Veg boxes - which do you get? why? would you recommend it?

[oysterpots]

Thinking of getting a veg box - prob medium fruit and veg - have identified abel & cole, and Riverford.

What do you get and why?

I want to try this as well. We arent in an area suitable for delivery though. I am interested to know what others think

We have used Riverford for 3.5 years now (originally called Rivernene, an offshoot of Riverford), have had small, medium, large boxes, fruit&vegbox, individual items... chop and change the order from week to week. It'd take a lot for me to give up on the boxes, in fact I'd cut other corners to keep them! Many and varied reasons, delivery man/wife team always have a smile and happy word, good choice of produce, menu ideas, friendly website, good quality and tasty to boot. And the only asparagus I've had in my lifetime that's had the 'asparagus effect', whether that's 2 spears or 10, so 10 it is!

Have tried Abel & Cole, Riverford and Ocado.

Now regularly use Riverford as they seem to offer better variety than Ocado at a lower price than Abel & Cole.

Haven't done a particularly scientific evaluation though, so would love to hear more opinions.

One advantage of Abel & Cole is that you can choose to exclude certain types of produce that you don't like. However, another disadvantage was more mud I think than Riverford which does cause a lot of extra time sorting, washing and clearing up.

Also heard of Farmaround Organic which might be another options for certain areas.

riverford. love them. great variety, cheaper than tesco's if you get a box, and you can just order a box as and when you feel like it (rather than having to do a weekly order)

fruit and veg are scrummy too. only drawback are the muddy carrots.

Love Riverford! They are very committed to keeping close relationships with their customers as well as their farmers, and to being as environmentally responsible as possible - never air freight, minimising food miles on the road, packaging etc.

I'm going to try Riverford, thanks to all your recommendations. Particularly like that you get to order as and when - the regularity of it was what made us decide to give up the veg box we used to get (that, and the fact we kept forgetting to pick it up).

Yay! Just placed my first order