8/12/26 Food Safety & Why Scale Matters
This is an article I should have written a few weeks ago about the lettuce outbreaks, but I was traveling and figured you knew. Then it came up in our 1st Wednesdays Farm Tour last week, and this week there is a new outbreak involving jalapeños.
This summer’s cyclosporiasis lettuce outbreak and now another issue involving jalapeños with e-coli in prepared foods (guacamole, salsa, dips), shows why industrial farming can be dangerous not only to the environment, but our health.
This isn’t new. The 2006 E. coli outbreak in spinach and subsequent outbreaks involving peanut butter, eggs, sprouts, cantaloupe and other foods built political momentum for the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA), the largest overhaul of U.S. food-safety regulation in generations. It impacts farms of all scales. We just filled out our annual FSMA forms and did a big two-day compliance training earlier this spring.
When we cut a head of lettuce for you, it might have soil or a stray slug, but it doesn’t have many potential contamination points. Additionally, we prefer to sell whole heads, and even our lettuce mix isn't washed and combined with lettuce from thousands of other plants and run through a large processing system.
In fact, we only wash produce if it’s very dirty after rain or has lots of insects. This isn’t because we’re lazy, but because washing is the main point of contamination as well as spoilage. Once produce enters a communal wash system, contaminated produce or water can spread pathogens to other produce. A little dirt on a head of lettuce is not the same thing as a pathogen. We'd much rather you wash it in your own kitchen.
FSMA and the organic standards we follow also have very specific rules around one obvious source of pathogens: manure. We never use raw manure in the fields. In fact, the manure we use has already been composted by the farmer we get it from, and then we compost it again as if it were raw, following specific time and temperature requirements.
What about farm size? Farms like ours, and the majority at your local farmers’ market, are not causing outbreaks. Even the federal government recognizes this. Not only because we can’t make as many people sick (less food), but because small farms far less frequently make people sick even when accounting for their size.
What about the supply chain? Our produce gets to you quicker, with fewer steps. Your lettuce was harvested this morning, put into a washed bin, cooled in our walk-in and then put into your box. You might take it home, wash it and eat it the same day.
Now imagine the industrial version: lettuce harvested from enormous acreages and multiple fields, trucked to a processing facility, cut, washed, mixed with other lettuce, packaged, shipped to distribution centers, and then sent to restaurants and stores across many states.
If contaminated lettuce enters that stream and gets chopped, mixed and distributed with enormous volumes of other lettuce, we potentially have an “outbreak.” That's not hypothetical, that’s what recently happened.
None of this means food from a small farm can never make someone sick. We grow food outside. There are birds, skunks, gophers, insects, soil, water and humans in our agricultural ecosystem. We are excited by this life. We believe in creating balance and supporting positive biology rather than fighting negative biology on every scale. And yet there are always risks, and we take food safety seriously.
If something does happen, we are also incredibly traceable. Today’s Cherokee Lettuce came from a crop of 400 heads in the south bed of the South Bay hoop house, planted 7/2 from seed started 5/18. If someone got sick, I could quickly contact CSA members, make a notice at the farmers’ market and text the chef/owner of a restaurant it went to.
It is a very short farm-to-plate journey. That's one of the things we love most about CSA. You aren't just buying vegetables but fundamentally changed your food chain.
Farm → Processor → Packer → Distributor → Warehouse → Retailer/Restaurant → You
Becomes simply:
Us → You
We'd still recommend washing that slightly dirty head of lettuce when you get it home. And if there's a slug tucked inside? Well, at least you know exactly where he came from too.
This Week’s Box
Cherokee Lettuce
🌽 Bi-Color Sweet Corn 🌽
Mixed Tomato Quart
Summer Squash (SR) OR Cucumbers (WC)
Shishito Peppers (SR) OR Cherry Tomatoes (WC)
Herb: Parsley (SR) OR Genovese Basil (WC)
Family: Strawberries & Baby Bok Choi
Produce Notes & Recipes
We have Bicolor Sweet Corn in the CSA for the 3rd week (the first week being just to Family Boxes). It’s still delicious but it’s not quite as tender as the first two weeks. Ears continue to develop but this might be a week for cooking rather than eating raw like I know some of you like. Please do look to last week’s newsletter for a Corn Milk Pasta recipe. And I’ll remind you again that we have the ends chopped off
I’m happy this was such a large succession (we usually only get one full CSA off a succession) but I’m very sad to report that our 2nd succession is a complete fail. We trialed growing it together with clover for better soil cover and the clover strangled the roots, the corn is short and stunted. The 3rd succession is coming along for a few weeks from now and we’re hoping for one more week of CSA then.
Cherokee is a gorgeous red-tinged summer crisp lettuce with thick, crunchy leaves, excellent heat tolerance, and a sweet, mild flavor. Its sturdy leaves are perfect for hearty salads with creamy or tangy dressings, or tucked into sandwiches and burgers.
Greek Summer Salad with Shishitos
1 large cucumber, chopped
2–3 ripe tomatoes, chopped, or 1 pint cherry tomatoes, halved
4–6 shishito peppers, very thinly sliced
½ cup chopped parsley
½ small red onion, thinly sliced (optional)
½ cup crumbled or cubed feta
⅓ cup Kalamata olives
3 Tbs extra-virgin olive oil=
1½ Tbs red wine vinegar or lemon juice
½ tsp dried oregano
Salt and freshly ground pepper
Combine cucumber, tomatoes, shishitos, parsley, onion, feta and olives in a bowl.
Drizzle with olive oil and vinegar, sprinkle with oregano, salt and pepper, and toss gently. Let sit 5–10 minutes so the tomato juices mingle with the dressing.
Taste and add more vinegar, lemon or salt as needed. Serve with crusty bread to soak up the juices.
Variation: For a more substantial salad, serve it over chopped Cherokee lettuce—the crisp leaves are particularly good with the juicy tomatoes, feta and sharp vinaigrette.
Pasta with Smashed Zucchini Cream (101cookbooks via Member Sarah B)
Use your favorite noodles here, long or short.
8 ounces dried pasta
3-4 medium zucchini (2 lbs), washed
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
6-8 medium cloves garlic, grated on microplane
1/2 teaspoon fine grain sea salt
1 1/2 cups grated Parmesan or pecorino cheese
1 cup basil, thinly sliced
black pepper
toasted almond slices
Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Salt the water well, and boil pasta per package instructions. Drain, reserving some pasta water, and set aside.
In the meantime, slice the zucchini in half lengthwise and use a spoon to remove most of the seeds. Cut into 1/4-inch pieces. Heat the oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add the garlic and cook until fragrant, a minute or so. Stir in the chopped zucchini and 1 1/3 cups water, cover, and simmer until the zucchini absorbs most of the water and softens, roughly 8-10 minutes. Remove from heat, and carefully, with a fork or (even better) a potato masher, smash the zucchini until creamy.
Transfer the zucchini to a large serving bowl. Add most of the cheese and most of the basil, and lots of pepper. Stir in the pasta, and a splash of the pasta water if you want to thin it out at all. Taste, and add salt if needed. Finish by topping with lots of toasted almonds, and the remaining cheese and basil.
Extra Shares
Flower Share: 🌸 Zinnia & Dahlia in Focus
Lettuce Share: Lettuce Leaf Mix 🥬
Bunched Greens Share: 🌈 Rainbow Chard
Herb Share: Cilantro
Summer Pint Share: Fairy Tale Eggplant
Eggs: 🥚