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Britain-y Spears
It’s St George’s day which traditionally marks the beginning of Britain’s asparagus season (although we’ve been lucky enough to have them earlier due to weather conditions).
We’ve got loose, bunched and the delicate wild variety ‘amaro montina’ too which are skinnier, or ‘wee’ if you’ll pardon the pun.
It’s asparagus soup on the menu this week at ONHQ to mark the occasion!
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Good afternoon Organic Northerners,
Fancy a heap random updates about veg and all things related? If not, then I’m afraid that this is not the newsletter for you. I’ve been a bit pressed for time this morning so please forgive me if this reads even more slapdash than usual.
- Firstly, a very warm welcome to all of our new customers this week. From Bavette Bistro in Leeds to Nature’s Harvest in Helensburgh, a new drop in Cornwall and ‘Scoop’, a Jersey-based customer too, we had 4 new fab businesses looking to work with us for the first time last week and we’re expecting at least another two this week too. I’ve been boring everyone this end how excited I am that since the New Year, we’ve managed to welcome new customers every single week (sometimes 5 per week!) and the run continues! This interest in what we do is completely unprecedented and it’s giving us a lot of confidence in both what we’re doing and for what we hope to gradually achieve over the forthcoming years.
- In less positive news, we’re feeling the effects of the dreaded gap somewhat this week with Newfields having to curtail their season slightly earlier than usual due to adverse weather conditions. They’ll be back in a month or so though with their first new greens of the season, monsoons-permitting. Though we’ve still a lot available domestically, we’ll be leaning on our European growers more than any other time this year this week.
- This is also the last ever week of our much and long-loved supplier Francis Sampson who is moving onto pastures new. Francis has long been a vital supplier for us, especially during this time of year and we wish him all of the very best for the future. In his place are a group of budding new growers who we understand will at least try and take over his cauliflower production. I’ll keep you all posted when we learn more about these plans.
- Elsewhere our drone-flying extraordinaire, Ajay is at our Spanish berry supplier Flor de Donana today for his second visit in as many years today. He’s interviewing some of the growers there and looking to learn more about what they’re all about as a company…the lucky swine! I’ll be sure to share the results of his work as soon as I receive them.
- Lastly before the veg updates and just to keep you guys in the loop, my colleague Maddie is currently doing much of the leg work when it comes to compiling our weekly veg lists (has been for a while now) and she’s becoming more adept at doing so each week so big kudos to Mads as it’s not the simplest of tasks to do well. Mads hasn’t been with us very long but we all love working alongside her here.
- Props too to another colleague of mine, Josie who as well as the best cook we know, also happens to be the pun queen that has for a long time has been putting together the photos and bits of copy at the top and bottom of the weekly lists. As a side-hustle to the veg, she could easily enjoy a career as a comedy script-writer I reckon : )
VEG NEWS:
- The gap kicking in proper this week has had us scratching around for anything that we can get our hands on. New this week you’ll see some small caulis from Be Organic (French), some old season twister and alouette spuds from Pound Farm (Herefordshire) and there’s even some spring greens to go at from Riverford Farm down in Devon. The farm almost exclusively supplies the nationwide Riverford box scheme but has some surplus this week so we’re glad to be able to find the produce some thankful homes.
- Some other good news from the UK this week is that The Tomato Stall have added three new lines (punnets and loose) and Haslum have a few boxes of cherry vine for the lucky ones who nip in for those.
- Royal Oak have also added desiree potatoes and there’s plenty to go at too.
- From Portugal we’ve basil this week and from Spain there’s new toms and watermelons from Hortichuelas (mini ones available from Ecosur too), more toms from Bioalgarrobo and some of the first half-dry onions of the year from Biovergel too.
- On the Euro wholesale front Fairtrasa have mangoes, Zann has ginger and pears and the best picks from Dynamis include cardoon, romanesco caulis, red chicory, fresh garlic, noire crimee toms and the first cherries of the year! : )
- On the pantry items, we’ve butter again from Acorn, EVOO from As Pontis again, Arancello (lovely stuff) from Atlantic distillery and some seaweed sourdough crackers from the Fresh flour Company.
Before I sign off to begin processing your guys’ orders this week, here’s a link to an article about how to best store your veg. We’re actually working in house just now to have similar info saved onto all of our veg lines so keep and eye out for that development in the not too distant too.
Last up, I recently learned of a full- time chef position that’s coming available at a Spanish restaurant in my now local town of Macclesfield called Tempranillo. It’s a fab wee spot in an ace corner of town and the staff there are a delightful bunch so an great opportunity perhaps if you know any chefs in the area looking for graft?
Cheers and hope you all have a top week,
Sean and the ON team x
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Hembridge have sent us these very cute jams (thanks Kerry!) & Sean’s been getting about on his cool chimpified scooter.
With our trip to the trade show, enamel pin badges strewn across London and further afield – now these two beauties, we’re really getting Chester’s face across the nation!
We’ve got some little badges for you to rep Chester too. If you’re keen, just let us know and we’ll see if we have enough to pop one on to your order.
Trialling a slogan “If you give a monkey’s – get the chimp” 🙂
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