Winter Grain Bundle January 2024

Our winter grain bundles showcase what organic farmers have grown in this amazing province of ours.  Each seed and grain is a tiny piece of sunlight energy, transformed by plants into something that will nourish our bodies.  We love knowing that this food is part of the solution!  A solution to the pressures facing our natural environment, and also a solution that can help to build a stronger community of families, farmers and eaters.

This year’s grain bundle includes 20 different types of grains, seeds, flours, and oils, for a total of 90 pounds of organically grown lovingly milled grains!  All shelf stable, and enough for your winter soup pots, porridge pots, and baking.

Your January 2024 grain bundle will include the following Manitoba grown products:

• Organic Naked Oats (10 lbs/4.5kg – your choice of rolled, steel cut, quick cooking, or whole/unmilled oats – check out the link here if you’re not sure which type is best for you)
• Organic French Green Lentils (5 lbs/2.2kg)
• Organic Black Lentils (5 lbs/2.2kg)
• Organic Yellow Split Peas (4 lbs/1.8kg)
• Organic Whole Yellow Peas (1 lbs/900g)
• Organic Wild Rice/Oat Rice Blend (4 lbs/1.8kg)
• Organic Flax (3 lbs/1.36kg)
• Organic Pinto Beans (4 lbs/1.8kg)
• Organic Black Beans (5 lbs/2.2kg)
• Organic Cornmeal (3 lbs/1.3kg)
• Organic Corn flour (1lb/450g)
• Organic Wild Rice (1lb/450g)
• Organic Hemp Hearts (1lb/450g) (not hemp seeds like in previous years, but dehulled hemp hearts)
• Popcorn Kernels (1lb/450g)
• Organic Buckwheat flour (3lbs/1.3kg)
• Teff Flour (2lbs/900g)
• Organic Sunflower Oil (1L)
• Organic Millet (3lbs/1.36kg)*** (not 100% gluten safe, see link here for our gluten-free share option)
• Organic Sunflower Seeds (1lb/450g) *** (not 100% gluten safe)
• Organic Einkhorn Flour (6 lbs/2.7kg) *** (contains wheat/gluten)
• Organic Stoneground Emmer Flour (6 lbs/2.7kg) *** (contains wheat/gluten)
• Organic Red Fife Flour (18lbs/8kg) *** (contains wheat/gluten)

*** Although our facility and mill are dedicated to gluten free crops, there’s some pretty cool wheat-like crops growing here in Manitoba, and we certainly didn’t want to leave them out!  Milled off-site by other organic farmers (Dan and Fran Derucyk of Top of the Hill Farm, Benjamin Unrau, and Tamarack Farms) the emmer, einkhorn and red fife are pretty fun ways to keep the sourdough bubbling! But for those with celiac disease or other gluten-intolerances, we have put together a smaller bundle that excludes these crops.  There are also a few items are 99.9% gluten free, but have a slight chance of contamination (millet & sunflower seeds).  These items are also left out of the GF shares.  Full details of the gluten free share is here.  If your allergen needs are somewhere in between, feel free to choose the gluten free bundle, but add some of the gluten-y items as add-ons.

For those following a whole-foods plant-based diet, please leave a note in your order that you would like to leave out the oil and receive an extra portion of either oats, french lentils, or pinto beans with your order, and I can make that substitution for you.

* The list is as close of an approximation as we can make it, but there is a chance that some quantities will juggle around slightly before the final pick-up.  Some of the products are milled and ready, but others are still being cleaned, milled and prepared.  A few are still out on the wintery fields, waiting to be harvested!  Our grain CSA is about letting the harvest, the sun and the rain dictate the details.  We will do everything we can to ensure that you get good value for your purchase, and skipping out a lot of transportation, brokerage, packaging, and distribution costs makes many of the products more cost efficient than a trip to the grocery store, but it’s not always predictable or the same year to year!

Grain bundle pick ups will be in late January (Saturday, January 27th seems like a good guess) in Winnipeg.  Details will be sent out by email a few weeks in advance with details for selecting a time to pick up your bundle.  With our ‘zero-waste’ model, you will have the opportunity to bring your own containers to collect your grains without the excess packaging so rampant in our industrial food distribution system.  Bring clean jars, bags, boxes and containers of all shapes and sizes.  I will send out a sample list and precise sizes closer to the pick-up day.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Our Winter Grain CSA is not just about buying food.  It’s a way to connect with the land and the farms around us.  The pick-up day (in late January) will be an opportunity to meet the farmers and producers involved with growing your food, and also offers opportunities to gather, to learn, to meet others, and to share our ideas for creating a more sustainable and human-scale food system.  There will be casual workshops and learning opportunities available throughout the day, with details following in January.

If you know that you’ll be using lots of certain items, there are extra portions of most grains available as add-ons.  As well, there are some additional local food offerings like fresh veggie bundles, dried mushrooms, and dried herbs that are also available as add-ons.  If your order is $500 or more (the equivalent of about 2 grain bundles, or a similar quantity of grains),  a 5% discount will automatically be applied to your cart.  It’s not a huge discount because we set our pricing awfully close to our break-even point, but we love seeing people taking such amazing steps to fill their pantry to the brim and eat locally all year round!  Please note that the discount only applies to grains, seeds, flours, and oil, not to the fun veggie/mushroom/herb/honey add-ons.

A list of the recommended types of containers and sizes that you should bring is posted on the FAQ page.  The flour products will all be pre-packaged in paper bags to help minimize gluten contamination (and flour-dust) at the pick-up day.  Oats will also be pre-packaged, although if you have a large enough pail to store them in, we’ll happily empty our paper bags into your pails.  And we’ll always have extra paper bags on hand just in case your containers aren’t fitting everything.  You won’t have to leave with your pockets stuffed full of lentils 🙂

For those who are not able to make it to our pick-up day, we suggest trying to find a friend who can pick up for you, but failing that, we can also accommodate a small number of home deliveries.  For our home delivery option, all products will be pre-packaged and your share will be boxed up and delivered to your home (Winnipeg, Stonewall, Steinbach, Kenora or Brandon addresses) approximately one week after the CSA pick-up (early February).  Select “Pre-Packaged with Home Delivery” at the checkout for a $35 fee.  Veggie bundles, mushrooms, and herbs are not available with the home delivery option as they require refrigerated storage.

If you have questions about the pick-up day, substitutions, allergens, pricing, etc, please visit our FAQ page here (or, of course, shoot us an email!)  We are also super excited to be able to offer a Sliding Scale Pricing Model for those facing financial hardship, and there’s more information about that concept here.

I get a lot of questions about how long this quantity of food will last.  It’s an impossible question to answer!  I know families who share a bundle with another family to use it all, and I also know single folks who have purchased multiple bundles, with extras on the side!  It really depends on your own cooking style.  In our North American food culture, we are more likely to zip to the store several times a week to purchase what we need, and our long-term food use can be really difficult to quantify.  But in addition to all the advantages of local/organic, purchasing in bulk is also a great way to reduce your overall food budget.

If you can’t anticipate using all of the variety of items that are in our grain bundles, all is still not lost 🙂  After the dust settles in February-ish, I will reconfigure the website with the individual items/add-ons that we have extras of, and orders can be placed for individual items, either for home delivery or Winnipeg pick-up.  Items are usually a few dollars more because buying in bulk is most efficient for everyone, products will be pre-packaged, and getting your delivery is certainly less of an event (no pick-up day excitement and workshops…), but this format allows you to select only the items that you know you will use.  Veggies bundles, mushrooms, herbal teas, and some of the fun add-ons won’t be available, but many staples (oats, lentils. beans, etc) will be available all the way through the year for regular re-stocks.  If you would like, you can send me an email with a wish-list of items.  I can’t guarantee that all items will be available, but i’ll try!

I look forward to seeing you in January as we create a better food system together.