Bountiful Baskets

Every Saturday we participate with Bountiful Baskets. I am the Volunteer Site Coordinator for our location, and we try to arrive 15 minutes ahead of the truck so we can set up our baskets. Every participant gets two baskets full of produce: one for fruit, one for vegetables. Our site has a cap of 96 participants and we fill up within five to ten minutes every Monday at noon. We are a popular site and it's always a mad dash to get a basket! Today was a beautiful day, it was so pleasant to spend this time outdoors.

   

Once the truck arrives, we are busy unloading cases of produce and other items such as bread, cookies, miscellaneous packs, etc. Our volunteers usually arrive just in time to help with this task. We love our volunteers! Cases of produce are stacked at the top of the lines where volunteers can easily get them to fill the baskets. I make a list on a white board of fruits and vegetables and quantities of each that should go in each basket. That way our volunteers can work at their own pace.

Items are distributed into the baskets by volunteers. Here Melissa and Josh are putting cucumbers into the baskets. Everyone gets the same items to begin with. After the baskets are filled according to the list, our volunteers take an extra item as a thank you for helping. Next the case ends are distributed into the baskets as evenly as possible. Poor quality, bruised, moldy or broken produce goes into a box that we give to a neighbor for her chickens. I guess chickens are not too particular about what they eat. The poor chickens didn't get much from us today. All the produce was in great shape and very fresh.

We have lots of cardboard boxes that need to be broken down so they can be taken to the recycling center. If we have many volunteers, some of them are assigned to this task. Children younger than 13 are not allowed to handle produce, helping break down boxes is a good job for them. Today we had only enough people to fill the baskets, so they all helped with boxes once their lines were finished.

Line monitors and volunteers take their baskets first. Next we are ready to let participants collect their baskets. Line monitors hold clipboards that let the participants know which line to come to for their baskets. We always get signatures and collect confirmation slips. Participants put the produce from our baskets into the baskets they brought from home, or they use boxes that we set aside for them.

People who have ordered extra items also check out with Terry at the table before they leave. Today we had cases of apples, bananas and yams, Italian packs, organic boxes, cookies and nine-grain bread. This man in the red shirt has been coming to my site for three or four weeks now. I love him. He takes all the cardboard in his truck to the recycling center. I wish all the participants could meet him and thank him for doing this job. He is awesome. Before he came, different people would take stacks of cardboard home with them. Everyone will help do what they can.

We have a lot of fun doing the baskets. We have met so many great people and have tried a lot of produce that we would have never looked at or maybe never seen in our grocery store. Today we had Daikon radishes! We know we are getting fresh food that is good for us and we are helping our community have this same opportunity.