The vegetable conundrum

I’ve been meaning to start getting a weekly organic veg box for quite a long time. The fact that I don’t currently get one is a great illustration of why I’m doing this project – lots of good intentions, but little action.

For the vegetables I eat, there are a number of things that are important to me – sourcing from a local independent shop, eating produce that is grown locally, eating organic produce where possible, and also trying to eat as seasonally as I can. The last one is especially important. We have lost touch with the growing seasons in this country, as we can go to the supermarket and buy strawberries in January and pumpkins in July. This means that even if these products are grown in the UK, they are often grown in energy intensive greenhouses, or imported from abroad.

Now, there are some good fruit and vegetable shops about 15 minutes walk from where I live (ticking the local supplier), but the produce is often (a) not organic, (b) not locally sourced and (c) not seasonal.

Another option is a nearby organic “supermarket”, but some of the produce is organic produce imported from abroad, and quite frankly, it can get a bit pricey.

An organic veg box seems like a good solution. Because your box contains whatever is harvested that week, it is usually cheaper than organic food from a shop. But a quick browse of the local schemes revealed that there were still a mountain of different options and a number of decisions to make. A quick search revealed five local schemes, each offering between 1 and 14 different boxes. That’s a lot of choice.

So how to narrow it down. Well, one box had come with a bad report from a friend as to the quality of the produce. So that one was out. Another didn’t have a size and variety option that appealed, and so that one was out.

So down to three options. One of them is Riverford, a large and well established veg box scheme that runs across the whole of the UK. They have four farms across the UK, and about 78% of their produce comes from the UK with the rest imported. Whilst the reputation and selection was excellent, I was a little dissuaded by the distance that the food travels from the farm and the amount of imported food, and so have ruled it out for not.

So two options left.

One is The Community Farm, located between Bristol and Bath, which is a community owned farm (as suggested by the name). Bonus points for supporting an enterprise that I would like to encourage. Specifically of interest is the small Gert British box, which is filled with 100% British produce.

The other option is to join the Simms Hill Community Supported Agriculture scheme. Again, bonus points for being a CSA, which I'd like to support. It works out slightly more expensive, but the food is grown really locally (a few miles from my house). Rather than deliver, they have local drop off points from where you collect your box. However, you have to become a member to get a vegetable box, and as it's such a fledgling scheme, I'd not want to do that without being fully committed.

I’ve never had a proper veg box before (excluding a few sporadic forays into the Riverford boxes a few years ago), and so in all honest, I’m not sure how it’ll work out. So I’d really like to be able to try it for a few months without any great commitment. For this, The Community Farm box seems more ideal. And then, if I find that it works for me, I’ll contemplate switching to Simms Hill, especially if I can persuade my future housemates to join in with me.

So the source is chosen, now I just need to place the order...