Independently owned, organic grocery store. Our Annex serves prepared foods and offers a selection of wine and beer. Our florists are here to help you with fresh local cuts and dried bouquets.
Sunday, May 21st | 2-5pm
Taste 30 wines | Tickets $10
You may pre-purchase your tickets or buy them at the event. To purchase now click > here.
Many of our wines are organic or biodynamically farmed.
We are also having a 20% off Price Crush SALE (12 or more bottles, mix & match ok)!
If you buy a case that day (5/21), we’ll refund your tasting fee*!
The 20% off wine case sale lasts all week: May 21st – 29th!
* The eventbrite service charge is non-refundable
May 13th is World Fair Trade Day. The purpose of this international celebration is to showcase the small-scale farmers and artisans at the heart of the fair trade movement and the contributions they make to healthy and sustainable communities around the world.
This year we’re highlighting small-scale farmers who bring together traditional farming methods with innovative organic practices, creating truly regenerative agriculture. Brands like Alaffia, Alter Eco, Dr. Bronner’s, Equal Exchange, Guayaki Yerba Mate, and Maggie’s Organics are building these supply chains that make a difference—and bringing you products that you can feel good about putting in your shopping cart.
Each brand’s products and its producers tell a different story: Alaffia’s deodorant helps support reforestation projects in rural Togo, increasing food security and helping to slow erosion. Alter Eco’s chocolate partners are reintroducing heirloom cacao varietals as part of an agroforestry project in Ecuador. In India, Dr. Bronner’s is partnering with a project that is revitalizing land into a rich, regenerative ecosystem to grow mint oil that puts the tingle in your soap—and a wealth of food and cash crops. Equal Exchange’s coffee helps power deep organic practices, and farmer-led workshops that pass the wisdom on to the next generation of Honduran farmers. And in Paraguay, Guayaki works with the indigenous Aché Guayaki who cultivate your yerba mate boost in the understory, earning a living in harmony with the rainforest instead of depleting it.
Small-scale producers are growing food and farming systems that give back to their communities and regenerate our planet. When you support the fair trade brands that support them, you’re helping grow that future too.
Look for special in-store deals throughout May, and let your purchases be Fair for Farmers every day!
Learn more at FairWorldProject.org
The folks at MESA (Multinational Exchange for Sustainable Agriculture) work to connect leaders in sustainable farming around the world for experiential training, knowledge-sharing, and cross-cultural exchange to cultivate community food systems. The Natural Grocery has long been a host for MESA stewards looking to gain work experience in our retail setting while working with our 100% organic produce.
Since 2011, The Natural Grocery Company has hosted 10 Stewards from these six countries:
The work MESA does is vital to maintain a healthy global community, sharing resources and skills around the world to strengthen sustainable farming and international solidarity.
This Thursday, MESA will join us to share information about their Bay Area work supporting women, immigrants and formerly incarcerated community members to launch organic urban farms and businesses. They will also be actively fundraising in collaboration with East Bay Gives. You can help them reach their fundraising goals!
Come on down to the Annex on Thursday, May 4th to hear about their work, meet some of the people they serve and support a local non-profit!
They will be available for questions and information from 11-2 and 4-6. We hope to see you this Thursday!
Join us now through Sunday the 16th for our holiday menu:
Are Minerals Really Essential?
I have long thought that eating well (organic, whole, unprocessed foods) was all I needed to maintain optimal health. Recently, I started asking more questions of our vitamin and supplement team members and learned startling information about potential mineral deficiencies. Minerals are vital to cellular well-being. Some of the most common ones are chromium, magnesium, iron and zinc. Not only are these elements found in the universe, they are also found in our bodies. As with all living things, we expel and take in nutrients constantly, including minerals. But the question is this: are the foods we eat providing enough replenishment? Now that many of our soil systems are not as densely nutritious (a result of systematic chemical sprays with pesticides and herbicides), some say we need a little extra help getting those essential nutrients. Here is an interesting article showing a comparison between measured mineral levels in common vegetables from 1963 and 1999. With another 18 years of industrial farming, I venture to guess that the mineral depletion has increased based on the trajectories demonstrated in the article.
This insight inspired me to consider adding a trace mineral supplement (one that includes magnesium) to my daily routine. Time will tell me if the mineral boost helps me feel better over time.
Wine Is Food
By Jake Wright
Eric Asimov, for those of you who may not be familiar with his name, writes about wine for the New York Times. I really like his writing and his perspectives, so I was quite pleased to read his recent article “Want to Pick Better Bottles? Repeat After Me: Wine Is Food” (NYT, 3/6/2017). In his clear and compelling way, Asimov describes to a T what we are all about here in our Annex Wine department. It practically reads like an endorsement of our approach.
For us at the Natural Grocery Co., wine is food, it is an agricultural product. We pay close attention to how the grapes were grown, and how they were treated in the cellar. I choose wines that, besides being delicious, are produced at least sustainably and at best regeneratively. My favorite stories from winemakers include how they took an abused parcel of land and brought it back, literally, to life.
There are certainly many people for whom wine is just a drink, and there are a lot of options out there. But for those who want more than just a cup of liquid unwind, there’s more to the story.
With customers, I often use the analogy of bread. Imagine on one end of the spectrum the highly processed, industrial, chemical-laden, food-like artifice such as Wonder Bread. This clearly makes some people happy. On the other end would be a naturally leavened loaf, made with grain from a known source (or even a known field), freshly ground, kneaded by hand, unhurried, and that is a clear reflection of its maker. Bread full of life, and deeply delicious to boot.
It’s the same with wine. I absolutely agree with Asimov that “a simple way to understand wine, to elevate the quality of what you consume and the pleasure you take in it, is to treat wine as if it were another staple of the table, just as you would the produce, meat and bread that you shop for and eat.”
Now, it was true for me, and is true for many (and Asimov also makes this point), that wine is one of the last things we think about as we procure quality ingredients for the table. I know in my life it took me a while to learn to prefer food I could relate to, where I knew the farmer and knew the story of how and where that food was grown, and where and how that food was processed. I wasn’t born a foodie: I’ve earned that title.
So now, I expect that for a significant percentage of the food I eat, and wine I drink, I know its backstory. Like all food we eat, wine is a product of the earth and an expression of our relationship to it, for better or worse. I try to choose better, and ultimately, that adds to my pleasure at table and sense of connectedness to the community and land around me.
Pleasure, connectedness, delicious clean wine and food. Surely these are among the best things in life, and for that, I can be grateful every day.
We’ve been selling East Brother beer since the day they opened! Check out the Richmond beer scene: http://www.eastbaytimes.com/2017/03/04/richmond-brews-up-craft-beer-business/
Burroughs Family Farms – Extra-Virgin Olive Oil
We recently started selling Burroughs Family Farms organic, non-GMO, cold-pressed extra-virgin organic olive oil [aka EVOO]. This exemplary family-owned farm, situated in the Sierra foothills below Yosemite, is one of our favorite regional producers. We already source quality pastured eggs, organic cheese, and almonds from their property. The Burroughs Family Olive Oil is a blend of Arbeqina, Arbosana and Gretchenina olives (originally from Spain). The oil has a pleasant fruitiness with hints of grassy undertones. It is very versatile and may be used in sauces, salad dressings, as a topping to bread and for low heat cooking.
Here is what Burroughs Family Farms says about their oil:
Our olives are first cold-pressed at temperatures that do not exceed 80 degrees F. This protects the polyphenols, antioxidants, and vitamins that give the oil its nutritional value and its aroma and flavor.
Why extra-virgin olive oil?
- EVOO is known to contain stronger concentrations of phytonutrients (especially polyphenols) that have well-known anti-inflammatory properties
- EVOO supports blood vessels not only by providing antioxidants like vitamin E and beta-carotene, but also also providing unique molecules like HT that actually work at a genetic level to help the cellular walls of the blood vessels remain strong.
- Cholesterol lowering and blood pressure lowering benefits of monounsaturated oil (olive oil contains 75%)
High quality extra virgin olive oil has a smoke point of around 405ºF (191ºC), making it ideal for lower temperature cooking such as light sautés and non-cooked uses such as dressing salads and dipping bread. Such uses protect the nutritional value and beneficial qualities of the oil.
Why California Olive Oil?
As with wine, it has taken years for people to discover that some of the world’s finest olive oils are produced in California. Our family owned and operated farms rest on the rolling hills near Yosemite National Park, where the combination of the moderate Mediterranean climate with good soils and water grows some of the world’s finest quality olives.
Buying California olive oils vs. imports supports our farm economy, and California olive oils have a lower carbon-footprint because their shipping distance is much shorter than that of imports.
Conservation on our farms
Ours is not the easiest way to grow olives, but we think it’s best for our land and for our family who lives and works here. From organic production to state-of-the-art irrigation systems, we do whatever we can to protect air, soil, and water from herbicides, pesticides, petrochemical nitrogen fertilizers, and genetically-modified organisms. All that, plus our hedgerows of native plants support the health of native species and bees who have the most important job – the pollination of the olive flowers.
We do it for the future of our farms. For you, it’s deliciousness and more.
Burroughs Family Olive Oil is certified annually by the California Olive Oil Council (COOC). Year after year it’s labeled “extra-virgin” by the council. To get the seal the oil is lab tested and 
undergoes a critical analysis by an expert panel. The trained sensory panel (think of these people as the sommeliers of olive oil) ensure that the oil is free of defects in flavor or odor. In the U.S., many oils are labeled “extra-virgin” but do not undergo any such testing.
If you are anything like me and you love crunchy, crispy, salty snacks, I invite you to try this delicious (and simple) recipe using kohlrabi!
Kohlrabi is one of the most underrated and forgotten vegetables in our winter produce line up. It is a cultivar of cabbage and is part root, part leafy greens. The root part can be eaten raw (think slaw) or cooked. The greens can be used as you would kale, collards or other winter greens. With so much versatility, it’s a wonder this root doesn’t get more love. Perhaps the recipe below will help to change all that!
Savory Kohlrabi Crisps
Ingredients:
Directions:
Enjoy!
If you end up baking these at home, please feel free to share your results with us on Instagram @naturalgroceryco