Wanigan Organics

Beets are a nutritional powerhouse with their rich, deep red-violet colour that holds beneficial betalain pigments. These pigments can help keep nerves healthy, have anti-inflammatory benefits and helps detoxify the body overall.

At Wanigan, we recommend eating them raw or gently steaming them if you want the full nutritional impact of the beets super powers. 

Try beets simply shredded and added to salads and onto other dishes. Juiced with an apple, carrot and ginger makes a  potent and healthy juice.

Of course, beets are delicious roasted in the oven or prepared into soups and stews as well.

The colour in beets makes for an excellent food colouring for baking cakes, muffins and icing. If you're into colouring easter eggs, beets make an excellent red dye that is 100% natural.

Beet & Carrot Salad

1 large red beet, peeled and grated
3 carrots, scrubbed and grated
2 green onions, finely sliced
1⁄2 cup raw pumpkin seeds
1⁄2 cup raw walnuts

Dressing:

2 oranges, peeled and seeded
2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
1⁄2 tsp sea salt

Finely shred beets and carrots, separately in a food processor. 
Keep them separated until you are ready to serve so the bright red colour of the beets will gradually saturate the carrots. Set aside.

Blend all dressing ingredients and pour over beets in a medium-sized mixing bowl. Toss together and gently add carrots and toss again.
Before serving, sprinkle pumpkin seeds and walnuts on top.

Makes 2 servings



Carrots are high in antioxidants, mainly the well known beta carotene. Beta carotene helps to keep the cardiovascular system strong as well as improving eye health and helpful in lowering cholesterol. High in fibre, vitamin A and C, they can help keep your immune system strong.

Enjoyed in so many different ways, carrots are easy to include in daily meal planning:

Juiced, pairs nicely with apple, ginger and beet.  Steamed or roasted. In baked goods for added fibre, who doesn't enjoy a good carrot cake! Soups and stews. As part of veggie trays for dipping instead of crackers. Blended for healthy baby food. Shredded into salads for a crunchy topping.

Carrot Basil Soup

6 tomatoes, roughly chopped
3 carrots, chopped
2 ribs of celery, chopped
3 green onions, chopped
2 tbsp olive oil
2 cups water
4 fresh basil leaves, julienned
2 tbsp dried basil
1/2 tsp black pepper
1 tsp sea salt

Heat olive oil in a soup pot, saute carrots and celery for about 7 minutes, until glazed and lightly browned.

Add green onion and seasoning, quickly stir a few times and add tomatoes and water. Gently boil on medium heat until carrots are softened. Once cooked and allowed to cool, transfer to a blender or processor and blend to your liking.

Serve with fresh basil.

Step 4.

The grocery store model is: buy, sell what you can, and throw out the rest.

Average fresh produce waste is greater than 30%. It's not just the produce itself, either. It's the box it came in. It's the truck that brought it to the store. In most cases, it's all the chemicals used to grow it. It's the wasted refrigeration, the staff time. It's just a ton of waste.

To stay the course through our journey to zero produce waste, we made a point to stay connected to the environment, local farmers, and all the wonderful members of our community who shared our vision.

What we found was that like-minded people were as happy to reach across the divide as we were. Local farmers, allied businesses, customers. We started to work together to create an alternative, regenerating business model.

We lowered food miles, reduced plastic packaging, starting composting, and basked in all the mutual moral support.

At the same time as our food waste was going down, we saw our Wanigan organic basket deliveries going up.

Thanks, everybody. We couldn't have done it alone :)

If you are interested in starting deliveries with Wanigan, it's easy to sign up now and get your second basket free.

Delivery Sign-up

Wanigan is a plant-powered organic & local food company that conveniently delivers really fresh assortments of organic veggies, fruits, juices, smoothies and snacks right to your door.

Delivery Sign-up

Wanigan, a plant-powered organic & local food company, conveniently delivers really fresh assortments of organic veggies, fruits, juices and smoothies right to your door.

Step 2.

A few years ago, we put on our creative originator hats to reshape our organic home delivery business. We knew the average grocery store had more than 30% produce waste.

We wanted zero waste.

How could we redesign our business model to achieve zero waste? At the same time, how could we continue to improve quality and raise our customer experience even higher?

We knew we had more leeway with oddly shaped vegetables. Bent carrots are often unacceptable for mass grocery store shelves but at Wanigan our customers appreciate and enjoy the randomness that a typical organic farm can offer. This gave us a head start, as what was considered waste elsewhere, was useful and desirable at Wanigan.

To go further though, we needed to get creative.

So, at our Vegquarters in Brampton we built a certified kitchen and juice bar, and bought 2 dehydrators, a slow juicing machine and 2 smoothie blenders. We developed recipes that, alongside our new equipment, would use gentle preparation methods to maximize nutritional benefits and minimize food waste. Fruits or veggies deemed unsuitable for our deliveries, like items that were too small, too large or too ripe could be transformed into 100% plant-based nutritious foods.

Order juices and smoothies for home delivery

We launched a line of cold-pressed juices, real food smoothies, salads, wraps and spreads. With the dehydrators, we introduced nutrient-packed greens powders and fruit snacks with ingredients that were 100% pure.

Wanigan made Raw Orchard Mix is available for home delivery

Elsewhere, we started treating our greens like cut flowers so we could extend their life and keep them vibrant. We handled each plant with extra care, and stood them stem down in water, so they would stay properly hydrated. Now customers tell us time and time again that our produce lasts way longer than what they buy from a typical grocery store.

The next step was to figure out what to do with any spoiled fruit or trimmings from our kitchen...

Delivery Sign-up

Wanigan, a plant-powered organic & local food company, conveniently delivers really fresh assortments of organic veggies, fruits, juices and smoothies right to your door.