veg boxes? abel and cole? riverford? something else?

[harpsichordcarrier]

what would you recommend?
TIA

i use abel and cole - theyve always been great.

cx

We went for Riverford. I'm really pleased with our delivery, we have been having a mixed fruit and veg box for the past 10 weeks or so. Really good variety, but also a lot of 'regular' fruit and veg including apples, mixed salad, strawberries, nectarines, onions, courgettes, so I do find we easily use most of it each week.

We pay about £13 per week but you can easily manage your account online and add any extras from a long list of things if you like or change your delivery from week to week.

Overrated IMO. Have tried 2 companies - RiverNene Organic and Woodlands Farm and was disappointed with both. Veg seemed to deteriorate quickly and we would get gluts of staples such as potatoes carrots onions and beetroot. When you think about it there are possibly more food miles associated as many of the companies are not in a position to grow everything themselves. I now buy off a local chap who has a fruit and veg shop alongside his Nursery(plants not children) and this is a happy medium between boxes and the supermarket.

interesting.
we do have a lot of farm shops near here too.

We use Riverford. We change which box we order each week to suit our needs. I personally enjoy not being able to choose what goes into the box as it forces us to eat a wide range and it means we get to eat some of the more 'exotic' veg that I would normally not consider buying. It is a little frustrating though that practically every box has courgettes and we are growing a glut our selves.

If I had an easily accessible (I can't drive at the moment) farm shop that sold locally sourced veg then I would go for that instead. My priorities for food are - local, fair price to farmers, tasty, well produced; organic is a bonus.

organic delivery company are good if you are in London

I'm looking into the same and locally (Buckinghamshire) everybody seems to go with Riverford and be very happy with them. hth

Another riverford user here - been with them for about a year, and they've always been great. Can get a bit repetitive in the depths of winter...guess it depends how much you like Kale!

Riverford are great - not only are the veg, in our experience, far higher quality than we get anywhere else, but they are also ethical, don't air freight, and are trying to 'localise' as much as possible. Plus they send you lovely little newsletters agonising about their ethics. And they are a co-operative of farmers, so the producers get the benefit

There are issues if you are in London, with shipping all the veg up from Devon, but then most of the veg box suppliers in London either have to just be wholesalers, or ship the veg in, so there isn't a perfect solution.

I can buy more local veg here, but to be honest the quality is so variable that it is often a waste of money; and in the end it's not a charitable donation but my shopping...

I use River Swale which I do like for the veg but have not been that impressed with the fruit. Very little UK. But then I suppose this summer has been a particularly bad soft fruit harvest and I have supplemented the soft fruit with our local PYO and frozen some. Our local farm shops sell all manner of unseasonable stuff which makes me dubious about them.

vonsufed - london/the SE cannot grow enough veg to supply it's population so some shipping is bound to be required. I actually feel like I should be able to manage more local supplies than river swale in North Yorkshire when I am on the West/South Yorkshire border but my farm shop experience has not been positive.

See what's available locally, rather than a larger co. Keeps food miles down, is truly local produce and supports local economy etc etc

I once was bored and compared prices with Ocado and Abel and Cole realised it was cheaper to buy the food from Ocado and I could choose what I wanted to eat as well. Also got a farmers shop supermarket nearby but it is v. expensive.

Another vote for Riverford here.

Much better then Able and Cole plus about half the price. If you dont like a certain veg you can let them know and they will not place it in your box and refund you for that veg.