River Swale Organic Vegetables home delivery (also Riverford/River Nene)

Has anyone ever used one of these organic vegetable delivery services?  I came home and found a flyer for it in the post tonight and I'm very intrigued.  I'm using www.riverswale.co.uk (based on a farm in North Yorkshire), but it looks like they have franchises that can deliver to southern and eastern England as well.

I like the idea of getting a box of fresh mixed organic veg every week or every 2 weeks- especially since I'm ordering my groceries online now and am not convinced of the supermarket selection that I don't pick out myself....prices don't seem to be extortionate either.  I actually went ahead and ordered a winter veg box for delivery next week just as a one-off to see if I like it, but was just wondering if anyone else has tried it or heard of the concept!

i love it!  i use Woodlands Farm north of Peterborough

every fortnight we get a small box of veg & fruit.  this lasts the two of us plenty!  there's always onions & potatoes & another root veg (parsnip/beetroot/turnip,et) & 2 or so others.  I love eating what's in season.  I love not having to think about buying veg. I love supporting a local farmer.  I love that it forces me to figure out what to do with fennel or kale or rutabagas!

i will say that it can take a few weeks/months to get the qty right.  and even though i cook most nights, there's only (2) of us, so i have to be vigilent about using up what's in the fridge. 

I think we had a thread about these a while back, because I was thinking about signing up for one...

Here it is! 

http://talk.uk-yankee.com/index.php?topic=33079.0

awesome! thanks for finding that, Meg!

(I'm new to this cooking thing so have only really been paying attention to the Food Talk forum for the past few months!)

LOL....I pay too much attention to this forum - I'm blaming it for at least the last ten pounds I've gained! 

We prefer to give our local green grocer our business.  We are able to pick out (and hand select) exactly what we want, and he sometimes gives us free stuff too!

We did an organic veg delivery scheme here in NI for quite a while, and I liked it in principle. The biggest problem I had with it was that we got too freakin' many potatoes! Seriously, we were getting upwards of five pounds of potatoes a week. Being only two of us and not huge fans of potatoes, we were getting buried alive. We cancelled in mid November and only finished off the last of the potatoes in late January!

Still, I do think it's a great idea, and I may do it again. With no potatoes.

i love it!  i use Woodlands Farm north of Peterborough

every fortnight we get a small box of veg & fruit.  this lasts the two of us plenty!  there's always onions & potatoes & another root veg (parsnip/beetroot/turnip,et) & 2 or so others.  I love eating what's in season.  I love not having to think about buying veg. I love supporting a local farmer.  I love that it forces me to figure out what to do with fennel or kale or rutabagas!

i will say that it can take a few weeks/months to get the qty right.  and even though i cook most nights, there's only (2) of us, so i have to be vigilent about using up what's in the fridge. 

Thanks for the info.  I was considering Woodlands or Priory Free Range for a veg/meat box, it's good to get some feedback (I'm in Spalding). 

I've used Riverford for about 8 months.  We get a fruit and veg box every fortnight  that's plenty for hubby and I.  We tried the ones with potato and onions and like Elynor, found that although the potatoes were lovely, there were just too many of them for us to use in a fortnight, so we switched to a box that doesn't include potatoes and we get on much better that way. 

The only thing that isn't so great is that sometimes the greens don't last long - I had a pak choi delivered in Thursday's box and by the time I came to use Friday it had started to wilt.  I've noticed the same with spinach and lettuce, so now I always make sure to use up those types of items first.

I love that it forces us to eat fresh veg, and that we're much more creative with our meals and eat things we normally wouldn't eat simply because it was in the box and needs using! 

We've been getting the mixed organic box from Abel & Cole for nearly a year now and I absolutely utterly adore them. Our box gets 3 fruits, 4 veg and some potatoes (but not 5 pounds, omg!) every week and we find it's just right for the two of us considering I cook every night and I like to take in leftovers for lunches, too. You can mark what foods you hate (so we never get brussel sprouts, for instance) and what foods you love (so we'll always get mushrooms if they're available) and you can make your choices temporary if you've got way too many onions left over or something.

We live on a gated mooring and the delivery guys put our box right on our deck every Wednesday, and if we add on any perishables, they go in reusable chiller boxes. And we always get a nice newsletter with stories from the growers and recipes and you get to see what all the other boxes got that week, too. I've found it's really nice for breaking out of a food rut as they've given us vegetables I would've never picked up at the supermarket, but I've found we actually really enjoy (like swede, caleriac, kohl rabi, jerusalem artichokes...).

(psst. If anyone decides to join up, PM me and I'll tell you my name as we get a free bottle of olive oil for any referrals, bwahaha)

I've really been thinking about Abel & Cole, squirrelllypoo, but was unsure as to whether the fairly steep price tag (we're on a pretty tight food budget here) was worth it.  Fiancé and I are big fruit eaters (we each take about 2 pieces in our lunches everyday), but would like to incorporate some more, interesting fresh veg into our diets.  We usually honestly spend less than £5 a week on fruit/veg, so while I like the concept of veg delivery, I need to know it's worth it.

We've been using Everybody Organic for about a year or more now, and we love it. We started out with a mixed fruit/veg box, but since DH doesn't eat much fruit, we found that it was just too much for me to eat in a week, so now we just get a veg box. It is just the right amount for us. Like most everyone else has said, I love not having to think about buying vegetables anymore. I get everything I need for the week delivered right to my door, and if I need anything else I can supplement from the local greengrocer. I also love being forced to use unusual veg. I do find that I have to plan ahead a bit more, but it's kind of fun planning out menus. If I know I'm getting greens one week, then I just plan to use that on the day the box arrives. If I find that I have tons of potatoes or onions left over, I make a great soup. At least I FEEL like I'm eating healthier with the box, even if I do sneak in the ocassional ice cream after dinner.

I've really been thinking about Abel & Cole, squirrelllypoo, but was unsure as to whether the fairly steep price tag (we're on a pretty tight food budget here) was worth it.  Fiancé and I are big fruit eaters (we each take about 2 pieces in our lunches everyday), but would like to incorporate some more, interesting fresh veg into our diets.  We usually honestly spend less than £5 a week on fruit/veg, so while I like the concept of veg delivery, I need to know it's worth it.

If each of you eat 2 pieces of fruit each day there probably won't be enough in the box I get for you, but they do boxes that are just fruit, or you can have a recurring order to add something like apples or bananas onto your box each week (or every 2 weeks, or every 3 weeks, etc) to supplement it.

I'm intrigued that you only spend £5 on fruit and veg a week, though - is it that you just eat fruit at lunchtime and hardly any veg at all, or are you market buying or eating just frozen veg or something? That seems hardly anything at all, and doesn't seem to equate to at least 14 pieces of fruit...

Paying £15 a week did seem like a lot when we first started, but honestly we think we're getting fantastic value when you look at how much you get in the box (and there are boxes smaller or bigger than ours, too). I've found A&C err on the side of unripened stuff, too, so I've never had anything rot after a few days, but I have had stuff that wasn't ready to eat until a day or two before the next box came. But that just means you need to plan and eat the stuff that's ripe first!

We've used River Nene for about a year now.  For the two of us we get the mini box weekly and a fruit bag every other week.  Good quality stuff.  Prompt delivery.  Good recipes with the  deliveries.

We'd love to get eggs from them too but they were so expensive. 

I'm intrigued that you only spend £5 on fruit and veg a week, though - is it that you just eat fruit at lunchtime and hardly any veg at all, or are you market buying or eating just frozen veg or something? That seems hardly anything at all, and doesn't seem to equate to at least 14 pieces of fruit...

I use mostly bags of frozen broccoli and spinach and peppers for cooking.  I also tend to buy about 2 onions for us.  Then I get various amounts of fruit to last us for the week.  Everything else various widely - potatoes only when we need them (which isn't often).  I confess to going as cheap as possible on everything - no organic .  I buy fruit from the local vendor, as they do REALLY cheap 6/7-for-£1 deals on fruit.

Anyway.  Someday I'll bite the bullet and go for boxes...our neighbor gets them a lot and I'm always jealous!!