Eat fresh tasty vegetables every week
Support responsible farming and local business
THE CSA TURNS 10 THIS YEAR!!
We invite you to join us for the coming season!
CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture, which is a way that people have been connecting with farmers since the 1980s. Historically, the "community" was fully entwined with its farm, throwing in its lot with the farmer and receiving a literal “share” of what food was picked each week. Most modern CSAs, however, including ours, are a way for people to eat a steady supply of fresh vegetables in season and be a part of the life of the farm without having to take on the risk of unpredictable plants and uncertain weather.
We focus on the “staple” vegetables you already know, hopefully like, and know how to cook. We also include plenty of recipes for new ideas, and we bring you a quantity that you can reasonably eat in a week, not an oversupply that gets lost in the back of the fridge.
Every week from late June to October you will receive a box of 6-8 different vegetables selected for flavor, picked at their peak, and delivered fresh from our farm to your neighborhood.
2024 CSA Details
“Loved it. First time I’d ever done a CSA and I was very happy with it.”
Season:
The CSA runs from late June through early October. Every week, we pick & pack the best vegetables on the farm, and deliver the shares to neighborhood pickup sites on porches or at local businesses. You stop by to pick up your share anytime afternoon through evening.
Size:
One size, “regular”: We pack your share with 6-8 different vegetables each week. One "vegetable" could be a few big tomatoes, a couple cucumbers, a few zucchini, a couple peppers, a bag of lettuce, spinach, or salad mix, some onions, potatoes, or a cantaloupe. Depending on cooking style and time of year, an average box yields about two vegetable dinners for two people, a salad, maybe a root roast, and some snacks. Sound too big? Share it with a friend!
“Very inspiring. Helpful to have recipe ideas right there and they were good.”
”I enjoy the weekly emails nearly as much as the weekly veg!”
Weekly Recipes and Farm News!
We want you to know what's going on with the farm — and we want to give you lots of ideas for what to do with the vegetables in your share! You’ll get an email every week with plenty of great recipes along with some farm news or farmer thoughts. Many people are surprised to find that they end up looking forward to the weekly emails almost as much as the weekly vegetables! The most thoughtful (and least newsy) CSA letters are collected here on the writing page — you’re welcome to go over and read a few!
A Note on Quality and Freshness:
Being farmers, we rarely buy produce from the grocery store or farmers market. But CSA members do. People often write in after opening the first week’s box to let us know how delighted they are about the freshness, quality, and beauty of our vegetables. And people who work here comment on how much higher our standards are than on other farms they’ve worked on. It's true, we DO put quite a bit of effort into keeping our vegetables as fresh as possible, and we keep standards high. The freshness of vegetables a day or two off the plant, put right into the cooler after harvest, and then packed straight from the cooler into your bag cannot easily be matched. As farmers, we enjoy being able to send you vegetables that are just as fresh and beautiful as the vegetables we eat ourselves here on the farm.
Signup is open for 2024!
2024 Pickup Sites and Days
MONDAY PICK-UP SITES
Purcellville: At the farm, off Rt. 287 one mile north of Rt. 9
Ashburn / Rt. 267: Claiborne Pkwy & Rt. 267, off Windmill Dr.
North Springfield (Braddock Rd): off Braddock west of 495
Reston / Herndon: off the Fairfax County Pkwy and Sunset Hills Rd. north of the Dulles Toll Road, at 100 Bowls of Soup
WEDNESDAY PICK-UP SITESVienna: Downtown on Church St. at Bards Alley books
Oakton: off Rt. 123, northwest of the Rt. 66 interchange
Leesburg: Just off of Rt. 7 on Evergreen Mills Rd. near Rt. 15
Reston / Herndon: off the Fairfax County Pkwy and Sunset Hills Rd. north of the Dulles Toll Road, at 100 Bowls of Soup
FRIDAY PICK-UP SITES
Purcellville: At the farm, off Rt. 287 one mile north of Rt. 9
Herndon: Between Herndon Elementary and Herndon Pkwy
Reston East: On Sunset Hills Rd. east of Wiehle, at Bike Lane
Reston / Herndon: off the Fairfax County Pkwy and Sunset Hills Rd. north of the Dulles Toll Road, at 100 Bowls of Soup
“Your vegetables are spectacularly beautiful!”
”More than one occasion, we have literally pulled a head of lettuce or a carrot out of the fridge to show friends how gorgeous your produce is.”
”These are the finest onions and lettuces I’ve seen ever. The items are not squished from transporting, handling, pawing, or sitting in the sun 4 hours at a farmers market.”
2024 Dates and Prices:
“Loved all of it including the recipes. Your Thursday emails and our Friday pickups became high points of the week for us.”
Pickup day and time: Monday, Wednesday, or Friday (depending which site you choose). The pickup window is early afternoon until about 8:00pm. Some sites may from time to time be able to hold shares unrefrigerated until the following morning. CSA pickups begin the week of June 24th and end the week of Oct. 7th, 2024, although the last couple weeks of the CSA will include larger shares with plenty of fall vegetables to last you through October.
Vacation Weeks: We know many people go out of town occasionally or otherwise can’t pick up their weekly share. You have options! You may exchange your missed week for a double share any other week of the season. As available, you may swap a missed share for a bulk box of tomatoes, peppers, squash, etc. You may choose to donate your share to the sliding scale program. And you can always have a friend or neighbor come pick up your share instead.
Payment: One-half of the total is due at signup, with the remainder due May 20th, 2024. Or email us if a different plan would be better for you.
Sliding Scale Pricing (optional)
Issue: It's a reality that our country's food system maintains low prices through environmental degradation, worker exploitation, and government programs; that subsidy and regulation favor processed food designed to sell rather than to nourish; that access to fresh healthy food is difficult for those without the financial security and education to buy it; and that wealth is largely a product of the possibilities afforded by our parents' socioeconomic situation and our education – simply, of our access to opportunity.
Opportunity: Sliding Scale pricing allows people with financial resources to elect to pay more for their share in order to make the CSA available to people who have not had the opportunity to build financial security and thus, under our inequitable food system, are unable to access the healthy, well-grown food that CSA members enjoy.
“The produce was terrific and I loved getting new recipes to try each week.”
“The produce is outstanding, we can really taste the difference.”
Please email us at csa@secondspringcsa.com with any questions
Schedule of Vegetables
In any particular week, we will make up a box of 6-8 different vegetables that are in season at that time. We focus on the “staple” vegetables that people like to eat: squash, cucumbers, tomatoes, peppers, spinach, lettuce, etc. While we make plans as much as possible, every year is different and there's no way to forecast exactly which vegetables will appear when.
We aim to grow all of the produce in the CSA right here at Second Spring Farm but sometimes we want to add a little extra variety or supplement if we run out. So, sometimes we might buy vegetables from neighbors who use growing practices we like. This is a way to provide a good variety to you, to create an additional market for neighbors' produce, and to build relationships among farmers. We will tell you when a vegetable is not from our farm.
“The lettuce is gorgeous and we’ve already snacked on the beans, which are delicious. Really happy to be part of this.”
It's Winter! How do I know you'll come up with the goods so many months from now?
2024 will be our thirteenth year of farming, and the tenth for the CSA. We’ve reliably sent out the CSA in years of endless drought, endless rain, and even a pandemic — and we can meet whatever unknown challenges next year brings, too. We know and like CSA farming, and are familiar with the planning and production required. CSA survey responses from past years are overwhelmingly positive, and many people stay with us for many years in a row. Similarly, wholesale buyers at other CSAs stick with us because we reliably deliver high-quality, beautiful produce: all of the vegetables we grow end up packed into DC-area CSA bags, whether it's our own CSA or the CSA shares of neighboring vegetable farms.
In the event that we don't have enough of our own vegetables to give you a good variety in the box, we are happy to buy a vegetable or two from a neighbor who uses growing practices similar to ours. We will tell you when a vegetable is not from our farm. We pledge to bring you during the season the amount of produce we sold you in the winter.
Benefits of joining a CSA
Truly fresh vegetables: produce picked within a day or two of arriving in your kitchen; you cannot buy this at a supermarket — or even at a farmers market, where vegetables sit out in the sun.
Know where your food came from: You know the very person, and the very ground, that grew your food.
Eat with the season: As the various crops wax and wane over the course of the season, your dinners follow their progress.
Boost local economy and food production: Your purchase represents a direct increase in the amount of food grown right here in this area! If we don't sell it over the winter, we won't grow it in the summer.
Support responsible, ecological farming and land management: Buying food grown in ways you appreciate, and telling your friends about it, is the best way to increase the kind of farming you'd like to see.
Support businesses run by real people in your community: How often do you buy something from a person, rather than a large corporation?
“Love the entire spirit of the enteprise”
Who is likely to regret signing up for a CSA
“I don’t like vegetables and we never cook at home and I’m away all summer anyway...”
Anyone who is away on vacation many weeks, and won't be able to pick up their food or have a friend get it. Just like you rely on us to bring the vegetables, we rely on you to buy them: we do not give refunds or credit if your share is not picked up.
Anyone who thinks this is a way to get a bargain. We pack good vegetables at a fair price, and while over the season you will likely end up with more than you could buy at the farmers market for the same money, this is not a way to get a “bulk rate” deal.
People who don't really like vegetables, or who don't actually cook food.
People who want to know in advance exactly what they will be cooking with in the coming week. We include information about the vegetables you received, along with ideas for cooking, but we don't know what will be in the box until it's packed and can't tell you in advance.
