In the Veg Boxes This Week

Subject to last minute changes

Check out storage guidance for helpful tips and tricks on how to prolong the life of your fresh produce. If you’re wondering where your veg comes from, have a look at these maps. You can also join your fellow subscribers over in the Facebook group for lots of tips, tricks, and recipe ideas!

To contact us, ring 0141 378 1672 or email us at subscribers@glasgowlocavore.org

Click here for Veg Box Contents

The Nice Bit

The nice bit will be a bit less poetic this week as this is Sally standing in for your usual scribe, Saoirse who is on annual leave. I would like to welcome all our new customers who have signed up recently and I thought it would be useful to do a bit of a catch up of what is happening in Locavore particularly our news about new growing sites. The Hungry Gap Before I do that, a quick word about the Hungry Gap which is starting to bite now and we have no UK root veg except potatoes. At this time of year the potatoes are old and so we are putting extra in the boxes to compensate for the bits you might have to cut off. We always have a dilemma about their age and quality which does take a dip but there’s still lots of good eating in them and we like to try to use up all the crop than have any food go to waste. We will be switching to new potatoes as soon as we can. You may see some veg from overseas in your boxes in the next few weeks. We only do this when we really have to in order to get enough items for the box. The good news is that the weather is being kind and UK summer crops are starting to come through. This means you’re starting to see some salad items and more leafy stuff. This transition period from winter to spring is the hardest in the veg box calendar in terms of both getting the quality, availability and price we need. Customers who have been around a while know these are not the best boxes of the year but very soon we will have an abundance to make up for this few weeks. Our Growing sites Speaking of abundance we are very excited to have a new growing site this year at Narrowboat Farm near Linlithgow. This means we now have 3 sites, Neilston, Bellahouston (both in Glasgow) and Narrowboat. Our growing team, headed up by Floortje have made exciting plans to increase the number and variety of things we grow. Last year we grew lots of chard, kale, lettuce of various varieties, cucumbers, garlic, leeks, spring onions, beans, herbs and those 10 tonnes of tomatoes we all enjoyed in the late summer. This year they will add to these crops with a bigger variety of salad leaves, squashes, chillies, fennel. We are expecting the large harvests to start in about a month so fingers crossed for some warm sunshine. Check out our social media for farm updates. Growing local food is what Locavore is all about. Our mission is to change the food system. To have Scottish people eat produce grown on their own land which is being protected and cared for rather than exploited and poisoned by fertilisers and pesticides. We are organic certified which means we farm with nature and don’t use chemicals. It means we grow not just veg, but soil. We are replenishing the land rather than just taking from it. We use cover crops, manure and crop rotation to make the soil naturally fertile. Our growing sites are alive with flowers, insects and birds in a way you just don’t see on a conventional farm. It takes a lot of skill and patience but we believe it’s worth it both in the taste of the produce and the protection of our environment. Subscribing to a veg box means you have given us the confidence and opportunity to have more land and grow more. It directly helps us to change the food system to make it more sustainable. We would also really appreciate it if you could encourage your friends, family and colleagues to do the same. We have more food now we need more people to buy it. Please tell people about what we do. If you use social media please share photos of your box and the things you make with our veg. It helps others to get excited about what we do and spread the message of change. Together we can all make a difference. Other Locavore News Our new events programme is about to kick off and we have a new events co-ordinator, Sophie who used to deliver some of your veg boxes. This month we start with some tours and intro to Locavore events at our shops and we also have a film screening with Zev Robinson. You can find out all the details here: https://locavore.scot/whats-on/ If you’re in Edinburgh our new canteen is open. Pop in for a good feed in a really lovely location Our sales to schools in Ayrshire are increasing and we are very proud that children there will be eating the best organic food. Our children deserve this, in fact we all do so working to get better food into public institutions is something we are passionate about.