Meat CSA
CSA Overview
Why CSA?
North Mountain Pastures Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) offers a variety of "shares" of what we produce on the farm to customers in Central Pennsylvania and Washington, D.C. Members purchase a "subscription", and in return, receive meat from us every month. This helps our farm's cash flow and gives us an opportunity to know the people who eat the food we produce. And our members tell us they get more flavorful, healthier food and learn more about how food is produced.
Our members tell us they buy from us for a variety of reasons:
- Superior Taste and Quality: Many people tell us our meat "tastes like it used to taste". And because all of our animals have permanent access to pasture, they are dense in nutrients and omega-3 fatty acids. Click on the "Our Animals" page to learn more about what breeds we raise and how we raise them.
- Buy Local: Many of our members want more of their money to stay in the local economy. We're near where you live, and we make every effort to buy from local suppliers.
- Know Your Farmer: Everyone you meet from North Mountain Pastures works on the farm, and Brooks and Anna work the farm each and every day. We are always happy to answer questions or share the latest goings on around the farm.
- Convenience: Our Washington, D.C. members receive their dropoffs at their local farmers' markets. What could be more convenient? Many of our Central Pennsylvania members are also Spiral Path Farm CSA members, which makes things easy because we share the same dropoff sites and dates.
- Access to our Artisan Products: Many of our members buy extras in addition to their shares, including artisan salumi, bacon and sausage, and handmade organic fermented pickles, sauerkraut and kimchi. Not yet found in stores!
- Responsive Customer Service: Meeting and exceeding your expectations is very important to us. If there is anything we can do better, please let us know. We are constantly trying to improve what we do.
Meat CSA Seasons
Our current delivery season is five months, running July to November. We have a second season that runs five months from February to June. You can join at any time point in the season, but we ask that you commit to the rest of the season. We are happy to pro-rate shares.
Meat CSA Delivery Sites
We currently deliver to six sites in Central Pennsylvania, in Camp Hill, Carlisle, Harrisburg, Hershey, Mechanicsburg and Middlestown. In Washington, D.C., we deliver to three farmers' markets: Takoma Park, Silver Spring, and Bloomingdale. Visit our Delivery Sites and Dates page for information on specific locations and pickup dates.
Meat CSA Share Options and Full Season Pricing
We offer a variety of meat options for CSA shares. We recognize not everyone likes to eat pork or lamb; we even know people who will only eat animals that walk on two feet! Please refer to the handy chart for an overview of our 11 share pricing options, where we list our full, five-month season prices. But, again we do pro-rate shares if you're reading this and the season has already started! In our experience, a 1-2 person family can work their way through a Medium Share, and a 2-4+ person family can handle a Full Share.
What an Average Member Can Expect
Let's say you ordered a Medium Trio Share, which means you will have paid in advance for 12 pounds of Chicken, Pork and Beef for five months at a price of roughly $78 per month. We can't promise any specific cuts, but your monthly bag will be composed of 5 pounds of chicken, 3 pounds of beef and 4 pounds of pork. Overall, that turns out to be less than $20 per week, or a quarter of an average 2 person family's weekly grocery bill.
A Full Everything Share is 20 pounds of Chicken, Pork, Beef and Lamb for five months at a price of roughly $165 per month. This works well for four person families and meat eating 2 person families. Again, we can't promise any specific cuts, but your monthly is likely to include 8 pounds of chicken, 6 pounds of pork, 3 pounds of beef, and 3 pounds of lamb. We don't know about you but we can make a lot of meals out of that much meat.
Our Share Sizes and Cuts page has additional details on precisely how much meat you can expect.
And again, we do pro-rate shares every month, and a installment payment plan is available if you prefer to be billed monthly.
New - Convenience Share Add-Ons
We offer two convenience share add-ons that you may purchase as an option WITH a regular share:
1. Convenience share will be 6lb per month in addition to your regular share of quick thaw, easy cook cuts.
2. Cut Chicken option is a service for us to cut, divide, and package all your chickens in pieces (boneless breasts, legs and thighs, and wings). Note that for a cut chicken option, you are upgrading to all chicken in pieces, and must select whether you have a small, medium, or full share. If you order a chicken only share with this option, half of the chicken will be cut up, and half whole.
Ready to sign up? Click hereto start your order in four easy steps.
If you are interested in purchasing meat from us, but none of the above share options fits your family, please join our mailing list (on the right side of the page) to receive notices of Buyer's Club dates, where you will have the option to order a la carte.
