On hot summer days like the past few weeks have seen; its to hot to cook, to move, or to do just about anything. Philadelphia, Like the rest of the Northeastern seaboard, has been enveloped by a hot, sticky, humid, mess of a summer; however, for me, this can only be made acceptable by the promise of a delicious tomato season. These lycopene rich fruits generally come to Pennsylvania in July and are around until roughly September. If you are lucky enough to be able to pick up some tomatoes at a local farm stand in season, you can truly taste the vast difference between heirloom and local tomatoes, as opposed to their bastardized GMO and off season sisters available year round at many super market chains.

My friends and I recently went in on a C.S.A farm share with Lancaster Farm Fresh Cooperative. For those of you who are not familiar, C.S.A stands for Community Supported Agriculture and helps support local farm economies. The share consists of around 7-12 items a week and the bonus aside from the tasty seasonal bounty is that you actually save money participating as opposed to shopping at the grocery store ( a lot of store bought organic produce is normally marked up 50 to 150%, and much of it isn't even local!). I highly recommend it. There are a variety of pickup locations around the city including Russet in Center City. At my house we're a few weeks into the share that consists at this point of dark greens, radishes, and my favorite, beets. Around here we are getting creative with the produce from the farms in Lancaster and although I have to admit, it was a bit of a challenge to incorporate so much of the weekly share into dishes, I now feel as though I am getting the hang of cooking seasonally.