Chard -- the long distance runner

Bright Light chard

Chard and rice salad

   thinly sliced chard

   Wehani rice

   black beans

   apricots

   red bell pepper

   vinaigrette

Hi Winnie and Steve,

Remember when you used to drive to the little grange hall outside your town to pick up your box of vegetables each week?  I think that must have been one of the earliest stages of people getting involved in CSA (Community Supported Agriculture).  I'm glad I like chard a lot because I have it in my CSA box and in my garden.  I think it's one of the best vegetables for a beginning gardener like me.  When the dark green of the chard is mixed with other colorful elements, it is especially beautiful.

I read a book that reminded me of the dedication of those who raise food for us -- like Blue House Farm down the road from me where I get my CSA.  A good story is found in "The Orchard" by Adele Crockett Robertson.  She is forced by circumstances, including the Depression, to try and save a family apple orchard in order to survive.   When Roosevelt came on the radio to tell the nation that "the only thing we have to fear is fear itself", Adele was sitting "all alone in the cold house, hungry, discouraged, with a cellar full of unsold apples that was to keep the wolf from the door," and felt a "thrill of hope . . . a sense of inevitable victory." I almost feel like we celebrate her victory with the return of the small family farm.

Thinking of you.  Donna