Photo by Jen Maiser

I know much has already been said about the Mystery Box from Mariquita Farm -- both here on Bay Area Bites and elsewhere -- but I can't stop myself from adding one more paean of praise for this marvelous arrangement.

You go to a local restaurant for that week's drop-off, you pay $25, and you bring home a huge box overflowing with a variety of farm-fresh produce. Simple as that.

The first time I did the Mariquita Mystery Box, it was almost too much food for two people, but we did get through it all. My next go-around with the Mystery Box involved splitting it with a friend, using a fair amount to cook Thanksgiving dinner, but still having quite a bit left over. The most recent test of the Mystery Box's staying power involved a girls get-away weekend deep in the California redwoods.

This weekend's party consisted of six hungry women (one of them pregnant and, you know, "eating for two"), and five meals over two nights and two days.

This week's Mariquita Farm Box consisted of:

Mixed colors carrots
Mixed colors turnips
Austrian Crescent potatoes
Radicchios mixed with escarole
Watermelon radishes
Orach
Swiss Chard
Broccoli di Cicco
Tatsoi
Collard greens
Celery (classic)

Now, none of us are vegetarians, so of course we supplemented with meat and dairy, along with some basic pantry items. However, we did our level best to eat our way through all those vegetables, and not only did we get plenty of bang for our twenty-five bucks, but we even had leftover produce at the end of the weekend! All those who wanted were able to bring home extra carrots, radishes, a bunch of tatsoi, and I even snagged myself a beautiful purple head of radicchio. Everything else? Was cooked, eaten, and fully enjoyed in a range of dishes.

The Watermelon Radishes were sliced thin and served with butter and salt as an appetizer; tatsoi and chard got all garlicked up and jumped into a breakfast frittata; turnips, carrots, celery, and collard greens fortified a hearty soup; the potatoes were roasted with chicken schmaltz and served at lunch; the Broccoli di Cicco was quickly sautéed with garlic and pepper flakes and played a strong second fiddle to luscious steak and potatoes; and the exotic purple orach -- along with other sundry bitter winter greens in the box -- composed one of three delicious salads.

It's not like I needed to be convinced of the never-ending wonders of the Mariquita Mystery Box, but this reminder of its seemingly bottomless supply of fresh, healthful, affordable vegetables has made up my mind. Though I might now live in the far(ish)-flung suburbs, whenever Mariquita delivers to Piccino (easily accessed by the 101, dontcha know), I will be there to meet them.

Frankly, in this depressed day and age, can any of us afford not to invest $25 in a box of fresh, local vegetables that will last through many meals?

I know I can't.

Last Thursday, I made my way to Piccino, a small new pizza restaurant occupying a street corner in Dogpatch, to participate in an interesting new San Francisco ritual. I looked for the minivan full of vegetables, handed over $25 for a giant box of produce, and then sat down to eat dinner with some friends, side-by-side with other food lovers or food industry folks who were also at Piccino to purchase a "Mystery Box."

The Mystery Box was chock full of enough vegetables to feed a family of four for at least a week, and was grown by the farmers at Mariquita Farm, a well-known organic farm in Watsonville. Until March, Mariquita was a popular booth at the Ferry Plaza Farmers' Market on Saturdays.

When Mariquita's owners, husband and wife team Andy Griffin and Julia Wiley, decided to pull out of the market, a roar went up among customers who had been shopping at their market booth for many years. "We stopped going because our restaurant deliveries and CSA were successful enough that we didn't have to go to the Ferry Plaza, but we had customers who were having complete withdrawals and not dealing with it very gracefully," says Julia.

Thus was born the Mystery Box. Julia has a goal of eating at every restaurant that is a customer of Mariquita Farm, and decided to combine this goal with a trip to the city twice a month this summer, parking outside one of the restaurants and selling Mystery Boxes to customers who pre-ordered on the Internet. So far, she has conducted Thursday night box sales at Nopa, Zuppa, and Piccino.

"It's great cross-promotion for the restaurants," Julia told me on the phone on Monday. Many customers pick up their produce and stay at the restaurant to eat dinner. Additionally, the Mystery Box is a great way for the farm to add some extra income and off-load some of their surplus during the high season. Farmer Andy Griffin picked the produce for the Mystery Boxes on Thursday afternoon, and Julia printed up the ingredients list five minutes before driving to San Francisco, giving the farm ultimate flexibility in giving box-buyers the freshest produce that the farm had to offer.

This box contains a massive amount of food -- next time I will be splitting the box with a friend. This week, however, my friend Jeanne and I bought individual boxes. I talked to her last night about yet another recipe to use up some of the produce. "How long," I asked, "do you think you and I have spent on the phone this week talking about strategy to use up our produce boxes?" It was probably at least two hours since last Thursday.

This week the box contained: Godzilla fingerling potatoes, chives, rosemary, basil, Amsterdam cutting celery, erbette chard, Egyptian beets, spigariello, green and white cucumbers, mixed summer squash, poblano peppers, pimiento de padron peppers, purple and white bell peppers, carrots, and fennel. I was delighted to find several things in the box that I have never used before, and have been having fun this week planning new recipes for my produce.

If you don't participate in a CSA, this is a great way to have the benefits of a CSA this summer on a casual, as desired, basis.

One tip: Take along a few canvas bags, as Julia likes to take the boxes back -- they are expensive for the farm, and she'd rather they not go home with us. You can then transfer all your box goodies to your own bags.

The next Mystery Box drop-off will be on Thursday, August 16 at Slow Club.

To purchase a Mystery Box, sign-up through Mariquita's website.