Forever a City Girl?

Ho-ly-cow. What is happening to me? I have always, ALWAYS, thought that I would never be tired of city life. I never wanted to live away from a big city. But recently, something has been switched in my head and I wonder about life AWAY from the city.

Now, it's not like I live in NYC or LA or something. (I LOVE NYC!) But, Phoenix is a HUGE city. I do love my house, my neighborhood, my city - but sometimes I wonder what it would be like to live on more than my little postage stamp... what it would be like to ride my bike without worrying about being sideswiped by some A-hole in an enormous SUV. (I'm not bagging on SUV owners... I have one, too).

I am going to blame my somewhat sudden change of heart on my recent choice of reading material. Most of what I have been reading has been food related and with that comes stories of farm life. Yeah, I said it. Farm life. Don't get me wrong. I don't want to start wearing overalls and a straw hat or anything. (But I do look darn cute in overalls... ha.) And, I have no desire (yet) to raise and "harvest" my own animals. But I wouldn't be opposed to having a vegetable farm.

I have already started buying more organic food, more natural food, less processed food... For the most part, if I don't understand what the ingredients are, I'm not buying it. Most things I buy - bread, pasta, chips, etc - have between 5 and 10 ingredients and I know what they are.

But what REALLY sent me over the edge was my trip to Flagstaff this weekend. We decided to drive up on Sunday morning and go to a Farmers Market. I understand that in many parts of the country, this is something that is easy to do, easy to find, and not at all anything special. But for those of us living in the dusty brown oven we call Phoenix, it is a challenge. I have found a list of markets - some are opening in October and I am ridiculously excited about it!

Anyway, back to Flag... we went to a farmers market that was smaller than I had imagined it in my head, but regardless of the size, it had some amazing things. I grabbed my canvas bag and we started shopping. We did walk through once, just browsing the merchandise to see what everyone had and on our second pass we made our first farmers market purchases: a bunch of radishes and 3 yellow squash that looked like flying saucers. No joke. :) We continued through and also bought hot peppers, green onions that were HUGE, pickling cucumbers, a green bell pepper, hot peppers, a small loaf of zucchini bread, fresh pasta, and some honey sticks. Yum.
Looking back, and being over my giddy nervousness, I would have been a bit more adventurous and bought a few more things, like the bread I was eying, the basket of green beans, and potatoes. But I'm going to save that for October when the markets in Glendale and Surprise open.

Are you ready for the next crazy thing we are going to do? We are going to join a CSA - Community Supported Agriculture - which will allow us to purchase fruit and produce from a local farmer whose farm is about 10 miles from our house. We pay a fee and in exchange we get 10 weeks of freshness from his farm. I'm very excited about it. Here is an example of what we might see in one weeks take:

2 apples, 2 lb potatoes, 1 lb tomatoes, 1/2 lb red bell peppers, 1 bunch turnips, 0.4 lb salad mix, 1 bunch red Russian kale, 0.8 lb roasted green chiles, herbs.

-OR-
2 Onions, 1 lb Sweet Potatoes, 1/4 lb Green Beans, 1 lb Tomatoes, 2 Peaches, 2 Pears, 1 bunch Herb Mix (Basil, Mint, Lemongrass), Salad Mix.

You basically get a cut of whatever is growing. I'm extremely excited about this and am anxiously awaiting my reply email to the CSA! What I think will be the biggest challenge, though it will also be the most interesting and fun part, is learning to cook with what you have instead of going out to get what you want. It will also give us the chance to learn to eat new things.