An update from the Brooklyn Bridge CSA

Hello everyone,

We know it’s been a tough time for all of us – the COVID-19 pandemic presents new challenges each day, and we hope you’ve been staying healthy and safe.

As you can hopefully see, spring has sprung – and if you can believe it, our farmers at Sang Lee Farms are hard at work getting things ready for the summer CSA (with added safety protocols in place, of course). They sent us a note we are sharing with you all below.

We know that folks are facing more financial difficulties than ever, and it’s our mission to provide as much access as we can to our CSA. As always, we offer Reduced Price Shares (see more below), as well as payment plans. If you would like to set up a payment plan with us, just email us and we would love to figure this out with you.

Please know that we are also prepared to set up new safety protocols for our summer CSA pickups, using best practices and guidelines from our resources. In this moment, it’s amazing to have direct access to a farm that is growing our food — and realize how many fewer hands will touch our food before we receive it than if we had bought it at the grocery store.

We will be holding a virtual Meet the Farmer event on April 21 at 6pm – more info to follow on that as we get closer. We hope to have you aboard as a member in 2020, our 10th Anniversary Season, so that we can all delight in healthy, healing food for our bodies. More season details are below the farm’s email. If you haven’t yet already, please register today!

Take care,

Brooklyn Bridge CSA Core Group

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Greetings CSA members and potential members,

During these unprecedented times, we want to tell you that we are here for you. We are growing vegetables for the season ahead in the same quantities as we did last season. We are planning to feed you all, no matter what.

While so much is unknown right now about how the next few months will go, we do know that we are an essential business, and that now more than ever, many are realizing the importance of securing a food source close to home.

We might have to shift our systems and adjust our protocols to comply with safe handling, distancing, and the like this season. We assure you that we will find a way to deliver your vegetables to your neighborhood this season.

We would like to thank you for your continued support over the past seasons, and for your support this season, when things are changing all around us. Your investment in your food source now ensures you will have the best possible produce and add on items all season long.

We will keep you updated as things shift, and look forward to seeing some of you on our ZOOM meet the farmer session in April.

Best,

William, Fred & Lucy

Sang Lee Farms Team

An additional note about the farm – right now, the farm is closed to the general public (they usually have the farmstand open on the weekends by this time each year) but you can order to have it shipped to your house. Here’s the note currently on their website: Pre-ordering for 4/3 & 4/4 for home delivery & farm pickup is sold out. Please join the waitlist to be notified Monday when we open pre-ordering for the next weekend. Thank you for being patient and kind during this difficult time. We are doing our best.

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The Details:

Our 2020 season will run from June 3rd to November 11th for Vegetable Shares. Pick up Wednesdays from 5pm-8pm at First Presbyterian Church, 124 Henry St, Brooklyn.

Vegetables:
Vegetables come from our fantastic farmer Fred Lee at Sang Lee Farms, a certified organic specialty vegetable farm in Peconic on the North Fork of Long Island. For 2020, each veggie share is expected to be 8-10 items that week and this year the season is 24 weeks. You can sign up for a full share (pick up every week) or a half share (pick up every other week). Sample share listings for the 2020 Season can be found here.

Member bonus for 2020! Get 10% off all purchases at the farm and online as a CSA member. Also, pre-order and receive items from their certified organic kitchen directly to our pick up site without delivery charges.

Payment/Pricing:

You can become a member by signing up for a Full or Half Veggie Share.

The pricing listed on the sign up form includes a $19 administration fee, and a commitment to volunteer (covering two shifts over the course of the season). The farm has advised us that the prices have gone up as all of their costs have gone up this season, especially labor costs as the minimum wage increases each year in a labor intensive industry.

As in past years, we are offering three tiers of pricing:
– Standard pricing to cover the basic costs of the product and CSA administration
– Reduced pricing for those who need it. Separately, if you’re interested in discussing a payment plan or other options, please reach out to brooklynbridgecsa@gmail.com
– Sponsor shares for those that are able to donate a bit extra – please consider it! Sponsor shares subsidize reduced-price shares and enable low-income individuals and families to be part of our CSA.

Add-On Shares:

KITCHEN SHARE –
MONTHLY (6 deliveries total) including: 1 dressing, 1 dip, 1 pesto, 1 fermented/pickled, 2 (16 oz) soups from the Certified Organic Sang Lee Kitchen. More info and sample items here. This is only available monthly (6 deliveries total over the 24 week season.)

Fruit
Fred has partnered again with Briermere Farms to bring us this add-on to our CSA offerings. Fruit is conventionally grown, while utilizing many organic practices and composting.

Quantity: 3lb bag tree fruit or 1 pint berries per week (If you are interested in 2 fruit shares, please contact us.)

If fruit comes in early or all at once, Briermere may choose to give it out earlier. This would mean more fruit in the early shares and less fruit in later shares. The number of weeks may also be less in this case. Please read through the share contents CAREFULLY so you understand what fruit CAN grow on Long Island and that week to week you will be getting similar things depending on the time of year. If you do not LOVE apples, we suggest you do not participate in the share as the last month or two is primarily filled with apples.
Note: if you select to include fruit, whole vegetable shares must pick whole fruit shares. Half vegetable shares must choose half fruit shares.

Cheese
This year we will be offering cheese from the east end of Long Island NY as well as from the Hudson Valley NY. You will receive a different type of cheese each week from one of eight different farms! This combination gives you a wonderful selection of soft, medium and hard cheese textures and including cow and goat and sheep’s milk cheeses.
Note: if you select to include cheese, whole vegetable shares must pick whole cheese shares. Half vegetable shares must choose half cheese shares.

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We expect shares to fill up fast, so please sign up soon if you intend to buy a share this year. Registration officially closes May 1st or when we sell out of them!

Register for shares today!

If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us, your faithful core group, at brooklynbridgecsa@gmail.com.