One of the great things about living in the Willamette Valley is our local produce. The Willamette Valley used to be a lake (Lake Allison) a bazillion years ago and as such we have some nice soil here. As I was plucking some tomatoes off my vines the other day, I decided to share with you some local organic produce farms.
When I moved to Salem from Portland, I had to start over and figure out where to go to get my fresh produce fix. I try and eat organically as much as possible, and my veggies in my garden are all organic.
I had never heard of a CSA until I moved to Oregon. Despite growing up in corn country in Illinois, I think that there were so many commercial farmers in my area, I didn’t realize that there were these great local farms all over the country called CSA’s (Community Supported Agriculture).
Out here we have Denison Farms which is located in Corvallis, Oregon and Garden Ripe in Silverton, Oregon. Minto Island Growers is a Salem Oregon CSA, and they are working on their organic certification as I write this post. It will be nice to officially add them to the organic produce mix, once they get their certification! I have personally used Denison Farms and the produce was top notch. They have two pick up locations in Salem (one downtown and one down south) once a week. The organic strawberries never made it home because my kids devoured them in the car on the way back.
While I personally haven’t used Garden Ripe, I have heard equally good things about their produce AND they deliver it to your door. For busy folks that don’t have time to make the trip to get your produce box, Garden Ripe might be the better choice.
Either way, between our local CSA’s, farmer’s markets, and your own garden, if you are relocating to the Salem Oregon area from another state, you will have several local choices to get some good quality organic produce and support our local farms in the process.
I want to thank the tomatoes in the pictures because after they posed for my photos…they were immediately eaten. They were delicious.
I sure do miss all the organic produce from the Pacific North West–now, I’m hungry. Thanks! 🙂
Jess that’s what you get for moving back to Georgia. I’d send you some strawberries but they rarely make it home…
Garden Ripe was awesome. We were customers a few years ago (why aren’t we now?). Fun to chat with them when they came. Sometimes, you end up with a lot of the prolific veggies (read: zucchini), though.
Ron Denison was the same with tomatoes, but those you can just can.
thanks for an excellent post. bookmarked and will come back for sure.