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Why are there peppers in my box, I want local veg!

It’s a question we get asked a lot at this time of year. Most of our customers come to the box scheme as they want ‘local’ food. In the summer this is easy for us, we grow a full range of fruit and vegetables that will provide the contents of the box each week with an excess leftover for the shop and even a bit of wholesaling. However, for a portion of the year we have very little variety to offer from the farm, Northumberland or even the whole of the United Kingdom. This time, commonly known as the hungry gap is very difficult for all UK producers and is why Spain and Italy produce a lot of fruit and vegetables to harvest at this time of year – supplying Northern Europe with things it needs.

Now sure, you can survive on what we have on farm at the minute. For example, we have kales, some winter salads, sprouts, cabbages and kalettes, as well as things that are coming on and will be ready for harvest early spring such as cabbages, more salad leaves and stored roots…but I’m not sure it would be a fun and nutritious way to eat. So, we prefer to take a more balanced approach by including items from abroad that we wouldn’t in the summer and enjoy the harvest from further afield. We won’t put bananas in the box that often, but we do like to include a few everyday items like peppers or wonderful citrus fruits from Seville at this time of year to brighten up not just the box but also your cooking.

I should say that we would of had our own salads every week had we not lost our biggest polytunnel in storm Arwen. The fresh salads really are a treat when its dark and muddy outside and are a vital part of the boxes over winter…the taste of summer brings hope.

Over the years we’ve looked at managing this several different ways, after all, it’s a sentiment that’s close to our hearts. We set out on the journey of building Christmas Farm with the sole intention of supplying local food to local people. Some box schemes close from around the start of the year and get going again in May or June when their produce is ready for harvest again. In an ideal world we’d have all our box scheme members commit to the farm for a whole year, the boxes would change in accordance with seasons on the farm and when the abundance of things like strawberries are ready, you would get a lot in your box. Through the summer the boxes would be amazing and could contain twenty or thirty different items, but for the winter there would be a few roots and a portion of greens. Whilst a few would stomach this and just top up the box with visits to the supermarket, most would take the summer boxes and then just cancel in winter and our income would reduce to zero.

Seasonal incomes are something we want to avoid as it results in seasonal workforces. Exploiting people in need of short-term work to plant the crops or get the harvest in is the opposite of supporting the local community. We think that buying in extra fruit and veg for the boxes at this time of year actually supports local as it means the 12 local people who work here have permanent, secure jobs that they can build a life around and, in the winter, we can use the time to invest labour back into the farm to get the jobs done that often get missed off the list in the peak growing season.

We hope you can now see the reasons for having some peppers in your box and that you’ll continue to support local by shopping with us very week of the year!

If you do shop local, we thank you.

If you don’t, why not start today, money spent with us stays in the local economy and has a direct impact on the community that surrounds the farm.

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