Cedar Meadow Farm

By: Michael Cook (Mar 10, 2009)
I had a very mixed experience with the CSA at Cedar Meadow Farms

Some of their products were amazing: Chicken, Beef, Duck Eggs. Pork was a bit average. Sausage ran from excellent to inedible. I haven't tried the Hierloom breed Turkey, and that leads to my poor experience below.

I decided to go 100% local last year, and picked this CSA based on the nice variety and quantity of Poultry it offered: 3 kinds of Chicken, Duck, Pheasant, Quail, rare breed Turkey. The Pheasant, Quail, and Turkey all died or were killed. Or maybe they never had them, one of the farmer's children kept saying "Mom, we never had Pheasants" when I asked about them. I only got 2 kinds of Chicken, and less than half as much as estimated.

I get the idea of a CSA, you share the risks and the rewards. But there was no potential upside here, your best bet is to get what is planned for, you can't enjoy a bountiful harvest.

There was numerous substitutions, but adding it all up we paid considerably more than other options for local meats of equal quality. There were numerous communication and scheduling frustrations that added to the problem. I thought they'd discontinue the CSA, but I just got an email that they're doubling the enrollment!

I would be doubly concerned. Buyer Beware here!

Comment on this Review