Put the ginger in the freezer. Grate it directly into your cooking pot from frozen. Skin it first if you want. I always have ginger in the freezer.

We finally cancelled our CSA box, after we spent too much per week to get a few tomatoes, some squash, a few berries and a head of some leafy green. I never felt like we got our money's worth.

Yes, freeze the ginger.

One beet. Well I’d eat that, my issue was always the one potato. I’d try to save them up so that I could actually make something after a few deliveries, but they’d go bad in the meantime. I think all but one ended up in the garbage.

I do miss the mangoes.

Anyway, that’s the weakest misfits box I’ve seen! Thanks for the reminder to check my account. I never cancelled, just skipped a few months of deliveries. But if that’s the way they’re headed I might as well just quit.

I think I'm not a match for Misfits either. (I hadn't heard of them before but the concept is interesting.) This is exactly why I never do CSA or other random fresh fruit and vegetable delivery. Really, what is someone supposed to do with a single beet? (I love beets but I'd want at least a couple to go to the effort of cooking them.) I'd probably use up the fruit and maybe the limp celery, but for $22 I'd rather get the produce I want to eat and have a recipe ready to cook.

I've been getting customizable farm boxes (same org that Cloud Swift gets) that's sort of between Misfits and CSA. My problem was too many green beans (I assume a pound), which I solved with green bean popsicles, which are great. One can see the mix ahead and edit it, but I've found that singles of certain things like grapefruit and green bell pepper, for general purposes rather than a planned dish, works well. My biggest problem is when I overbuy extras. :) The farm boxes are delivered by the farm, I think, or a dedicated carrier, over night. I've only had one cool pack melted, and there was a lot of ice cold water, which may have been ice originally, but I also am lucky enough to be early on the route and get mine in the evening after dark sometime. I don't know if this kind of model is available where you are.

Don't you get to chose items with Misfits? I thought you could. The avocados from the farm box have been awful. I'm getting those from the market--the pickers are much better with avocados and tomatoes than greens, and the greens from the farm have been splendid.

Re the fennel, you can treat the bulb like onion and saute it for many kinds of dishes. My first box had a giant fennel, and I sliced and roasted it vertically, and used pieces of the bulb in everything from salads to sandwiches to pizza, and used the fronds as well on all kinds of stuff. I chopped the stems and used them as well. If you don't like the flavor at all, nothing will improve it, but a little roast fennel frond in a fancy sandwich (meat, cheese, condiments, veg) can add a little general flavor that enhances the whole without being massively fennely. The whole bit lasted well in a ziploc for the better part of a week.

This is my first (and now last) Misfits box. I did not see a place to choose anything. There was an email on Saturday that allowed me to add a couple of things for an extra fee. I can’t remember what, but I didn’t want them.

I may juice the grapefruit for a cocktail. I don’t think I’ve ever seen one so small. The onion is bigger!

I will use everything but the lone beet. At least I didn’t get any zucchini! Bleech!!

I've never heard of misfits. I buy yearly from a small produce market. They are closed after Christmas through early Spring. When items are not in season here, the owner goes to Alabama and Florida for fresh produce. Now that produce is in season here, they sell from local farmers. They have such good produce! I go at least once a week. I go at a time of day when they are not busy and they are in a city/county that requires masks. This week I bought fresh green beans, cucumbers, tomatoes, zucchini, yellow squash, a huge cantaloupe. Oh and eggs. They also have jellies and fresh fried pies which I try to stay away from LOL.

BB, I make a zucchini veggie pie that is so so good. I always include it in roasted veggies too.

I think you have to get a few deliveries before you get on the list to choose. I loved it, but I got a big box, every other week. I never got anything limp or bruised until nectarines; they are TOO fragile to bounce around in a box. They let me choose, but my email is so slow that everything I want is alway sold out. We eat very little fruit, and a lot of vegetables.

I had such an awful experience with Misfits that I cancelled after my first box. They were so unresponsive and charged me for the first two boxes before I even received the first one. The only way I was able to get through to them was on their instagram account, by being very persistent. They never responded to emails and I was very disappointed with the produce.

DH & I aren't a good match for random boxes of produce. We tried a CSA a few years ago and found it to be overwhelming. We split our bi-weekly share with a vegetarian friend. We didn't adapt well to it.

I freeze ginger, too--it grates so much more easily when frozen.

Farmers' markets by us have been wonderful this year--I'd take the $22 and go spend it there. (Don't throw out the beet! Just wash, slice and eat raw. Or add to a stir fry.)

Your box reminded me of this salad I make. I use a bit less oil, and it’s very light and refreshing.

Fennel & Apple Salad

Whisk together:

1/4 cup lemon juice

2/3 cups EVOO (or mixture of favorite oils)

Salt and pepper to taste

In large bowl, combine:

2 Granny Smith apples, thinly sliced

2 bulbs fennel, thinly sliced

Toss apples and fennel mixture with dressing. Garnish with chopped fennel fronds (optional).

You can wrap the beet in foil and bake it in the oven.

Fennel, once cooked, has a very mild flavor. I love it raw in a salad but dh does not, however roasted the entire family loves it. I am actually growing it this year because we love it so much and it is so expensive at the market.

One beet, grate it and throw it in a salad raw. Or, mix it with potato for a red flannel hash, or make a beet latke.

That celery does look limp, but I would still use it, worst case it would go in my stock bag.

Agree some giving you a melange of veggies is inconvenient. That’s why I love my CSA so much, I get X# picks, I go and choose what I want. One week a pick on offer was a quart of you pick strawberries, yes please I’ll take 3.

I’ve washed the celery and put it in the crisper wrapped in a damp paper towel. If it is crisps up, I’ll use it. Saving it for soup/stock is a great idea!

Like localeater, I would put any limp celery into my "stock bag", I have a roaster full of stock simmering right now, it'll go all night and get canned tomorrow.

I also freeze knobs of ginger, then just grate it, still frozen, into whatever I'm putting it in.

The beet? Oh yeah, I love beets. I'd either quarter it and roast it along with the fennel, or wrap it in foil and bake it until it was done and then just eat it! The fennel would either get roasted or made into some kind of salad with the pear and/or apple.

The mangoes? (shrug) I don't know what you could do with those. They are just too difficult to deal with and not worth the trouble for me. I'm not a huge fan of fruit, although I do like vegetables.

I'd try Misfits in the winter but in the summer there is too much produce in my garden, at the local farmer's market, the roadside stands, the U-Picks.

Close your eyes, bbstx, this is what my husband brought in from the garden this morning:

And, of course, I thinned the fennel, LOL:

Maybe I'll make some of Sol's Zucchini Pancakes for supper tomorrow, Elery likes them and I'm sure, somehow, that Mother will say "yuck". I'm not sure what I'm going to do with the baby fennel. I think by next week I'll have green beans.

Annie

For the mangos -- have you tried them cut into largish chunks, a squeeze of lemon or lime juice, sprinkle cayenne pepper and a little salt? So good.

I like to use zucchini in a leek, potato and egg casserole. The grated zucchini just disappears into it but gives it a nice body & vegetable note.

Our CSA let's you customize the box. It just can't drop below a certain value. @Plllog, in summer they adjust their delivery schedule so deliveries are either evening or early morning - essential in our hot climate.

My favorite thing to do with the pound of green beans is roast them on a baking tray with minced garlic, ginger and sesame oil. Good hot out of the oven or cool. The last batch arrived when my oven was dead so I made a green bean & tomato pasta. It was good but not as cravable as the ginger and garlic roasted green beans.

When I haven't customized, they've always put items in in reasonable quantities. A piece of fruit may be a singleton at times, but something like beets are in a nice bunch. Almost always they have nice beet greens attached so it's a twofer.

The box of strawberries last week was so good.

For limp celery, perhaps you could cut a slice off the bottom and stand it in a pitcher of water for a bit.

I forgot to mention that the top of the beet had been sliced off. I don’t mean just the greens and the part at the very top, but the entire top of the beet, including the shoulder, is gone. A large portion of the beet is exposed, raw beet. It has sealed over, which says to me it is also dried out. That beet is history!

I peeled one mango this evening. It was very ripe. I made an X in the top and peeled off the skin with my fingers. It was so small that DH and I got about 2 bites each.

I juiced the grapefruit. It was so small and the rind was so thick that there was very little fruit. I got about 3 oz of juice. I made Alex Guarnaschelli’s Pink Grapefruit Cocktail.

@annie1992, could you roast your little baby fennels?

Everyone who freezes their ginger - do you peel it first? If you don’t peel it, do you just grate the peel into whatever dish you are making? Should I break/cut it into more manageable pieces?

I do not peel my ginger before freezing. I just wash and dry whole (I don't break it up), place it in a freezer bag, and pull it out and grate whatever amount needed. The skin ends up in the grated mix, but it doesn't seem to impact the flavor.

I find ginger keeps well in a paper bag in the crisper. Something about paper retaining enough moisture so it doesn't dry out, but not enough to get moldy.

I don't peel the frozen ginger either. Someone, probably Alton Brown, said the difference was negligible, and I found that it was, so I just grate it in. I used to try to peel it with a spoon, another thing I "heard" on the internet, and it didn't work worth a darn, ginger is too "bumpy" for that to work well.

bbstx, I'm thinking I'll probably roast the fennel with some other vegetables. There's not enough by itself for any particular application, but maybe with some parsnips and sweet potatoes...

Annie

There is nothing wrong with the celery, it’s just thirsty. Cut the bottom off and either put it in a plastic bag with a little water or a vase so it can drink, it will freshen up just like any other plant when you water it.

I'm still wondering where a mature butternut squash comes from this time of year. mine are just setting fruit that are about 2 inches long.

Annie - Spoon is the only way I peel ginger!

Welcome to the squash, one beet and one potato club, 😂 but you did not even get a potato. Your box is a bit light. I'd say missing some greens to balance out the fruit.

I've only had one sad bunch of kale a few weeks ago. Limp like a wet rag. It perked up in a cold water bath.

Before customization we considered canceling because of too much fruit. Then quarantine hit. Then early March we could customize.

I would be thrilled with the fennel and ginger. We go through about a pound of ginger a week. DH uses a spoon if it's a big fat clean knob. I don't bother.

Our boxes are sent FEDX. Lasts weeks box was 25+something pounds. Weight is on the tracking e-mail. My few add-ons maybe weighed 2-3 pounds. The avocados. A snack bag of toasted coconut chunks dusted with chocolate. 😁

Look, 4 potatoes! The collards are a much bigger stack than it looks. Still have half this box a week later. Customize happens every Thursday starting at 4 pm.

Lost tract how many times I have e-mailed them. Not always complaints. Just observations and of course if an add-on is missing. And the time I got one tiny potato. Can't imagine someone packing my box and picking one tiny potato from a big bin thinking that is ok. 😂 Since it says potatoes with an 's' on my custom pick list.

I think the butternut squash had a label on it that said it was a product of Mexico. I, too, thought I would get things that were more seasonal.

This box may have come FedEx. I’m not sure. I was checking the porch periodically since I knew it was due on Wednesday. It came about the same time as the mail. Even if it were delivered by FedEx, the box had been riding around in a hot FedEx truck for more than half the day.

I may give it another shot in the Fall, but right now the packaging is inadequate for our heat. And that is the reason I gave for canceling.

It was mostly the heat but also the quality of the last couple of boxes we got that I cancelled. And of course the garden is producing and local Farmers Markets are in full gear. I might go back late Fall and try again. But honestly they do need to rethink warm/hot weather packaging.

I think it is where their home base is located. It is in the northeast near sleevendog. I had signed up to be notified, but decided not to try, since I am in the South. Those of us farther south seemed to be having more problems. I think they tried to expand too far.

I haven't bought a produce box lately. I was thinking of ordering one last week, as I was running low on potatoes. The box I usually get is heavy on the fruit, which isn't a bad thing, since I don't eat enough fruit. This forces me to.

I was trying to order a box on their website (a local restaurant supply store) but I couldn't find it, so I just picked up some fruit at the store and a 10-lb bag of potatoes.

I wasn't sure whether the $50 really was justified, but hey seeing what you got, for half that, I'd say it is! But I'm still hesitant if it really is worth $50.

5-lb bag of potatoes, 3 lb bag of Royal Gala apples, bag of grapes, 3 lb bag of carrots, bag of oranges, tomatoes, a cucumber, and the rest you can see.

Now I am worried. I sent my younger son in Brooklyn one Misfits box gift for him to order delivery when he would like. This was before the lock down. He plans to order it when fruit is in season he says. I am afraid he is going to be disappointed, and me too, from reading the above descriptions. Too bad, it seemed like a good idea.

Sheila, let us know what he gets. Being in Brooklyn, his produce may be in better shape than mine was. Because the cold pack was not leaking, I assume all the moisture in my box was condensation from things being chilled, then cool, then warm.

Topmost layer^

Upper layer of produce ^

Lower layer of produce ^ I think I had already removed the celery before I took the picture.

In my household of 3, we consume enormous quantities of fruits and vegetables. I’m fortunate to have a farmer’s market, a Sprouts and at least 6 Grocery stores including a Trader Joe’s, an Albertsons and some local stores within 2 miles. Sprouts, Albertsons and two of the local stores are on instacart. Between Sprouts and the farmer’s markets, my produce needs are more than fully met. Sometimes, I can’t believe how ridiculously low my bill is at the Sprouts check out.

I got an e-mail yesterday that they are adding Arkansas, Mississippi, and Louisiana.

Hot climates. Not sure that will be well received.

I'm still a fence sitter about the whole thing but will continue after the past few boxes were so good. Our situation is a bit different in NY. None of my friends, co-workers, neighbors, are shopping in stores or even farmers markets. Our covid numbers are so down, NewYorkers want to keep it that way. That makes an emergency so much safer.

My nearby insta-cart grocery stores are garbage for organic or any veg. Would not want a random shopper picking my produce. All good groceries are too far away for insta-cart. Our big health food store with all organic produce would be twice the price. Much smaller bundles of greens (no deliveries anyway)

One Facebook group, something like 'misfits recipe group', seem happy. And pretty funny, 😂

I like the idea of misfits but husband is so picky, it doesn't work for us.

If you like the vegetables they send and are close to their center, you will probably like it. For us, the vegetables are not what I would expect fresh. This time of year and going into next month, I would want fresh, corn, butterbeans, greenbeans, field peas, crowders, yellow summer squash, white patty pan squash, tomatoes cucumbers, watermelon, peaches, figs, among other Southern vegetables and fruits.

For sure, not kale, beets, leeks, fennel, and winter squash. I think I have had these once in my life.

I cannot give the ginger away! I have contacted my cookbook club, my neighbors, DD, and Sister. Finally one neighbor said she’d take a bit.

Sister related a story of a different use for ginger. She went to China years ago on a trip for medical professionals (I think it was continuing education). They visited an alternative medicine hospital. One of the patients was being treated by having slices of ginger laid on her which were then heated with something that Sister said looked like a big cigar. She can’t remember what the ailment was that was being treated.

Exactly Sherry! That is why I love my little produce market! We also have a weekly farmers market during the warm months, in the parking lot of a large church in the area. However, with Covid, I haven't been this year.

That seems so much like a winter box, that I wonder if the "misfit" part for most of the content is vegetables toward the end of their storage life.

Laceyvail, my farm box service has butternut on offer for next week as well. They do work with other farms, but as far as I know, they're in California.

More than ever, while I admire the concept of Misfits--delivering the potentially unsalable to anyone whom the delivery services deliver to, I like the local organic farm service. The quality is mostly excellent, and they deliver at night. I'm lucky enough that they get to my house early (they deliver from sundown (or twilight really) through 5am), and I can put things away right away, or at least before bed. I really think that for those who aren't well as well served by Misfits, it might be worth looking around for another option.

GInger freezes nicely, and those ice packs refreeze, too. I have quite the collection of the latter.

I have had one really bad box since starting in January (I am on an alternate week schedule), which was due to the box arriving two days late, on an unexpectedly hot week. It didn't help that the UPS or whomever delivered that day flipped the box around so the strawberries had a breakout and were squished all over the place. But other than the occasional bad one-off otherwise, it's been a good service.

I will be dropping it after the upcoming delivery for the rest of the summer - too many great things in farmer's markets, and starting up in my own garden.

Sleevendog, yes, I also got the One Tiny Potato at one point. I think it was to go with the One Tiny Beet that came the following delivery. But I do like picking, as I try to lessen the amount of fruit I'm getting. (Lemons and limes are always welcome, however.)

We have 2, maybe 3, CSAs in the area. You go to the farm and pick up your box. To my knowledge, we have no vegetable delivery service.

Cloud, interesting thought. I’ve read that butternut squash will keep 1 to 3 months. There is nothing about the one I got that looks old. In fact, nothing I got was odd cosmetically. I thought that was the whole purpose of Misfits.

Artemis, I wish I had know about the ice packs earlier. I pitched mine.

I was never a fan of fennel, but the woman who cooked for us made me a convert. She used to make a fennel and cauliflower gratin that was delicious. I do not have her recipe but this seems similar : https://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/fennel-au-gratin/

Cooking fennel mellows the flavor and, of course, you could au gratin cardboard and I'm in!

I will also post this wonderful (raw) fennel salad recipe I got from a cooking class:

Citrus Salad

serves 4 to 5

1 head fennel, shaved

1 blood orange

1 navel orange

1 grapefruit

1⁄2 small red onion, thinly sliced

2 cup loosely packed arugula

juice of 1 lemon

Copyright © by Haven’s Kitchen and Sarah Bode Clark. All rights reserved.

1 tablespoon honey

1 tablespoon sherry vinegar

1⁄3 cup vegetable oil

1⁄3 cup toasted hazelnuts, chopped

3 sprigs mint leaves, leaves cut chiffonade

Peel the citrus and cut into supremes (cutting in between the membranes to remove the flesh

in segments). Toss the citrus with the fennel, red onions, and arugula.

To make the dressing mix together the lemon juice, honey, and sherry vinegar. Slowly whisk

in oil until the dressing has thickened slightly and emulsified. Adjust seasoning as necessary.

Toss dressing with the citrus salad, hazelnuts and mint to serve.

I asked a Chinese woman about storing ginger years ago and she said it's best in sand. That isn't doable for me, but it was interesting. I do keep mine in the freezer and grate, peel and all, as others note. You can make a nice ginger syrup by slicing it up and simmering in equal parts sugar & water, though I usually go a bit lower on the sugar. I use it in sparkling water for a ginger ale that can be a lot less sweet than cans, and it's very refreshing. You can also use it in Manhattan drinks. Or as a drizzle on many things. Keeps well in the fridge.

For mangoes - make a mango lassi! Easy, with yogurt, milk, honey, and either rose water or cardamom. Blend it up.

I wish I could participate in a misfits-type program, but I'm too remote and right now too hot to even consider it.

My smaller winter icepacks said on the pack to feed your houseplants. Or re-freeze for later cooler use. The summer ice packs are huge. I zip-lock them and stack in the freezer.

I've read about ginger in sand. I have so much at any given time I usually freeze whole with turmeric root, for green juices I freeze or blend. Ice cubes for SpaWater or into my iced tea. Blendered with citrus....etc.

Do re-visit your local CSA's, like plllog mentioned. Years ago CSA's were not consumer friendly. Bad inconvenient pick-up hours, etc. My local, just a few miles away has a new a-la-cart via web site ordering. Has never suited us locally as it is always what I'm growing in my garden. Seasonally.

Misfits takes a 20 or so percentage beyond local farms for box variety. For many reasons. I do know that they hire local to their warehouse. Many have no cars and many struggles being un-employed needing public transport.

Makes sense that I got two zucchini instead of cucumber a few weeks ago. 😂

video link, HERE

Looking back, having taken pics of all my boxes, even before covid, I will continue to support...it suits us but understood why it is not for others.

February...

Snow on the ground and I get this.