Spring Harvest with Cultivating Opportunities

I went to a farm! I was super excited to spend a morning at Elmgrove Organic Collective to help Zandra of Cultivating Opportunities harvest produce for her weekly CSA.

Growing up and living in the city I don’t often get to see where my food comes from and the work that goes into putting food on my plate. I support local, shop at the farmer’s market and talk to the farmers & vendors about their products, but spending a few hours on the farm gave me a greater appreciation for the care & dedication of the farmers. It’s hard work! Plus I came home with a bag full of fresh, local, organic produce – rhubarb, lettuce, bok choy, spinach, turnips, radishes, lambsquarters, spring garlic, green onions and arugula.

Freshly picked bundles of rhubarb at Cultivating Opportunities farm

Check out these recipes for some amazing ways to use the produce.

CultivatingOpportunities_Zandra_backfield

Cultivating Opportunities is a social enterprise that co-creates meaningful work opportunities in organic farming with individuals looking to reconnect with themselves and nature. They believe meaningful work – and particularly working with the land – is an invaluable means for personal healing and growth.For this reason, every growing season they seek to hire individuals living with mental illness and/ or addiction to work on the farm with us – to grow good food, share knowledge and stories, and to simply be.

CultivatingOpportunities_bees — This is a swarm of bees that somehow found their way to the back of the barn. Thankfully the local beekeeper wasn’t too far away and he came by to help them find their way back to the box.

This was an eye opening experience for me and gave me a renewed appreciation for where our food comes from. I spent a few hours each week helping to harvest some produce, pull weeds, water plants and whatever else needed to be done. It was a lot of work!