Nathan Vannette is the co-owner of Growing Green Family Farms in Anderson and Greenville, SC, which offers a year-round CSA. Nathan and his wife, Rebecca, also operate Cottage Farmstead, a blog and YouTube channel for homesteading education.
For anyone who doesn’t know, how are CSAs beneficial to farmers?
It provides upfront money for seeds and resources to start growing the crops. But also it’s a connection with our community. They’re investing in the long-term outcome of the farm. It’s reassuring that we have a vision and they are coming along with it.
How does Growing Green’s CSA work?
We have a couple options. It’s split up into small or large shares. We have several pickup locations to increase accessibility. We partner with restaurants in different regions of downtown to make it easier for people to participate. Also, we have a flex share option. The rigidity of the small or large shares can be cumbersome for some people. So we created a token system. You get 10 tokens and you can choose 10 items. So, for instance, if someone wants to make salsa, they can get a lot of tomatoes, peppers. They next week they might have more of a Mediterranean-style menu, and they can get ingredients for that. You’re still paying upfront, but you can choose what you want. We offer a flex week as well. If you go on vacation, you can take a week off and be refunded or choose to gift that week’s CSA to someone. We are very well networked within the community to make sure that donated CSAs are allocated well. We want to take produce to food deserts. We’re doing that through gifting as well as some of our pickup locations.
Can you describe a typical share throughout the CSA season?
It’s split into four seasons. We try to have diversity within this. People get sick of collards in the winter, so we make sure to have root crops—carrots, beets. Lettuce is our mainstay. We grow that January to December. There are eight items in small share, which comes out to roughly $3 per item, and 12 items in the large share, so it’s 50 percent larger.
Do you have tips on cooking with a CSA that you’ve shared with CSA members?
We have a blog with recipes—which is nice because it also attracts people outside of the CSA. Our market customers will come to the website for the recipes. The CSA members get a monthly recipe for what’s in season. For instance, kohlrabi is something that a lot people don’t know how to cook, but once they do, they love it. Then we have almost a Q&A format on our social media pages.
What are some questions people have asked?
How do you preserve tomatoes? It seems like the preservation component is something that current community is very interested in. I mean, that’s our livelihood. Thats what we do in our own home, so it’s easy to share that. Those questions feed into what classes we offer. Growing Green’s education is more commercial, mentoring different farms. Our new business, Cottage Farmstead, is more based around what the individual can do.
Who is the right customer for a Growing Green Family Farm CSA?
Anyone is right for it. We’re catering the CSA sizes for our market demographics. Small is great for two people who eat intentionally or a family. The large share is great for six to eight friends. People often split their shares. We tell them a CSA is great opportunity to connect with your neighbors or bring them to your table. After the turmoil of COVID, food is something we can build community around. They love it, especially those who live in more urban areas, in an apartment. It’s very easy to share.
We’ve learned more about what we grow from these friendships that have developed. We didn’t know some of the produce we grow is ethnic to Eastern Europe, Ukraine in particular. One of our CSA members shared sorrel with Ukrainian friends, who asked, “Where can we get this?”
That’s inspired us as farmers to look more at the cultural background pertaining to food we grow. We want to grow more spices. Some cultures are used to fresh spices they can’t access here—such as cumin, caraway, French tarragon.
What are the main benefits that customers get from participating in a CSA?
They absolutely love the freshness of the produce, the building of community, and the diversity we offer throughout the year. We’re in a region where we can grow year round, but our farmers markets don’t go year round. We can provide access to local produce. We can also parter to help local farmers who are still growing in the slower season to have an outlet. So we’re making those community connections as well.
Want to connect with a CSA near you? Check out ASAP’s online tools for finding CSA farms.