Throughout the region farm stands and farmers markets are re-opening. You want to patronize them, but it can be ­so much easier to shop at the grocery store. Here are some reasons for making the switch.

Such Good Taste

Summer is almost on us. If you’re old enough to remember a time when summer meant something in relation to the food we eat, then this is happy time.

Summer was the season when we could get almost any fruit or vegetable we desired.  Food was fresh and it was something special. Now, we can get everything all the time, regardless of season. Our kids take it for granted. But something besides taste is lost with this total 24/7/365 access food. Produce comes in from all over the world. If nothing else, it feels different that we can no longer associate certain foods with their harvest season.

We can only skip traditional seasons because varieties have been developed for their shipping characteristics rather than their eating quality. Older varieties, which may have had shorter spans of maturity, were too soft for long-distance shipping; those different shapes and sizes have been replaced by varieties specifically bred to be firm and uniform for efficient packing.

These new fruits and vegetables are usually picked before they are fully ripened (for longer shelf life), so they never develop the natural sugars that fully mature produce possesses. Local farmers, with shorter time to market, plant varieties that taste great and possess natural sweetness. They pick the produce when it is ripe and not green. Fresh, local foods do taste better.

Your Local Economy

No one needs to be reminded about the economy. Local produce may sometimes be a little more expensive than what you can get in the grocery stores. It seems ironic that something shipped in from a long distance is cheaper, but economy of scale is at work here. Industrial farms are usually many thousands of acres; in Eastern NY, the average farm is well under 500 acres. Yet local farmers live on their land, pay local taxes and buy their supplies locally—making their living from what they produce, and adding to their neighbors’ prosperity. But you have to sell a lot of lettuce and tomatoes to buy a new truck or afford a new television.

Robin and Allen Cockerline, Whipppoorwill Farm, sell most of their farm's output through their charming farm store

Farms Are a Precious Resource

Try to look at farms as a resource, equivalent to trees, iron ore, or even oil.  Once they’re gone, they’re gone—they’re only renewable if we support them. We should do everything we can to keep agriculture where we live. Do you really want to depend on other countries to supply our food?  Less than two percent of the United States population is farmers; they’re an endangered species.

And don’t forget our concerns about energy conservation: The average distance your food travels is 1,500 miles. That’s a mighty lot of time and fuel.

Build a Relationship with a Farmer and an Environmentalist

When buying produce at a farm stand or farmers market, you are building a relationship.  It’s personal. You can ask about his kids. You learn about a specific varietal. You can give feedback to the grower on what to grow next season. It feels good.

And farmers are environmentalists. To make your living from the land, you must take care of it. Growers are constantly doing good things for the land. They rotate crops, plant crop covers, and generally take care of the soil so it will take care of them. Besides providing open space for livestock and wild animals, farms provide green space to keep our water and air clean. In the long run, it is much better to have land in farms than in development.

Good Farmers Equal Safer Food

The food safety issue has probably done more to bolster local agriculture than anything else. There have been a number of food scares in the last few years. They have all been a result of the lack of “controls” on big, industrial farms. So much can go wrong on a big operation. Just think about the number of times produce is handled between when it is picked, rinsed, packaged, stored, loaded, shipped, unloaded, stored again, repackaged, trucked and then handled again before you buy it.  Local produce receives a minimum of handling. The people selling the produce are the ones who picked and transported it, and you have a personal connection them.

To me, all food is personal. You can tell when fruit and vegetables are fresh. You know it’s local if, when eating a peach, you need two or three napkins to soak up the juice on your face. You know a local tomato because there’s a difference between cardboard and flavor. Eating locally grown fruits is a pleasure that cannot be experienced year round. That’s what makes it so precious and so wonderful.