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As far as the Nourish Food co-op, that doesn't seem like it's got any forward momentum at the moment. I'd love it if it happens, esp. if they keep the location near to where I am, but I'm not holding my breath. I used to see lots of yard signs for it but now that I think about it, I don't see any of those any more.
It really surprised me finding out about the lack of co-ops in CO. I'm originally from WA and moved to Minneapolis a couple of years ago. I was shocked to find out there's at least a dozen co-ops across the twin cities metro. There's even a co-op in the small town of Grand Marais - a town on Lake Superior - less than 1500 people.
It really surprised me finding out about the lack of co-ops in CO. I'm originally from WA and moved to Minneapolis a couple of years ago. I was shocked to find out there's at least a dozen co-ops across the twin cities metro. There's even a co-op in the small town of Grand Marais - a town on Lake Superior - less than 1500 people.
Small farms are easier to have when water is plentiful.
... My Grandio was destroyed on Christmas day 2017 (out of town) some jackholes demolished it after breaking in looking for pot.
A close friend has a green house in his back yard and leaves it unlocked with a big sign that says the contents are vegetables. He has had a few jackholes....
Yes, hard to have such markets in winter given the very short growing season in Colorado due to the elevation and the huge swings in temperatures during those months. Having lived 11 years on COLO SPGS at 7,000 feet there were only a few months of such markets and IMO the offerings were not very good.
I gave up on Farmer's Markets years ago; didn't trust half of the "farmers" selling the stuff as I expected some of them just went to a large commercial wholesale produce terminal to buy the best stuff they saw and passed it off as their own locally grown. I get great fruit and veggies at my local Safeway here in AZ and even a lot of this comes in from CA or Mexico. I won't bother with farmer's markets now unless I go TO the farm and buy it from a stand alongside the road, then I'd believe it was local. We have to trust some people, and I trust Safeway (much more so than Kroger, aka Fry's).
In Colorado everyone loved the sweet corn from Olathe, CO and peaches from the Palisades area on the western slope. Lots of potatoes grown in the San Luis Valley (think Alamosa, etc) and lots of cattle feed lots on the eastern prairies (think Greeley). Even the Palisades peach orchards on the western slope are having trouble this year given that immigrant farm workers are in hiding and peaches are rotting in the fields out there.
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Yes, hard to have such markets in winter given the very short growing season in Colorado due to the elevation and the huge swings in temperatures during those months. Having lived 11 years on COLO SPGS at 7,000 feet there were only a few months of such markets and IMO the offerings were not very good.
I gave up on Farmer's Markets years ago; didn't trust half of the "farmers" selling the stuff as I expected some of them just went to a large commercial wholesale produce terminal to buy the best stuff they saw and passed it off as their own locally grown. I get great fruit and veggies at my local Safeway here in AZ and even a lot of this comes in from CA or Mexico. I won't bother with farmer's markets now unless I go TO the farm and buy it from a stand alongside the road, then I'd believe it was local. We have to trust some people, and I trust Safeway (much more so than Kroger, aka Fry's).
In Colorado everyone loved the sweet corn from Olathe, CO and peaches from the Palisades area on the western slope. Lots of potatoes grown in the San Luis Valley (think Alamosa, etc) and lots of cattle feed lots on the eastern prairies (think Greeley). Even the Palisades peach orchards on the western slope are having trouble this year given that immigrant farm workers are in hiding and peaches are rotting in the fields out there.
So you are in AZ now? I thought you were in Colorado. Job opportunity?
Too bad about your Farmer's Market experience. The ones in NYC are government regulated and have to meet rigorous standards and rules to apply and be able to operate. I love our produce, seafood, meat and dairy. It's pretty limited in the winter, but there are still worthy vendors around. The biggest market in Union Square offers superior selection. After trying the produce in the farmer's markets I have a hard time buying from supermarkets. Everything is always more watery and has a refrigerator smell.
The supermarkets here, and I am including Natural Grocer’s, Sprouts, Trader Joe’s and Whole Foods, as well as King Soopers and Safeway do often carry local meat and produce as well as other locally produced items.
Some of the garden centers (Nick’s, Tagawa...) also have local produce in season as well as local honey, jam, etc.
Since you will be in/near Littleton, check out some of the stores along West Main St. and environs. There is a highly regarded meat market and other places that may have some of what you are looking for.
“The City of Littleton owns and operates two year-round community gardens with individual plots assigned to gardeners on an annual basis for $25 per calendar year. The Shepperd Gardens at 2171 W. Shepperd Avenue has 120 plots and the Berry Gardens at 703 W. Berry Avenue has 42 plots and 5 wheelchair-accessible raised planters.”
I like the idea of doing the community garden plots.. However, I know that sometimes those gardens get raided and your hard earned produce and work goes to nothing. I regret to say when I was growing up in Portland in my early 20s /late teens that I was friends with some eco-terrorists who use to raid people's vegetable and fruit gardens. They claimed the whole earth belong to them . The city of Portland (as well as Ashland and Eugene) literally have more natural produce growing on trees and bushes than many large farms. I remember all the giant apple, fig, grape, persimmon and pear trees growing all over the city in the Summer. It was fun climbing trees and picking lush sweet tomatoes off the vines growing around town. Many of the plants literally were growing like weeds and people didn't care about them. Sadly, some were the precious possessions of people's gardens and as a young kid you just don't realize the hard work people put into it ..
Anyway, all this has definitely given me some interesting ideas. Of course, I will probably have to mail order in fermented veggies and eating whatever type of fresh local fruits/veggies I can get. But, I may eventually consider if I could find some other people in looking into a joint greenhouse operation, where multiple people rent a plot of land, set of a greenhouse and share the produce and perhaps could even sell some of the excess. That is a nice idea, but I will be way too busy working 70+/hr week job to pursue such a goal.
Of course, one day I hope to live on my own plot of land and have a farm and ranch, raising my own veggies, fruits, cows, chickens and whatever else I can.. Oh well, that is a ways off
I have looked at the Westwood and West Colfax Co-ops, but they do not appear to be community health food store co-ops, but rather some type of mission type of stores that help feed poor people in the neighborhood. I am thinking the Westwood Co-op is being mislabelled as a health food store hippie type co-op. I looked at their website and could find nothing about it being a storefront and seem more to be a community relief type deal.
I have no clue what this West Colfax Food CO-op is, as it just seems to be a concept the city of Denver is trying to launch. I'm pretty surprised that Boulder and Denver do not have these type of community style co-ops or at least a locally run health food store which are present in every city in the Northwest, including Idaho and Montana. Even Bozeman, MT has a community health food co-op store.
Even Washington state has a pretty short local growing season, as it gets quite cold and dark for most of the year. The northern latitude coupled with 9 months of overcast and over 6 months of freezing temperatures (mornings and nights half the year can dip below 32f) make growing many crops a challenge. In fact, in Washington even at the local co-ops I would only see local produce for 3 months of the year, usually starting in mid to late july. In Oregon, the season was longer. The Yakima Valley and Columbia Gorge utilize some modern technology to expand their growing season of the large fruit agricultural farms. Usually, this entails large numbers of special frost protection fans blowing in the early Spring to protect the fragile blossoms from the frequent frosts that occur in the Gorge and Yakima Valley.
Leaving the local growing climate aside, community co-ops can utilize resources even in areas with formidable growing environments. However, these stores carry more than just local produce and carry many other types of products like locally sourced meats, raw milk, eggs and other hard to find health food shelf products you don't find at the big corporate stores or are stuck ordering online.
I am very new to the Denver area and I am relocating from living in Oregon and Washington most my life. In Oregon, Washington and Idaho. all the cities I lied in had local food co-ops that were non-corporate and had a nice selection of local organic/biodynamic produce, locally made cultured foods, grass fed meats, eggs, raw milk and other types of products that you cannot find at the larger corporate stores like Whole Foods, Sprouts, Natural Grocers (at least the one in Boise I saw), etc. For example, in Eugene, we had Sundance Foods, in Portland, People's and Food Front Co-op,in Seattle they had Central Co-op and Boise had the Boise Co-op. I have been looking all over online and cannot find any type of similar type of store in the Denver area.
I see Boulder has a few non-chain health food markets , but they do not have very good reviews and don't seem to be run in a co-op type of fashion and just seem to be replicas of the corporate stores from the reviews I am reading. As well, Boulder is a bit farther away from where I will be living.
I guess I was wondering if there is any type of stores where the granola crunchy or those who like locally sourced items and other items the big corporate stores will not carry and could help a bit with supporting the local community, farmers, etc. I have lived in CHarlotte for the last month and was sad to see it is next to impossible to purchase any type of produce or products made in North Carolina. Almost all the produce and items in the store are from California and other areas far away. At least with produce, meat and milk I really rather get something from local farmers then get stuff shipped in from Australia or mono-cropped commercial low-grade produce grown in California.
Anyway, I am just wondering what options you would have in Denver or even Boulder. I was surprised to see there was no "Denver Food Co-op", but maybe this whole food co-op thing is a Pacific Northwest type of deal. I know California and Montana have some of them as well, like in Missoula. Maybe food co-ops are more of a West Coast type of deal. Even Asheville, NC doesn't have one and that shocked me based on its reputation.
Anyway. I'd appreciate people's advice. For example where I was living in South Puget Sound there was no food co-op , but there was an organic food market named Marlene's which was actually better than most of the hippie/hipster style food co-ops I would shop and carried all types of items I would never find at a Whole Foods, like raw milk and locally sourced veggies, etc.
Hey Rotse, funny to see you on here. It's your old friend from WA you went bar hopping in Tacoma with. Hopefully you enjoy yourself a bit more in the Denver area. Best of luck.
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