Only the best possible produce
We are fortunate to have our big brown barn for washing, grading and storing vegetables year round! During the summer months all veg is harvested fresh from the fields and then is sorted and washed in the barn. It is then packed and shipped direct to the Farmer’s market! We have a large cooler area where sometimes produce spends the night before it is sold, particularly if the market is an early morning one! The cooler is also used all winter long housing bins and bins of storage vegetables for winter sales. We have a common storage area where our sweet potatoes are cured and later our potatoes and other storage vegetables not needing refrigeration call home all winter. We have a large area of the barn insulated and heated where we sort and grade during the winter months. We grade out only the best possible produce.
Limiting waste from the process
Blemished or damaged produce is composted! We do the majority of our washing and grading by hand and sorted on grading belts and tables. We also have the use of our brush washer to clean potatoes, peppers, cucumbers and roma tomatoes when we begin to harvest some volume. These crops then spill out onto a long grading belt to be sorted and boxed. One of the best things about being a small farm and selling direct to consumers is the lack of container waste. The majority of all our big green and orange bins are used week after week, market after market! Even The Big Carrot buys our cabbage from us in these green bins and saves them for us! At market customers are encouraged to ‘dump out’ the quarts of produce into their bags and give us back the containers to refill for next market! We implement food safety on farm and have a station to pressure wash bins as they arrive back from the city before we fill them back up with fresh produce!