food. according to me.

Eatin’ Out of The Box

Last Tuesday evening, as we settled into the Pearl Room at Powell's to hear Doug Fine speak, my good friend Kristi and I picked up a conversation that we've been having for more than a year: we are always talking about where to find the good food around here. Last summer, we staked out farmers' markets, Sauvie Island farm stands, and local co-ops looking for the tastiest raspberries, the snappiest pea pods, the juiciest cherries. For Kristi and me, "good" encompasses the things we value most in our foodstuffs – we're way into the whole local-organic-sustainable-tasty-ethical thing that is so trendy now.

Seconds before Mr. Fine turned on his projector and announced that his goat had just given birth, Kristi whispered that she'd signed up with Organics to You, a company in town that does produce home delivery, much like a CSA (that's Community Supported Agriculture, and you can get a good overview here).

When you sign up with Organics to You (OTY), you can choose which produce or fruit bin you want to have delivered each week (or a less frequently, if you wish). There's the Small Bin, the Large Bin, and the Bin For One. Then you've got your Office Bin, your Kid's Bin, and your Value Bin. There's a Fruit Bin, a large Fruit Bin, and a Juicer Bin. The idea is to pick whichever of their fixed-price bins suits your household's fruit-and-vegetable consumption level. The description for the Value Bin, for example, reads thusly: "Great for larger families. 17 to 20 different fruits and veggies. You really like to cook." There is also a list of the items included in each bin for the current week to help you get an idea of what kind of stuff you're likely to get. You can't specify exactly what you want in your bin because, like the CSAs, OTY is gonna give you the best of what is available this very minute. It's a little scary, handing over your grocery shopping like that, but you can tell OTY about the things you really like (more fruit, please) and the things you're not too hot on (skip the tomatoes, thank you), and they will nudge the contents of your box according to those preferences. It's very nice, really.

So after hearing about life on the Funky Butte Ranch, I ran right home and signed up for my own weekly box of organic goodies. I chose the twenty-five dollar Bin For One, though there are two of us. "Great for people on the go," the description reads, "12 to 14 different fruits and veggies." I am not sure what the vegetable needs of an "on-the-go" person are, but I figured that a dozen or more varieties of grab-bag produce would be a good enough introduction to the service without being overwhelming. I also got a little click-happy and added on other groceries: a pound of coffee from Portland Roasting, a Rustic Baguette, and a 32-ounce bottle of spicy Dragonfly Chai. They'll also bring you Papa G's Tofu, bread from Nature Bake, eggs, dairy, soy milk, or hummus – all sourced locally. I chose to surrender my credit card number for recurring payments, but I could have opted to promise to leave a paper check for the OTY delivery person.

The box, bread, coffee and chai arrived at about 2 pm on Monday, my neighborhood's designated delivery day. The driver left them in the shade on my porch, and everything was exactly as I ordered it. Inside the box was a colorful jumble, such a welcome sight after a string of grayish days. There were two young leeks, a Meyer lemon, cameo apples, pears, a bunch of cilantro, one small green bell pepper, potatoes, yellow onions, three roma tomatoes and three minneolas, an avocado, snap peas, and a mystery vegetable that looked, well, like a sea monster.

Look at it up there in the top left corner of that last photo. Do you know what that is? Did you have it for lunch last Wednesday? The tie that held it bunched yielded a web address which I initially misread, causing even greater confusion over the purple, stalky, kelp-like, floppy vegetable on my kitchen table, waiting. It was only eleven hours or so before I thought to check the OTY website and learned that the vegetable in question was kale raab, though there is big ol' note there that says kale raab is not included in the Bin For One. Must have been my lucky day.

I googled around for about thirteen seconds and read somewhere that kale raab (or Russian Red Kale, as I believe it is more appropriately called) can be handled in the same ways as broccoli. So tonight for dinner I julienned one of the leeks, hacked down the sea monster into reasonably sized pieces, and sautéed them together with garlic and butter. We ate it with half of the Rustic Baguette (crispy and extra-delicious after being sprayed lightly with water and refreshed in a 400º oven for about ten minutes) and a green salad full of my favorite nibblies (like those snap peas and a sprinkling of toasted pumpkin seeds). The kale was good, I think. It tasted like brocolli, only earthier. The leaves were tender, and sweeter than the stalks. We agreed that it's "different" and "durable" and I don't yet know that I would seek it out for anything but novelty or variety – but maybe those are two perfectly good reasons for choosing a vegetable anyway.

I think I will enjoy this new relationship with OTY. I can't foresee giving up my frequent trips to the Cherry Sprout Market right down the street, or shopping at the farmers' markets, or Sauvie Island. Still, I like this thing where the groceries come to me instead of the other way 'round. And I like that some choice has been removed. This way I am only buying organic produce, which I certainly haven't been able to do when I go out into the world to shop. OTY is also about supporting local farmers as much as possible, and that means that the stuff I get will be in tune the regional growing season. That pretty much covers all of the trendy food movement right there. Above all, you know, I just want to be hip.