Thursday, June 13, 2013

From the farm

Eastside Road, June 12, 2013—


We are surrounded here, nearly, by vineyards. One of them, maybe a mile up the road, is owned by a family who were friends of Lindsey's parents. 

Bob runs a really extensive vineyard, clean and productive. His son, however, seems not to want to follow in the grape business. Instead, with his young wife and much younger child, he has set up a truck garden operation on a particularly fertile piece of land down near the river. 

We buy his tomatoes at the farm market in Healdsburg in the peak of summer. We also like to buy his eggs: he runs a number of hens down by the garden. 

Yesterday we drove down the long vineyard road to pick up the weekly supply our daughter likes to buy from him. She subscribes to this service — is it called a CVA? — taking whatever's in each week, easing one of life's little problems, deciding what to have for dinner. 

Two identical stands are set up in the big pleasant barn, with boxes of produce, and a whiteboard noting what you're entitled to take today. We took a big bunch of tasty spinach, a head of lettuce, a couple of daikon radishes, some summer squash, and a basket of English peas so new and tender we ate them without shelling them. 

With all this, leftover rigatoni from Lindsey's dinner Monday night st Monti's. First time in years I've eaten from a doggy bag, and not bad at all. 

Cheap Barbera d'Asti, 2010

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