Box Divvy Narraweena - Birinta

12/10/2025

Food for Thought

Why Provenance is important

At a time when everyone seems to be claiming that they’re ‘supporting local farmers’, we need to ask ourselves: what’s local? And which farmers? And how supportive?

Because when push comes to shove, a lot turns out to be ‘farm-washing’, local means: anywhere in Australia, and supportive means: we just buy your produce at the lowest price, thank you very much. (And continue to charge customers like wounded bulls). Luckily, scientists are getting very close to being able to determine where a prawn was actually caught, or whether a corn-fed chicken was actually fed corn, or where a bunch of kale was grown locally (for example, by George Portelli in Maroota), or someplace else.

Box Divvy has invested a lot of time and effort into setting up the traceability and transparency of not only our fresh produce, but of all products we sell.

The importance of ‘provenance’ (literally: the place of origin ) is especially relevant when it comes to blueberries: a lot of publicity around the rapid expansion of blueberry farming around Coffs Harbour highlights two major issues: the improper and possibly excessive use of chemicals (and not following guidelines with regard to withholding periods – i.e. the minimum length of time between spraying and picking), and the flouting of labour laws by unscrupulous labour hire firms.

Around 90% of our blueberries are sourced from 2 suppliers:
- The bulk comes from Mountain Blue who has been growing in the Lismore hinterland in northern NSW since 1975. They are very strict on when and what chemicals they use, and on observing the withholding period when they do. In all their testing, they have never found any chemical residues. They also do not employ labour hire firms, instead preferring to employ picking and packing staff directly – and looking after them. For more information, check out their website – there are sections about sustainability and employment (including a handy guide about accommodation options – in case you were thinking of doing a road trip to the Northern Rivers region…)
- OZ Berries (Or: OZ Group) is a 100% farmer-owned co-operative (similar to Norco), with farms from Grafton to Macksville. Most are family farms, where literally the whole workforce of pickers and packers consists of husbands, wives, cousins, brothers and sisters. Where they employ external staff, they strictly follow ‘Fair Farms’ guidelines. Oz Group has been a Fair Farms member since 2019. All their berry supply is also compliant with Freshcare certification, which includes strict guidelines for chemical use. For more information (and to meet some of their growers), check out their website.

04/10/2025

Food for Thought

GOAT: Greatest Of All Time?

Did you know that Australia is the largest exporter of goat meat? A 44% market share, to be precise. But are we eaten any of it? Meh nah but no not really: only 9% of all goat meat we produce is consumed domestically: the rest is exported. That‘s despite the fact it’s cheap (compared with beef and lamb anyway), is high in protein and iron. And tastes pretty good, if you know how to cook which cut.

28/09/2025

Food for Thought

Protein hype: Why your $4 “Power” snack is just fancy packaging and broken promises.

The supermarket aisles have become a jungle of black-wrapped “high protein” promises.

Everything from yoghurt to cheese sticks, flexing its protein message of goodness, almost prepping for a bodybuilding competition. But as nutrition scientist Emma Beckett points out in The Conversation , these so-called “protein” products often offer little more than the originals. For example the new black wrapped Babybel cheese, which only has 0.4gms more protein than its red-wrapped cousin. It feels intense, urgent to try the new, but it’s mostly marketing smoke and mirrors.

Aussies are already getting enough protein unless you’re deadlifting weights before breakfast, but if you think you’re short, stick with the real and reliable sources of protein. Think chicken, tuna, eggs, legumes, oats, and peanuts. These quiet achievers pack more protein per dollar than the plastic-wrapped nonsense.

For value and nutrition, peanuts provide 42gm of protein per $1. Oats give you 33gm per dollar. Compare this to the shiny supermarket protein bar which might barely squeak out 4gms per dollar. That’s not fuel for your body it’s a snack tax at $5 a bar.

And here’s the kicker if you do want an easy protein snack bar and great value: Box Divvy’s got Famous Nutrition protein bars $1.85 each or a box (12bars) $20. Ours are real, 20gms of protein, affordable, and made for actual eating, not flexing. That’s 11gms per $1.

Australians are not protein deficient, according to Ms Beckett, but fibre: that’s another thing altogether. Only 28% of adults meet the basic daily intake, with kids just 42% meeting their needs for disease prevention.

Don’t obsess about protein: we should be upping our fibre.

21/09/2025

Food for Thought

“Unhealthy food environments are contributing to the worldwide surge in overweight and obesity in children and adolescents”, according to a report by UNICEF.

As a result, obesity among children and adolescents is now more prevalent than underweight, with nearly one in 10 children aged 5-19 classed as obese, according to a separate UNICEF report.

In Australia, around 36% of 5-19 years olds are either obese or overweight – but in parts of the Pacific region, the rate is more than 50%.

Much of the global increase is attributed to aggressive marketing of cheap ultra processed food and drinks.

How much exposure do children get when shopping in supermarkets?

13/09/2025

Food for Thought
Biodiversity Month and Sustainable Food

September is Biodiversity Month - a time to raise awareness, inspire action, and champion practices that support environmental, social and economic wellbeing. Biodiversity isn’t just wildlife “out there”; it’s the bees that pollinate our crops, the rich soils that hold water and nutrients, and the mix of plant and animal species that keep farms resilient. In short, healthy ecosystems make dinner possible.

Our everyday choices help. Choosing seasonal, Australian/local and low-waste foods cuts food miles, supports growers who care for their land, and reduces what ends up in bin trucks. Saying yes to “funny-looking” fruit and veg, storing food well, and composting scraps all protect the same systems that feed us. Through Box Divvy, buying what’s in season keeps prices fair and backs regional farmers; sharing extras via the Kindness Box means less waste and more good food in our community.

As a community, Box Divvy backs practical, long-term habits: know where your food is grown and by whom; plan meals; cook and eat together - and don’t let the compost bin become a personal landfill. Reducing food waste can feel daunting, but the fix starts in our own kitchens.

06/09/2025

Food for Thought

If you’ve been wondering why your supermarket-bought avocado is already brown, here are 2 reasons why:
They have been gassed with ethylene to speed up the ripening. Research has shown that many people want their avocado ready to eat today. However, the gassing makes them go over-ripe pretty quickly, so you’ll need to eat them like…now. They’re gone tomorrow.
To find that ready-to-eat avocado, 97% of shoppers will on average squeeze 3 avocadoes – and that has the same effect as dropping them: they bruise.

Little wonder that supermarkets are on the lookout for technology to help reduce the amount of prodding in their stores – and Tesco in the UK may have found it: an infrared avocado scanner. This is how it works: you pick up an avocado, hold it in front of the scanner – and check the ripeness. If not ripe enough, put it back and pick up the next one. Keep going until you find the perfect avocado.
Wait - if all shoppers do that, then every avocado will have been picked up – on average – 3 times??

Keep buying avocadoes from Box Divvy: a less bruising experience.

24/08/2025

15/08/2025

Food for Thought

September is National Sustainability Month.
Actually, it’s officially called National Biodiversity Month – but the 2 are clearly interlinked. At Box Divvy, we care about sustainability:
Low food miles by prioritising local growers and producers
Minimal packaging, re-using boxes and minimising food waste
Ranging products that make it easier to be sustainable
Over the next 6 weeks, we will put these products into the spotlight – as well as bringing you new products, such as this week’s marine-grade stainless steel clothes pegs that will last a lifetime.

08/08/2025

Food for Thought

We all know that unprocessed foods are better than ultra processed food – not only for your physical health but also for mental health.
Now there is hard evidence that just switching from UPFs to unprocessed foods – making your meals from scratch – will help you lose weight, even when matching calories. Over an 8-week period, the calorie-adjusted weight loss was 2% off their baseline weight for those on the unprocessed food diet. That may not sound like much, but…they ate the same number of calories, and – according to the researchers – this could scale up to 9% for women and 13% for men over a full 12-month period. (We reckon that might be a bit of a long bow, as it assumes the rate of weight loss stays the same of the year – but still…).

If you are a heavy consumer of artificially-sweetened soft drinks, we might have some bad news: a can a day will increase the chance of getting Diabetes Type-2 by 38% - even more so than by drinking a can of sugar-laden soft drinks a day (23%). This is one of the findings from a study released last week by Monash University. The study did not specify what type of artificially-sweetened beverages were covered – it was based on a self-reporting sample of nearly 25,000 people – so it’s unclear whether pre- and probiotics such as Remedy Kombucha and Sodaly would quality as an artificially-sweetened soft drink – they contain ‘natural’ sweeteners (organic erythritol and stevia). However, other studies have suggested that diet drinks can feed our body’s cravings for sweet, so even if the drinks themselves may not necessarily contribute to diabetes, they do so indirectly.
Perhaps try some of our new Fever Tree Mixers: they are sweetened naturally, but only contain 4-5% sugar – less than half than the amount of sugar contained in Coca Cola.
Regardless, we strongly suggest to treat any flavoured beverage as an occasional treat: water should be our go-to drink for regular hydration.

03/08/2025

Limit the amount of fruit for kids?? Not really

“We do need to reduce kids’ sugar consumption. But this needs to be achieved by reducing their intake of processed foods that contain added sugars, rather than fruit”, says Dr Nick Fuller, health expert and author of Healthy Parents, Healthy Kids.

In this article in The Conversation, he argues that the Australia’s Nutritional Guidelines are outdated as more research suggests that higher (fresh) fruit consumption is associated with lower levels of obesity and diabetes type-2. “The insoluble fibre in fruit skins also helps kids stay regular, and the soluble fibre in fruit flesh helps keep their cholesterol in a healthy range, absorbing “bad” cholesterol to reduce their long-term risk of stroke and heart disease”, says Fuller.

26/07/2025

Food for Thought
Seed Oils: It’s More About the Process and the Company They Keep
From time to time, members and Hubster write to us and suggest we should ban seed oils from our product range. Alas, the seed oil issue – often pushed by online influencers and RFK Jr – is not entirely black and white, as we’ll see below.

A new study suggests that seed oils rich in linoleic acid—like sunflower, soybean and canola—may actually lower inflammation and help reduce the risk of heart disease and type 2 diabetes. But before you rush out to buy just any bottle, it's worth noting: how the oil is made matters. Cold-pressed or expeller-pressed oils, such as the Plenty Oils ranged by Box Divvy, retain more nutrients and avoid the chemical solvents often used in industrial oil extraction. Choosing minimally processed oils makes a big difference to both taste and health benefits.

Seed oils have been getting a bad rap lately, mostly because they’re common in ultra-processed foods (UPFs)—the real problem. Many UPFs are loaded with salt, sugar, additives and poor-quality fats, making it easy to blame the seed oil when it’s the whole package that’s unhealthy. When used in moderation and sourced well, seed oils can be part of a healthy, balanced diet. Like most things, it's not the ingredient—it's how it's processed and what it’s paired with.

28/06/2025

Food for Thought

Is there a future for insect-based protein? Seventy-seven per cent of agricultural land is used to farm animals. That land accounts for just 17 per cent of the global food supply, and it’s increasingly vulnerable to the effects of climate change. With the world population adding another 2 billion by 2050, and rising incomes able to purchase more meat and seafood, something got to give. Hence the interest in using insects for protein. However, “Public polling in the US and Europe has found that while as many as 91% of respondents would be willing to try plant-based “alternative meats”, only about 20% would consider eating insects”, according to a paper published in the Nature journal npj Sustainable Agriculture.

Perhaps it depends on how the protein is presented: consumers may not be so keen to munch on whole crunchy fried meal worms, but what about say cricket powder?

Sydney-based company Circle Harvest is forging ahead with enriching foods like corn chips, brownies and pasta with pulverised cricket protein. It grows its own crickets – several tonnes a month – which not only provide protein, but are also rich in calcium, iron, vitamin b12, zinc, magnesium and omega 3.

We think they’re worth checking out, so watch this space.