopeful. "I think CSAs will continue to see a lot of growth," he predicts. In his first year as a CSA farmer, he was one of only six in the area. Today, more than two dozen CSA farms supply produce to the region. He sees the safety and security of organically grown produce as a benefit likely to continue attracting interest in the future. "A lot of parents are concerned about what their children eat. Have you read the ingredients on a box of Fruit Loops?" he asks before launching into a description of the chemical dyes found in processed cereal.

Better to stick with broccoli.

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