It was a wrong turn on a country road that led us to the sleepy little produce stand in Skagit County where a little bit of faith in humanity is on display with fresh apples and potatoes.
The Pleasant Ridge Farm produce stand is about an hour’s drive north from Seattle, in the middle of Skagit’s famed farm fields.
The stand is small, but the locally grown produce is plentiful. When we stopped there on a recent chilly, sunny Sunday, the shelves were stocked with 5-pound bags of sweet, refreshing Jonagolds, peck baskets full of squash, Skagit’s famous tubers and beets so big they rivaled the size of my son’s head.
We were the only customers, so we followed the directions on the hand-written sign, written in English and Spanish:
When no one is here we operate on the honor system. Please pay at the black box at the front of the stand. Thank you for shopping with us! Your honesty and integrity is what makes our operation a success!
After grabbing our produce, we deposited $11 in the black box and paused to soak in the view of Mount Baker in the distance before piling in the car and heading to the Rexville Grocery country store for lunch.
Greg Lamm 