Sunday, September 23, 2012

Bountiful Baskets

I absolutely loved Bountiful Baskets when I was participating last year, but my schedule ended up always conflicting with the pickup time, as well as Vince's, so we had to stop. After reading about Sara getting Bountiful Baskets and seeing her pictures, I was reminded of how much I love it and decided to look into it again and see if there was another added pickup spot. There was! So now Vince and I are participating again! For those who don't know, here's a quick re-cap of how this works: basically you pay $15 (or $25 for organic) a week ahead of time to participate in a food co-op. Bountiful Baskets then buys cases of fresh fruits and veggies as locally as possible (think California instead of Mexico or China), then volunteers separate it into boxes the morning you pick it up. Because everything is volunteer run, you save a huge amount of money on the food because you aren't paying a store that needs to cover various bills. They claim that the average box 'retails' for about $50, so you save anywhere from $25-$35 depending on if you got a regular or organic box. I would agree with that statement!

This week (I'll get it every other week) I got an organic box for the first time. I was nervous that it would be a lot less food, and while it's a little less food when I compare it to what I got last year and what Sara got a few weeks ago, it's still a lot of food! This is what I got:
A lot of organic food for only $25! I don't buy all of my fresh food organic, but rather follow the 'dirty dozen' rule. I have the Environmental Working Group's Dirty Dozen app on my phone and I look at it every time I go shopping. It gives a list of the top 12 foods that have the most pesticides and should be eaten organic, and then also gives me a 'clean fifteen' list that are foods that should be safe if they're non-organic. All of these, with the exception of the watermelon(because it has a thick peel, it doesn't need a lot of pesticides), I would buy organic, so this was well worth it! From my memory, here's about what some items would cost organically if bought from the store: apples cost about $1.25-$1.50 each, so they're about $10. Plums are a little under $1 each, so about $6, lettuce in a bag like that would be $5, butter lettuce $2, bananas about $1 each, so $6, peaches about $2 each, so $4, cauliflower about $2 a pound, so $6, packs of bell peppers about $6, and personal watermelon about $4. So total, everything would be around $46, not including tax! So that puts us around the estimated $50 retail price when you add tax. Not bad.

Vince is particularly excited about juicing the apples, as am I because I want to make some fresh cider! Can you tell I'm excited for fall to be here?
I've already eaten half the watermelon and will be sad to see it be out of season soon. It's definitely one of my favorite fruits!
And does anyone know what these are?!

18 comments:

  1. Well I got conventional this week so that's probably part of it, but the only similarities were bananas and apples, and I did get a different kind of lettuce as well. The last time I got organic I got maybe 75% of what you got this time and was so disappointed. It does look like it's a little more than I had gotten before though so perhaps I'll look into it again.

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    1. Oh, and the mystery... it's not a kind of leek, is it? You're usually better at this than I am but I had leeks last basket that were definitely different, but somewhat similar? At least, in my mind.

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    2. I bet it's different because of where we live as well. And if it were any less food then this, I would be disappointed too! Hopefully it stays like this or better!

      And nope, not a leek, according to everyone but us it's bok choy! I thought it was leeks at first too, but then I googled it and they look nothing like it. But bok choy it is!

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    3. That's true, probably has at least a little something to do with it.
      That was actually why I stopped doing it for a while in Flag, because I wasn't happy with the organic, but then I decided conventional fruits and veggies are better than none!
      I kind of figured it wasn't a leek but I expected it to be something similar. I don't know that I've ever had it before, but I know I've heard of it. Used in stir fries and such, yeah? Well good luck, I'm curious to see how you use it!

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  2. The two bunches of something is bok choy aka Chinese cabbage. Use it as you would cabbage. Good in stir fry, slaws and my favorite--steamed and served with garlic butter and malt vinegar!

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    1. That's the consensus of everyone else! I've looked for bok choy many times for stirfrys but have never found it, so I'm glad I know what it looks like now! Garlic and butter sounds like the best to me!

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  3. Looks like bok choy to me. And I also like it in stir fry.

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    1. That's what everyones saying. I'll have to make stirfry this week now!

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  4. how cool! and close-up photos are so beautiful.

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  5. Yum yum yum!!! We thought of doing something like this, but with our limited budget (add in buying all organic and gluten free) we are strapped! But all of those items we buy weekly! Yes, even the mystery bok choy!! :) we feed it to our Leopard Tortoise, Banjo who thinks it is the bee's knees! Do they do this year round??

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    1. This comment has been removed by the author.

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    2. It's definitely cheaper to do it this way, unlike with the CSA! And yes, they do this year round.

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  6. Yum yum yum!!! We thought of doing something like this, but with our limited budget (add in buying all organic and gluten free) we are strapped! But all of those items we buy weekly! Yes, even the mystery bok choy!! :) we feed it to our Leopard Tortoise, Banjo who thinks it is the bee's knees! Do they do this year round??

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  7. Bummer, they don't appear to have it in IN just yet. I think there might be something similar though. That looks like a lot of good produce. I don't particularly care to EAT watermelon, but now I like to make it into juice.

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    1. Aww no fun! And watermelon juice....so good!

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  8. this makes me want to eat more fruits and veggies. mmm!!

    just wanted to say hey and hope all is well!

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    1. When my fridge is full of the stuff, it's so much easier to eat healthy!

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