We recently took a trip down to Rochester, MA to visit our friends at Jonathan’s Organic and learn more about where their sprouts come from. Liz Reilley, Jonathan’s Director of Sales & Marketing, was kind enough to show us around their main sprout facility, which has been in the same large barn for over 30 years! We even got to sneak a few samples.

After putting on our hair nets and lab coats, Liz showed us their seed storage room and explained the importance of seed testing. Food safety is a top priority for Jonathan’s Organic, which is why they thoroughly sample and test all of their products from seed to sprout. Sprouts are grown from seed to sprout in only a week, and they can be grown year-round.

Our next stop was the sprout packing room, where we were surrounded by racks of beautiful alfalfa sprouts, sunflower sprouts, mung bean sprouts, and spicy radish sprouts. We were pleasantly surprised to find that instead of using a mechanized packing process, Jonathan’s employees weigh and pack each container of fresh sprouts by hand. They are able to package and distribute approximately 40 tons of sprouts each week!

Hi folks! We have a quick update for you regarding some of our produce this week.

We’ve been speaking with our friends at Atlas Farm since the snow covered their fields over the weekend, and we have had to adjust box contents slightly to account for shortages. Western Massachusetts got about a foot of snow, which crushed the majority of the lettuce in Atlas’ fields.  We have enough lettuce from Atlas for Dogma Box customers through the rest of the week, but due to the limited local supply, all other customers will be receiving lettuce from California. In previous years, we’ve been able to get lettuce from the east coast later into the year and transition to Florida lettuce pretty seamlessly. Due to weather conditions this year, we may need to source our lettuce from California for a few weeks during this transition.

We were unable to get kale from Atlas for the rest of this week’s deliveries, so we’ve supplemented the local kale with collards and kale from California. Luckily not too many other local crops have been immediately affected, and we are receiving cabbage, pumpkins, turnips, and potatoes as scheduled. Atlas should have limited amounts of kale and collards available for the next few weeks.

The weather over the past few months has posed quite a challenge for many of the growers we work with in western MA, and we’re hoping for clear skies ahead. We will continue to keep you all updated as we get a better sense of changes in availability.

As always, if you have any questions (or kind words for our growers), feel free to contact us at any time at service@bostonorganics.com or at (617)242-1700.

-The Boston Organics crew

Last week, a couple of our staff took a little field trip out to Western Mass to pay a visit to some of our growers. We were headed to the 2011 NOFA Summer Conference at UMass Amherst and thought we’d check in with some of the farmers that have been bringing us delicious local, organic produce all summer long.

Our first stop was Enterprise Farm in Whately, MA, where unfortunately much of the staff was busy dealing with a “harvesting emergency” on another plot of land (farming is no easy job!). Lucky for us, Stacy, the CSA coordinator, was kind enough to give us a brief tour and talk to us about some of Enterprise’s projects. Enterprise is heavily involved in all sorts of food justice ventures, including a mobile farmer’s market that brings fresh, organic produce to food deserts and also accepts SNAP benefits. Pretty cool, huh? Here’s a photo of the mobile market bus:

Stacy also walked us through some of the fields and greenhouses where we got to see (and taste!) some of their beautiful tomatoes and purple bell peppers.

Our second stop on the trip was Atlas Farm in Deerfield, MA, where we met up with our friend Gideon (Atlas’ head farmer). He graciously took out an hour of his busy day to show us the fields and answer some questions we had about organic growing. This season was a particularly challenging one because of the drastic temperature changes, but Atlas has managed to provide us with all sorts of top quality veggies regardless. Take a look at some of the crops in the field that may soon be in your box!:

We also took the opportunity to ask Gideon his thoughts on the USDA National Organic Program. Interestingly enough, he doesn’t agree with a few of the chemicals and practices that are allowed in the program and actually chooses to operate by his own, even stricter set of organic standards. While he admits the USDA program isn’t perfect, he participates because he knows it is one of the only ways that customers like you can be sure his food is organic.

Before we left, Gideon also mentioned how much he enjoys working with Boston Organics. Unlike other wholesale buyers and supermarkets, he finds that Boston Organics is willing to be more flexible and committed to making the partnership mutually beneficial. Thanks, Gideon! We here at Boston Organics definitely feel that it’s important to build good relationships with the people growing our food!

Do you have any questions you’d like to ask our farmers? Don’t be shy! Just send us an email and we’ll make sure your questions get answered!

Bonus: Check out this video of Gideon telling us all about what Atlas has in store for the fall!

Beautiful Asian Eggplants from Enterprise Farm this week! Read about our visit with our friendly local farmers, notes from the NOFA summer conference,  and more!  Check out the newsletter!

It’s always great to get an email from one of the farms we work with with news like this… Gideon at Atlas Farm in South Deerfield let us know that he’s got a bunch of greenhouse baby greens available! (And Jess at Atlas was kind enough to send over these photos of these very greens!) These greens are similar to those amazing greens we had from Atlas in the fall, but they’re a little heartier and a little bigger. They’re of course good for salads but you could just as easily use them in a stir fry or braise them.

Anyway, Atlas is going to bring some over for all of you to order as add-ons for the week of February 28th. We should have enough but it’s always tough to anticipate demand, so we’ll go with “first come, first served” for availability! We may be able to get some more the following two weeks but we’re not sure yet. You can order them on our Order Add-Ons page. Have a great weekend!

The first  Maine wild blueberries of the season will be available starting the week of August 9th! The wild blueberries are from Burke Hill Farm in Cherryfield, ME.  They will be available until the first frost which typically arrives in mid-September. As in the past, we anticipate irregular availability and will fill orders as best as possible. Order here!

These are lowbush blueberries and grow in the glacial soils of Downeast Maine. The lowbush variety are known to be a superfood because of their high levels of antioxidants that are believed to protect against disease and promote healthy aging. A lot more information can be found here

This week (July 26th-July 31st), we will be offering certified organic red and purple potatoes (2 lb bags) as well as English peas (1 lb) as add-ons..

The peas need to be shelled (pods can not be eaten).

These will be provided to us by Charlie’s Redhouse Farm located in Winchendon, MA. The farm is operated by the same people who own the Red House Restaurant and Charlie’s Kitchen in Cambridge.Their intent is to supply their restaurants with their very own local, certified organic produce. They are pretty low key about their farm to fork efforts but we think it is very cool and worth highlighting.

This is their first year at it and they have some extra produce. We are very happy to have connected with them and hope this is only the beginning.

As this was not planned, we only have access to a limited supply and were not able to get the items into any of the boxes (except for peas in the Dogma box).

Also, as is often the case with many smaller, local organic farms, it is more costly for them to grow and harvest their fruits and vegetables as almost all the labor is manual with little automation/mechanization. In addition, most of these farms do not utilize subsidized labor.  This requires them to charge a price that makes it difficult for us to get the items into your boxes; but in the least, it allows us to offer them to you as an add-on.

We learned yesterday that green beans from Plainville Farms in Hadley, MA have been cancelled for the rest of this week.

The growing conditions proved to be too hot despite farmer Wally Czajkowski’s best estimates and planning. It’s  a bummer as the quality was excellent. We’ll try to get them in the boxes again as soon as we have a more reliable supply.

In the meantime, we’ve made a last minute substitution of North Carolina sweet potatoes that we are able to get from one our partner suppliers.

We apologize for any inconvenience.

This week’s broccoli rabe from Pedersen Farms is looking really nice.

Use exactly as you would Broccoli – steam, roast, braise, sautée, and let your taste buds appreciate the difference

Broccoli Rabe is a bitter, zesty-tasting broccoli-like vegetable. Like the Chinese broccoli and broccolini that it resembles, broccoli rabe has long, tender stems that are topped by broccoli-like florets and a profusion of delicious leaves. It is prized in Italy, where it is known as broccoletti di rape or broccoletto, and it is becoming increasingly well-known in the United States thanks to its reputation as a great source of vitamins A, C, and K, as well as potassium, calcium, and iron.

Storage: Wrap in a wet paper towel in a plastic bag in the crisper.