Hi Jimmie and welcome to ATP. First, a question - what do you mean by "edible parental plants"? Do you mean perennial, maybe? Plants that live more than one season?
I am in central Florida on the West Coast so we have relatively similar climates except you probably have a bit more cold weather than we do. We also have nothing but sand to garden in, so yes, amending soil is a "way of life" here. You can't just do it once, either, it is an ongoing thing because the organic materials you add to enrich and help hold moisture in your sand break down in the high heat, humidity and heavy rains we get for half the year. So you need to amend at least each year.
We have a terrific composting program at our County landfill and the compost they make is excellent and free. But you have to go and fetch it yourself (or cajole somebody with a truck . . ). So my first advice would be to see if your County has compost, and find out how to get it. Plan to get some every year going forward, because a 40ft. area of raised beds will use a pickup load of compost, or maybe even two each year!
The next (but expensive) option is to buy compost or organic amendments of some sort. If there are horse farms anywhere near you, the stable sweepings and manure is great, although you might not be able to plant right away after adding it to your beds. Manure can be high in salts, and also release a lot of nitrogen very quickly, so letting it sit for a couple of weeks after you dig it in, plus watering it if there's no rain is best. Pine bark fines are also a good amendment, although not quite as beneficial as compost or manure and straw.
As far as what to plant, well once you amend your beds, you should be able to grow nearly anything you like. That's the key, to grow stuff you like! Sure as a gun if you plant some veggie that you're not all that fond of, it will be the one that produces a bumper crop every year.
It might be a bit late in the spring to plant the cool season stuff like lettuce, other salad greens, peas and things in the cabbage family but you can plant them in the fall and still get a good crop before frost - don't we know that the first cold weather was SO late this year!
