JULIAN COLE tries a veg-box service with a difference, in that each box contains all you need to make three meals for two people.

WHAT comes in a big box and stops you having to worry about that night’s meal? If you have answered “pizza” then you are way off the mark.

This particular box is packed with healthy goodies rather than a greasy disc of bread. Not that there’s anything wrong with pizza, although the boxed takeaway versions are usually something to regret.

No, open this big box and you will find the ingredients to make three meals. Some veg boxes come with a random selection of whatever is in season, whereas the Riverford Farm recipe box comes with vegetables and other ingredients packaged up and sorted out into distinct meals. Meat boxes are also available, but in our case that would have left my wife hungry. So a veg box it was.

Riverford invited us to try one of their boxes and the one they sent would have cost £33. That sounds expensive and perhaps it is. Yet we were won over by this service for the simple reason that all the ingredients were good and the three recipes from the company’s cook, Jenny Spencer, all worked and were uniformly delicious.

The ingredients include pats of butter, grated parmesan and so forth, alongside the vegetables, which for us were all in good condition.

The recipes change every week and one week’s box comes with a flyer telling what will be in the next delivery. Our three recipes were pistou soup with bread; fennel, lemon and mint risotto and Japanese omelette with sesame summer greens.

All were good, and the French-style soup was an inspiration and one we will try again – as were the others, to be fair. We often have risotto but had never thought of using fennel in this favourite rice dish (for which the wine came in a tiny bottle). As for an omelette with soy sauce, shiitake mushrooms and sesame greens – well that one was beyond our imagination, so thanks to Riverford for awakening our senses.

Where this system really works is that the recipes are easy to follow, coming on large cards with step-by-step instructions. You could make one of these recipes even if you had never cooked anything before.

Unlike that big greasy pizza in a box, they do take time, but then we found the process to be fun, a little culinary adventure without leaving your own kitchen.

• For more details email: recipebox@riverford.co.uk