Farm Shares

In 2008 we are offering four seasonal farm shares: Summer Share, Fall Share, Winter Share, and Chicken Share. Deliveries begin in mid-June with our Summer Share and continue through January with our new Winter Share. Below you will find a description of each share, including prices. Each share is sold separately. If you have further questions about our farm shares, please contact us at lafinca@earthlink.net. Happy Eating!

Summer Share

Our Summer Share deliveries begin in mid-June and continue for 17 weeks through September. Each week you can expect to receive a medium size box (about the size of a full paper grocery bag) containing a variety of 7 to 14 fresh, certified organic vegetables, fruit, and herbs. Our crops are hand-harvested and cleaned in our packing facility. Extra care is taken to provide you with a neatly packed box. To conserve resources, we ask our members to return their boxes when picking up their weekly share.

Each year we plant over 50 different vegetables, herbs, and fruit for our CSA members. Our offerings are dynamic-always changing based on the feedback of CSA members and the results of trials with new crops. Salad mix, tomatoes, potatoes, onions, broccoli, spinach, carrots, and basil are just some of the perennial favorites. You'll also receive less familiar veggies such as, parsnips, rutabagas, Hakurei turnips, new tomato varieties, mache, radicchio, and others. Members often comment that their membership in our CSA encourages them to eat healthier by increasing the amount of vegetables in their diet.

Below is a sampling of 3 different boxes from a recent CSA season to give you a better idea of what is included in our summer share:

Early Season: salad mix (8 oz.), broccoli (1 lb.), spinach (8 oz.), strawberries (1 pint), scallions (1 bunch), green leaf lettuce (1-2 heads), kohlrabi (1), garlic scapes (4 oz.) or beet greens (1 bunch) and bok choi (1 large).

Mid-Season: salad mix (6oz.), watermelon (1), cucumbers (2), summer squash (3), onions (3), garlic (1), green top carrots(1 bunch), tomatoes (1 pint cherry, 2 lbs. slicers), peppers (2),turnips (1 bunch), arugula (1 bunch), green beans (.75 - 1 lb.), swiss chard (1 bunch)

Late-Season: tomatoes (3 lbs. slicers), winter squash (3), parsnips (1-2 lbs.), yellow or red onions (3), garlic (1),green top carrots (1 bunch), leeks (1 1b.), broccoli (1-2 lbs.), red leaf lettuce (1 head), mustard greens (1 bunch), potatoes (2 lbs.)and spinach (1 bunch).

A weekly newsletter included with your share provides recipes and other helpful tips for using your food, and keeps you informed of the latest news from La Finca. In late September CSA members are invited to the farm for our harvest potluck. This is a great opportunity to meet and visit with fellow CSA members and farmers, participate in a work project, and become acquainted with the land where your food is grown.

The freshness, flavor, and variety of our summer share is outstanding! The cost of a Summer Share is $500.00.

Fall Share

During the months of October and November, we will be offering an extension to our traditional 17 week produce share. This share contains the best of the fall crops with an emphasis on vegetables that can be stored throughout the early winter. You can expect potatoes, carrots, beets, turnips, rutabagas, parsnips, celeriac, onions, garlic, leeks, winter radishes, winter squash, cabbage, kale, asian greens, salad greens, and more... Since many of these veggies store well, the fall share is a great way to extend the CSA season into the late fall. The fall share consists of four deliveries; each delivery will be the equivalent of 2 full grocery bags, or approximately double the size of our traditional CSA box. The cost of a Fall Share is $200.00.

Chicken Share

Our chickens are raised outdoors in moveable hoophouses. As they range across our fallow vegetable fields, the chickens have access to our locally milled chicken feed and fresh water. Unlike chickens raised in confinement, our chickens spend their days pecking away at various plant species and insects, taking dust baths, or resting in the shade. Their high quality diet coupled with time they spend ranging in our fields produces an exceptionally flavorful bird.

We raise a breed called Cornish Cross from day old chicks to nine weeks of age. The chickens are then transported to a state inspected processing plant in Brainerd where they are cleaned, vacuum packed, and flash frozen. The chicken share consists of 6 frozen chickens, which are delivered in 4 installments during the course of the CSA season. The tentative dates for the summer chicken share delivery are 7/30, 9/15, 10/15, and 10/30; each delivery includes 3 frozen chicken halves weighing 7-9 lbs.

If freezer space is not an issue and you prefer to receive your chickens later in the season, we will be offering a fall chicken share consisting of 6 whole chickens (12 halves are also available). The tentative delivery date for the fall chicken share is 11/15.

The cost of the Summer or Fall Chicken Share is $95.00.

Winter Share - new this year!

We are excited to offer this new farm share in 2008. This share contains many of the favorite veggies - broccoli, green beans. peppers, spinach, and snap peas, as well as prepared foods such as winter squash soup, tomato/basil pasta sauce, and more... Veggies for the winter share are harvested and cleaned at La Finca at their peak of freshness, and frozen for delivery in December and January. This is an especially attractive share because the veggies have already been cleaned and cut - ready for your favorite recipe!

The prepared foods like the soup and pasta sauces are prepared with 100% certified organic ingredients produced at La Finca. We'll provide you with tips for preparation and seasoning.

A typical winter share delivery will contain approximately 10 items - 1 soup (1 quart), 2 pasta sauces (10 oz's. each), 1 stir fry mix (1 lb.), and 6 vegetables (12 oz's. each ). Delivery will be every other week from Dec. 1st through the end of January for a total of 5 deliveries. The cost of the winter share is $200.00

See What We Grow for a complete list of vegetables included in each share

Certified Organic

After 6 years of growing organically, La Finca became a certified organic farm in 2007. Organic Certification verifies our participation in the USDA's National Organic Program (NOP), which sets organic farming standards for farms in the USA. As a certified organic farm, we are required to document our adherence to organic farming practices and are inspected annually by an independent party. Organic Certification is an assurance to our CSA members (beyond our honest faces!) that the food we produce is truly organic.

La Finca is certified organic by International Certification Services (ICS) based in Medina, North Dakota