This post is meant be a break from all the bad news these days – on-line, on the radio, and on television! It’s about food, and community. I was so happy with my visit to a local farm shop last Friday that I decided to do something similar again this week.
This time around I looked into buying vegetables from a farm that’s even closer to home. So close, in fact, that I ride past it almost every time I go for a bike ride! Its name is Les Jardins Carya, which would translate in English to “The Carya Gardens”.
This farm, unlike the one I visited last week, doesn’t have a shop; I’d usually pick up their fantastic organic vegetables and sprouts – my favourite are the sunflower sprouts – at a Saturday morning pop-up farmers’ market. With that lakeside half-day market now closed until further notice, I checked the Jardins Carya’s website.
They’re taking an original approach to selling produce during challenging times; they’re offering pre-orders of a ‘family basket’ of foods each week, which you then pick up at the farm. They offer delivery to those who are in quarantine, otherwise unable to go out, or who don’t have cars. I ordered one of these baskets, and was quite curious to see what treasures it would hold.
The idea is that the basket would include a different selection of local foods each week, not only their own products but also some from other local organic farms. Farmers supporting other farmers; that’s lovely to see. We have a real community of agriculture in western Montreal, despite being part of a large metropolitan city.
This has always been heartwarming to me, and one of the many reasons for which I love our little area. I’d noticed the same thing last week, at Quinn Farm. Their shop showcased items from other local food producers, including sunflower sprouts from Les Jardins Carya.
There were also, from many different food producers in our area, herbal teas, honey, maple syrup, quail eggs, meat, milk, and more. Not to mention their nice selection of local microbrewery beers and local wines. All sold alongside Quinn Farm’s own vegetables and farm-baked breads, pies, and cookies. Their soft pumpkin-chocolate chip cookies, by the way, make perfect snacks for long bike rides ‘-)
It was bucketing rain when we stopped by Les Jardins Carya for our scheduled pick-up today, so I didn’t even glance into the large bag of goodies that one of their employees carefully placed into the trunk of the car for us.
Although each order is stored in an individual ‘basket’ at the farm, they’re lined with a large plastic bag (which we’ll re-use) that one of their employees can lift out and put into a client’s car. They schedule a pick-up time for each order, to ensure that customers – our fellow foodies – won’t come into contact with one another.
It would be impossible to keep a safe distance in the small covered area that they’ve set up, outside a farm building, for these pick-ups. When we got home, we were in for a treat. My husband carried our huge bag of food inside, onto our dining room floor (which can easily be cleaned).
Then I gleefully unloaded each item onto our dining room table. It felt like Christmas morning! First out of the bag was a large Mason jar of homemade carrot-ginger soup, then a 5 lb bag of russet potatoes, followed by a big bag of carrots and a loaf of sourdough bread.
All organic, as with all the foods in their ‘basket’. A large bag of sunflower sprouts was next, and another of mixed vegetable sprouts. Some radishes, a vegetable pâté, and then the most beautiful mushrooms I’ve ever seen.
The orange ones are cinnamon cap mushrooms, the pale grey are oyster mushrooms. Each bunch looked like an artwork, a little sculpture of plant matter.
All healthy foods, all looking absolutely delicious. So our dinner tonight will feature lightly-grilled cinnamon cap mushrooms, along with a salad loaded with different varieties of sprouts… with some sourdough bread on the side, of course!
Not only are we supporting one local family business, we’re helping several – because these food producers help each other out by selling each other’s products alongside their own.
As I wrote earlier, this post is about food – and community. I’m proud to be able to support this community, these families who work so hard to bring us wholesome foods. Thanks, to each of you who brings fresh food to us – every day.
And to you, as always, thanks so much for stopping by. I love to read your comments over on Instagram or Twitter, to have that opportunity to interact with you. The blog’s comments feature has been disabled, because I was receiving far too much comment-spam.
It had become impossible for me to deal with this, because of the mild cognitive impairment with which I now share my days. A legacy of my rare disease, Complex Regional Pain Syndrome (CRPS), which is both an autoimmune condition and a neuro-inflammatory disease.
Be well, stay safe, and take care of yourself!
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This blog has always been – and remains – 100% non-commercial. None of these businesses paid me, or offered discounts or free products, for me to mention them. I’m sharing information about them to showcase the different ways in which they’ve been helping each other in difficult times. We could all learn from this, I think.