Pick your own for zero waste

Recently we have been running down the frozen fruit in our freezer, and we don't plan to replace it, as that requires buying more plastic. Equally you can't really buy berries in the supermarket without plastic packaging. The solution for now, was to get to a pick your own. We went on the first Saturday they were open of the year.

We have visited many times over the last few years. mostly we freeze a little and eat a lot fresh.

We arrived at opening time, and there were already a few people there. We grabbed a small and large punnet, one plastic, one card with a metal handle, but we returned both of these at the end, I asked a member of staff if that was ok to leave them used, and they said, they prefer it.

We bought 1kg, and 2.5kg between the two punnets, we picked for about 45 minutes, and got lots of really red and ripe strawberries. I think it was 4.99 a kilo PYO, and 6.99 a kilo picked, maybe a little more than the supermarkets, but the taste is not comparable. 

We also bought a jar of jam, some chutney and a loose broccoli, they offered lots of picked vegetables without packaging, but we were due our veg box so decided not to pick up too much.

We raided our cupboard for every empty storage box we had. In the end when we decanted the strawberries, we filled an entire cake travel tub, a big circular plastic tub with clip on bottom (or top). I didn't think we would have needed it, but we filled up the second biggest tub with the smaller 1kg punnet of strawberries. Mountains of berries!

We have frozen a load of the strawberries for smoothies, with the green leafs at the top intact, they are added nutrition guys!

For about 5 days after the picking we ate loads of strawberries every day, took some to our friends, and made some rhubarb strawberry muffins too!

We might get to visit again during strawberry season. But we are excited for the Raspberry, tayberry, tummelberry, loganberry and boysenberry seasons!

True Foods Co-operative in Reading

Sadly my home town doesn't have an bulk food or zero waste stores... yet! We have previously visited Rice-Up Whole-foods in Southampton, but due to the distance this isn't a viable regular option. Thankfully we heard about True Foods in Reading, much closer, and not far from places we occasionally go anyway. It's north of Reading, near Caversham.

First off we noticed there are lots of fruit and vegetables, of really good quality, mostly more expensive than on the high street, but about the same or less than the farmers market. They have a wonky veg box, where we picked up two cabbages and plants for sale outside too!

Behind the counter is a fresh bread counter, with a great selection of breads and rolls. we recently picked up a potato and rosemary sour dough. We mostly buy our bread at Waitrose, as you can buy it loose, and you can pick up a bargain at the end of the day if you're not fussed what kind of bread you get. In the last few weeks we have eaten so many different types of bread, zero waste bonus! 

Above you can see the scales and our containers, we have the puffed quinoa and a box of loose wholegrain pasta, we also picked up oats, and aduki beans. the staff were lovely, and helped us to zero the scales so we could use our own container, they even seemed happy that we had brought our own containers. I imagine this could get a bit hectic if lots of people were in the shop, but we did ok. We have kept some brown paper bags from our veg box delivery, which are similar to the ones at True foods, so we take those, and they can weigh at the till. It's hard to remember the weights of everything as you go along, which is actually why I took these photos. 

There was a big variety of products in the bulk tubs, surprises included Nutritional yeast, raw sugar, sun dried tomatoes and chocolate drops. Many varieties or rice, lentils, beans, and cereals.

Below we have refillable laundry liquids, we haven't used these yet, but the prices looked reasonable, and an over view of the tubs and scoops area in the shop. 

Over view of True Foods, it's great if you're in the area and wanting to stock up on your pantry essentials. We visited the Reading vegan market, so took our second trip here. Stocking up on nuts for nut milk, and lentil for curry and lasagna. For us, for now, this is a good way to avoid buying plastic whilst stocking up our store cupboard. The alternative is buying tins of pulses, which can mostly be recycled. Our goal is the buy less variety but use more. I have found nuts and seeds from years ago, some of which I have had to throw away. I am hoping that the Zero waste journey, and living minimally mean we make better use of the fewer things we have in the house.