The CSA Chronicles: Week 1

This summer and fall, In Season columnist Stephanie Witt Sedgwick is sharing her experiences as a member of a community-supported agriculture program. CSA customers pay in advance for weekly delivery or pickup of produce and other fresh items from a local farm.

Here is her quick take for the week. Check out her accompanying recipe for Grilled Chicken and Squash Salad, which uses ingredients she received in her CSA bag, and watch for her column, which appears monthly in Food.

Contemplating my CSA bag this week, I can't say I was excited. A trip to the local farmers market over the weekend reminded me how easy it is now to get locally grown produce in great variety.

At the CSA, I get a share packed for me with whatever produce is ready. I have no say about what will be included (although some CSAs do offer a choice). The growing season at my CSA's farm in Vienna is easily three to four weeks behind those at the farms that send produce to area markets.

At the farmers market, I was able to fill a bag with sweet corn, fat yellow tomatoes, cucumbers and beans: a feast compared with the lettuce, cabbage and herbs that have made up the bulk of my CSA bag the past few weeks.

Oh, but I forgot the joys of my CSA too easily. Entering the shacklike cooler that houses the bags and buckets for pickup, I was greeted by the surprise of a pint of blackberries. The fruit was a "bonus" donated by a local organic fruit grower. So along with my vegetable haul (two heads of lettuce, a bag of mixed greens, a cabbage, basil, some sweet onions and pattypan/summer squash), I had an unexpected treat.

Inspired, I decided to make one of my favorite warm-weather meals: a composed salad. I grilled some chicken breasts and thin slices of the squash. Once they were cooked, I cut them into strips that I draped on a bed of lettuce, basil and those blackberries. I crushed a few of the berries and whisked them into a purple-hued vinaigrette to drizzle on top.

That one pint of blackberries made my day and my dinner.

Questions? Contact Stephanie Witt Sedgwick at food@washpost.com.