first harvest

hi folks,

after 2+ memorable years of living in the houseofkodai - we finally are going to have our first/second organic harvest in the next few days :-)

living here is peaceful, healthy, and fun. peaceful, because its quite (most of the time its your own thoughts making all the noise), healthy, because of unpolluted air/water and fresh (pluck from the garden type of fresh ;-) organic food and fun because we've been having tons of friends visiting us all the time. While we'd love for all of you to come and join us in our simple-rural-lives; I guess, its not something all of us are destined to do. We figured, if you cant come to kodai - we'll just have to box kodai and deliver it to your homes ;-)

we have always believed in organic farming - and started 6 months ago, after the griha pravesam of our new house (namma veedu) was complete. We tried potato as our first crop; generally one gets 10 times the yield with potato (we planted 500 kgs - expecting 5 tons and got 50 kgs instead ;-) it was certainly a learning experience; we kept the potato for our home consumption, and i'd have to say its' the finest potato we've ever had (if you doubt it, do visit us and we'll roast a few for you)

we're quick learners, we spoke to a few been-there-done-that friends and planted again - and guess what, we're going to have a good harvest this time. of course, a new challenge has come up - what to do with the harvest (this time the yield will be more than 10 times - over a ton). We figured that selling these in the regular market would be a wasted effort (since it would get mixed with the regular stuff and people would never get the opportunity to appreciate it). After a bit of thought and discussions, we have decided to home-deliver it to people, who can enjoy this.

our plan is simple,
"what we harvest today, you eat tomorrow"
every month, we harvest our vegetables/fruits on a Saturday, clean them, pack them in a box, transport it overnight, and get it delivered to your homes the next-day on Sunday. We're calling it the "bok" (box of kodai); it will contain a combination of organic fruits/vegetables/products - few of which will be harvested from our land and others (only organic) from nearby farms/forests. We will maintain a contact list of people interested in our efforts, and update them before every harvest with the cost and contents of our bok; we then prepare a delivery list and get our boks to your homes on Sunday.

This weekend, we are starting the bok-deliveries in chennai (because thats where my grandmother lives ;-). The first bok is going to contain radish, cilantro, mountain-banana, lemons, carrots, cho-cho (squash), and a bit of coffee - its going to weigh around 5 Kgs and cost Rs. 300/-

We need atleast 300 regular customers in chennai to make this an economically feasible, self-sustainable effort. Please, spread the word, inform your friends and family about this, and have them email their contact details (name, mobile, postal-address) to bok@houseofkodai.in - so we can deliver boks to them this Sunday, 24th January 2010.