Veg Boxes

Just try one, pengi, if that's what you want to do.  If you don't like it, it's not a binding contract - you can stop it & try a different one, change your mind, etc. 

Looks like Riverford is running an offer right now for new customers, where your third veg box order is free:

http://www.riverford.co.uk/pages/canopyandstars?PHPSESSID=7a12af87-baba37bd-7a12af86-baba37bd-00000002-f6b12lh8uavc9vjpfuehct9lp7

Pengi, did you ever end up getting a veg box?

Oh man - I am so glad that the leek season has ended (I think?) - I am all leeked out! 

I have one huge ziplock freezer bag & three smaller ones full of washed, chopped up leeks - I think they may last us until next winter when the new leeks come. Luckily, they do seem to freeze well (I clean & chop them up first) so I can just take out however much I need for a recipe along & along - they don't ever seem any worse for wear, having been frozen.  Kind of makes sense, I suppose, because the whole leeks are often in frozen ground for part of the winter.

I guess I'm just not used to using that many leeks - I never really ever cooked with them in the US.  I know Andee said somewhere to just use them in place of onions, but some of my recipes - well I really want an onion in there, and the more delicate leek flavour just doesn't do it for me in some cases.

Honestly, with so much going on I've not gotten around to ordering one.  But we are going to do it next week, just need to figure out what size to get and whether or not we want fruit.

We just ordered our first one from Abel and Cole:
http://www.abelandcole.co.uk

We got a flyer through the door, with an offer for a free fourth box. I've been interested in the veg boxes for a while, and like SP said, it will stop a lot of my impulse buying. It's all organic, and they can also deliver milk and bread, which means we don't have to go to the grocery store for quite a long time if it's good! First delivery is next week. I hope it's as good as it sounds!

We took a couple weeks off trying to save some money, but honestly, we didn't spend less for groceries, and the produce we bought was awful compared to what we can get from Riverford.  We're going to start up our orders again.  If we had a convenient Farmer's market/farm shop or a good green grocer near by, we might consider using that instead.  I miss our box, and TBH, we've not been eating as well.  Highly recommend them to anyone who doesn't have easy access to high quality veg and fruit.  As I said, when we're getting it, we eat mostly from the boxes, so our other grocery bill is relatively low.

We've finally done it and ordered our veg box.  We decided to get it from a place called Red Earth Organics.  Hopefully it will help cut down on our food bill.

It's our 3rd veg box week, and we love it! I get slightly excited for veggie day - which I realize is sad - and we have ordered extras every week so far. It's all great... We have gotten fish from them, which is so nice, and we have added the milk to our weekly order. It doesn't taste like any milk I've ever had. It's nothing like that stuff at Tesco. I don't like milk, but I drink this!

And today they've sent us a dozen free eggs. Last week it was free OJ.

We got a large box delivered yesterday, I'll be honest I am not sure how it is supposed to feed 3 —4 people!  Also, there weren't any labels or anything telling me what we had. I now have a fridge full of leafy green things I don't know what are.

We got bonus strawberries that I had last night and they were sooooo good, I'm kinda wishing I hadn't whizzed half for the baby.

Pengi, when you ordered it, the 'Our Boxes' page for Red Earth Organics should have said what was in this week's box.  Looking at it now, it lists (week commencing 30 May 2011):

Potatoes, Lettuce, Cucumber, Mushrooms, Broccoli, Carrots, Bunch Onions, Spring Greens, French Beans

So wondering if that's what you got in the Large Veg Box?  Sounds like your 'leafy things' are probably Spring Greens (yum!) & maybe some lettuces?

They really should tell you if they substituted something & what it is.  We do get things from time to time in ours that I have no idea what to cook with them, but the Riverford site is ace in that it has recipes & a recipe search function where you input the veg & it comes up with ideas for you. 

Yeah, I did take a look last night and some of what was on the list we got, but I think we got some sort of cabbage and maybe Chard or kale or something.

It's probably going to vary based on company.  I noticed that the scheme that we were considering switching to (more local, totally seasonal) seemed to be more this way when I was looking at its regular contents than the bigger regional/national ones.