Hello

With half term coming up please remember to log into your accounts and book holidays (accounts > holidays) if you are going away and do not need a veg box!

Well that was a tough week! 
As you may well have read, French farmers blocked roads around France including the E7 which is the main route for our Spanish produce up to the UK.

This caused all of our French produce to be cancelled and our pallets to arrive 22 hours late from Spain (normally at 7am Monday but instead at 5am Tuesday). Tuesday became a slog of collecting, packing and delivering all veg boxes as well as planning and ordering all veg for next week. Nothing like a 4am start and a 9:30pm finish to keep you on your toes! 

There seems to be multiply different types of farmers striking for multiple different reasons (all uniting over the food system being messed up) so this may not blow over particularly quickly.

Next week you’ll notice a lack of Spanish and French produce in boxes, I simply do not want a repeat of last week and want to play it safe until I know more about what delays are expected. Because of this our boxes will be feeling particularly British for the time being. This will be most noticeable in less root boxes which are fairly heavily reliant on Spanish produce at this time of year. You’ll find carrots, sprouts, leeks, mushrooms and squash in these boxes next week all homegrown.

There are a few Spanish items on order next week but I have spread them out across boxes in the hope that if there are delays it will affect as few people as possible. Any swap you make that includes something from Spain, don’t be surprised if it gets cancelled.

The upshot of all this is lots of British season veg and a brand new fruit I’ve never tasted before from Greece!

I’m not sure I’ve ever purchased any citrus from Greece so I was delighted to find nova clementines from Greece when scouring for fruit that perhaps wouldn’t transit through France (these are coming via a Dutch wholesaler). There's the most sprouts since christmas, tundra cabbages from Doncaster and some red beetroot from the borders.

Rob & Sarah at Passion4Plants have added one bunch of kale as well as their now normal winter offering - pea shoots, micro greens and bay leaves. 

Leeds Bread Co-op have a new special - sun dried tomato loaf for the next two weeks.

Have a great weekend!
Thanks
Sam