July 15, 2009
Camel Community Supported Agriculture’s latest video celebrates our first harvest. It marks the red letter day when members received their first vegetable box shares.
This video features our volunteer picking and packing team at work, while two of our three expert growers reflect on what we’ve achieved so far.
Click here to watch our two earlier videos: Camel CSA – Why we got involved and Camel CSA – First volunteer day.
July 14, 2009
Cornwall’s two community supported agriculture projects are in the news again.
Both Camel CSA and West Penwith CSA featured in the Western Morning News on Monday in the green communities section. We’re also in this week’s Cornish Guardian.
Growers pool skills to produce veg boxes – Western Morning News 13-07-09
Camel growers reap the fruits – and veg – of their labours – Cornish Guardian 15-07-09
July 13, 2009
An amazing amount of volunteer effort has gone into producing Camel Community Supported Agriculture’s bountiful harvest over the past fortnight. Some fresh faces have joined the teams which have been busy tackling the weeds, cultivating the vegetables and packing the weekly boxes.
Our volunteer task force sowed more lettuces and spring onions at the weekend. We weeded the brassicas, potatoes and celeriac and planted out courgettes. More dock leaves were cut down to prevent the seed spreading.
Many thanks to expert growers Jane and Jeremy and to members Carolyn, Charlotte, Danny, six-year-old Haydn, John, Kayleigh, Kitty, Mark, Mike H, Mike S and guest Pat.
We’ve decided to move the weekday volunteer growers’ slot to Friday mornings to coincide with the picking and packing team, who arrive at 10 a.m. Just turn up between 10 a.m. and 1 p.m if you’d like to help out preparing vegetable beds, sowing, planting and weeding.
The Sunday growers’ slot will continue as usual, between 10 a.m. and 1 p.m.
The picking and packing team last Friday comprised expert grower Mark plus Cath, Mike H, Penny, Robert, Yvonne and her visiting parents. As there seem to be so many willing volunteers to help share out the harvest we have decided to organise a rota in future weeks. As Mark explains:
“We had a great turnout of volunteers for picking and making up the boxes which meant we were able to be finished in little over an hour and a half !”
What’s in the boxes?
The standard boxes (£8) contained: –
- 1 kg potatoes (Arran Pilot)
- 1 kg broad beans (Super Aquadulce or Bunyard’s Exhibition)
- peas (Rondo)
- beetroot
- 3 onions
- courgettes
- salad bag
- cucumber
- parsley (flat-leaved)
- turnip or extra courgette
The small boxes (£5) contained: –
- 600g potatoes (Arran Pilot)
- 750g broad beans (Super Aquadulce or Bunyard’s Exhibition)
- peas (Progress)
- beetroot
- 1 medium onion
- parsley (flat-leaved)
- lettuce (red oakleaf)
Some items were provided by our team of expert growers from their own plots. The salad bags and cucumber came from Jane and Gav Mellowship at New Polzeath; the courgettes from Mark Norman at Bodmin; the lettuces from Jeremy and Antonina Brown at St Kew Highway.
If you’d like to give some feedback on box content, click on the comments link at the top of this post.
July 9, 2009
Camel Community Supported Agriculture was featured on BBC Radio Cornwall’s Breakfast programme on Monday 6 July.
The item about our first vegetable boxes being prepared featured one of our expert growers Mark Norman, our secretary Mike Sadler and volunteer picker/packer Robert Manders.
The radio slot included a phone interview with Sally Peterson of West Penwith Community Supported Agriculture. They started handing out veg boxes last week as well!
July 5, 2009
Above is our first standard veg box.
We’ve had an enthusiastic response from our members to Camel Community Supported Agriculture’s first vegetable boxes. This is despite some teething problems with distribution.
Tony says:
“The box looks fantastic! We’re looking forward to next week’s already.”
John and Cathy are delighted with the quality:
“The cucumber which was sweet and fresh and the lettuce and onion we used in a salad.”
They like the wide and interesting variety of vegetables and have found new ways of using them:
“The beet greens we cooked almost like a spinach or spring greens and had with fish – better than spinach – along with broad beans and potatoes.
The beets will be roasted and eaten with a lamb casserole with the rest of the onion, turnips and courgettes and we will try your broad bean soup. Nothing wasted.”
In the end, both small and standard boxes contained potatoes, broad beans, beetroot, turnip, cucumber and onions. Standard boxes had a salad pack and small boxes a lollo rosso lettuce. In addition, standard boxes contained Swiss chard and courgettes. There wasn’t enough time to pick parsley.
We have a glut of broad beans, so each box was given an extra £4-worth at shop prices! We don’t yet have our own poly tunnel, so our three expert growers – Jane, Jeremy and Mark – supplied the salad bags, lettuce, courgettes and cucumber.
New team
Grateful thanks to our volunteer picking and packing team of expert grower Mark Norman, Mike H, Penny, Robert and Trish. Mark says:
” It’s great to see some new faces. I hope the boxes going out means that we’ll see even more volunteers next week.
As first boxes they are excellent. I hope we can keep the variety going.”
If you would like to volunteer, either picking and packing or planting and cultivating, just turn up on a Friday or Sunday between 10 a.m. and 12 noon.
Compost bin
This Sunday we constructed a compost bin from wooden pallets lashed together with binder twine. At long last we have somewhere to dump the annual weeds, unwanted plant tops and thinnings.
A great deal of effort was devoted to the backbreaking job of cutting down the remaining dock leaves to stop them going to seed and spreading all over the site. We were grateful there were so many of us to share this potentially soul-destroying task!
We weeded the Swiss chard, carrots and brussels sprouts. We planted more radishes to replace the ones which had gone to seed in the hot weather.
A big thank you to expert growers Jane and Mark N and Charlotte, Danny, Ian, Mark M, Mike H, Mike S.
June 24, 2009
It’s that moment we’ve all been waiting for! We’re about to harvest some of our own food.
Camel Community Supported Agriculture’s first vegetable boxes will be ready on Friday 3 July. Any member who would like to share in the harvest should contact our treasurer Cathy Fairman as soon as possible.
The first boxes have been allocated to members who have paid in advance. They will be ready to collect on Friday 3 July from St Kew Harvest Farm Shop at any time between 12 noon and 5 p.m. Cathy says:
“We are all hoping that these boxes will meet expectations. Please, please, if for any reason you are not totally happy let us know. We really want to get this right so your input is crucial.”
We also need volunteers to pick vegetables and pack the boxes. Cathy adds:
“We will be picking and packing the vegetables on Friday mornings. Times will vary and we would like to form a rota of volunteers to help the growers in this. Any members who would be able to help please let me know.”
Volunteer growers
If any members would like to help on the site at St Kew Highway outside the normal volunteer times on Thursday and Sunday mornings, please contact expert grower Jeremy Brown on 07971762227 or phone St Kew Harvest Farm Shop on 01208 841818. There’s lots to do as usual!
Last Sunday we constructed more growing beds, spread compost, sowed extra carrots, did loads of hand weeding, spread concentrated chicken manure on the potatoes and dug up scores of dock leaves that were threatening to go to seed.
Many thanks to expert growers Jane and Jeremy B and to volunteer members Carolyn, Cath, Charlotte, Diana, Mark M and Mike S.
June 13, 2009
There’s a great deal to do at Camel Community Supported Agriculture this Sunday as the growing season continues apace.
As expert grower Jeremy Brown explains: –
There are runner beans to plant out and French beans to sow. We also need to sow some more rows of carrots.
Everything needs weeding – the carrots (yet again!), the parsley and celeriac… But the onions are okay.
The early potatoes also need weeding and ridging up. The peas need supporting and tying up.
Just turn up to join the team on our site at St Kew Highway between 10 a.m. and 1 p.m.
If you can’t manage Sunday, why not come to our new mid-week volunteer session every Thursday morning at the same time? Or ring Jeremy Brown on 07971762227 if you’d like to help out another day.
Mid-summer celebration for members
Don’t forget it’s our mid-summer barbeque next Saturday 20 June in St Mabyn from 6 p.m. onwards. Please contact Charlotte Barry if you can come at charlotte.barry@btinternet.com so we have an idea of how many people to expect.
Everyone is asked to bring some food for the barbeque, a drink and a seasonal side dish or pudding. Don’t forget to bring your own plate and cutlery as well!
June 10, 2009
Around 60 adults and 20 children joined in the fun at Camel Community Supported Agriculture’s first Open Day and were rewarded with glorious sunshine and not a hint of rain .
Visitors ignored the threatening storm clouds and came out in their droves on Open Farm Sunday to see our vegetable growing project in north Cornwall.
They built bee nests, joined guided tours, planted lettuces and nasturtiums, made scarecrows, watched a sheep shearing demonstration, sat chatting in the sun and played on hay and straw bales.
Assorted individuals, couples and families travelled from a 30-mile radius to give us some constructive feedback on our efforts to make local food work: –
Fantastic project. Amazing! Brilliant!
An excellent idea – keep it going
Great for the whole family. Liked the things for children to do
Lovely, interesting day – will come again
Loved the tour – very inspiring
Learned a lot about not needing to dig. Hurrah – compost!
Need to encourage more people to learn where food comes from and to eat seasonally
Excellent initiative – more farm events would be great
We provided a barbeque, home-made-cakes and cold drinks. Hot drinks and cream teas were available at the farm shop.
In scenes reminiscent of Eric Carle’s children’s classic The Very Hungry Caterpillar, our guests and helpers munched their way through a shoulder of organic moorland mutton, a mound of sausages, beefburgers, veggie burgers and vegetable kebabs, several bowls of homegrown salad leaves, radishes and spring onions, 8 slices of rhubarb loaf, 10 rhubarb muffins, 12 slices of coconut sponge, 16 chocolate buns, 24 pieces of lemon drizzle cake, 30 iced cupcakes, 40 flapjacks…
And the verdict among Camel CSA members?
A job very well done! We are so lucky to have a group of such enthusiastic, committed, capable, lovely people
I think we have all pulled together really well
We have managed to spread the word to so many people and explain what we’re doing and why we’re doing it
It was so lovely to see it all coming together and the atmosphere it created
Most of all we have been able to show that we are a “community” working together
We can’t wait to be part of this again!
June 9, 2009
Camel Community Supported Agriculture members succeeded in spreading the word far and wide at the Royal Cornwall Show and the open day on Open Farm Sunday.
Hundreds more people in the south west now know what Camel CSA is doing to help make local food work and how we’re going about it.
Our efforts also resulted in plenty of media coverage in the past week or so – on BBC Radio Cornwall, in the Cornish Guardian and in the Western Morning News (three times!)
Discover food glorious food at the Royal Cornwall – Western Morning News May 26 09
Open day to feature county’s first community food growing group – Cornish Guardian June 2 09
Cornish food at its best – South West Farmer June 1 09
Food from Cornwall News – June 6 09
Other groups keen to set up their own community agriculture project should contact the Soil Association’s south west CSA co-ordinator Traci Lewis at tlewis@soilassociation.org or on 0787 0268654.
June 5, 2009
Camel Community Supported Agriculture’s stand in the Food and Farming Pavilion at the Royal Cornwall Show has attracted a great deal of interest.
Countless visitors have stopped to chat and to find out more about our community food growing project, which is the first of its kind in Cornwall.
They have admired Antonina’s fresh and original design and Jane’s bountiful display of plants in boxes. Everyone has been really impressed with the beautiful peas, the vast courgette plant, the kohl rabi, broad beans, mint and parsley as well as the marigolds, nasturtiums and cornflowers.
Lots of people have wanted to touch the peapods. Small children were tempted to pick and eat them!
We have fielded all kinds of questions and dealt with a variety of comments, as Antonina explains: –
Courgette plant – are the spots dangerous?
Are the peas a certain kind?
How do you deal with black fly on broad beans? Is it best to plant broad beans in autumn or spring?
How do you cook kohl rabi?
Why are the beetroot sooo big?
Why is the cauliflower pink?
Can I pick some of the mint to go in my salad?
Why not grow this and that?
I grow mine like this and that….!!!
We have sold a large number of freshly-picked mixed salad bags. The National Trust chef incorporated several of our salad packs in a cookery demonstration and has ordered several more to use on the third and final day.
Camel CSA has been making its presence felt at the show courtesy of the Plunkett Foundation and the Soil Association, who are prime movers in the Making Local Food Work initiative.
We have been sharing the stand with the newly-formed West Penwith Community Supported Agriculture project and we wish them the very best in their new venture.
We have one more day at the show before our first Open Day on Sunday – Open Farm Sunday. Watch this space.
