18 March, 2020: Those were the words Chris texted me this afternoon. Pictured above is our “cooling” walk-in. It’s a relatively small walk-in fridge with oversized cooling and a series of glass doors. In normal operations it’s in and out. We pack it from the door side and empty it from behind. Sometimes we turn it 3 times a day.… Read More
17 March, 2020: I’m hours and hours into painstakingly reaching out to the HUGE number of services Clover uses to operate. For all it’s the same thing. (1) We want to use these services as soon as we re-open, (2) we DON’T want to lose all our data and set-up all over again, (3) We CAN’T pay while we have… Read More
16 March, 2020: We all spend so much energy figuring out how to get from where we are to the next place. And at Clover that feels like such an imperative. Clover is trying each day to solve this existential challenge we face: Global warming. But now we’re facing a different more immediate challenge in COVID-19. We’re going to be… Read More
15 July, 2010: We’re growing. You’re going to be seeing more stories like this one. Efficient operations have been important to us from day one, and we’ve been constantly experimenting and improving. But with the new truck (completely new floor plan), larger volumes, and larger staff our procedures are more important than ever. This is about making sure the food… Read More
15 March, 2020: Hi all. Just learned of Massachusetts declaring all restaurants to be closed by Tuesday, except for delivery and take-out. Sometime soon we’re all going to stop feeling surprised by these changes. I don’t know about you but I’m not there yet. We are learning what this means for us. In the meantime all Clover restaurants are open… Read More
13 March, 2020: My kids picked up chicks today. They are 1 day old! This is Octavia. She is an Easter Egger. That’s a kind of chicken. Octavia and these other fluffy balls will join our mature chickens in our backyard. She’s not even going to know what this COVID thing is when she grows up ; ) Read More
11 March, 2020: “Do you think we could pull off a jerk sandwich?” Chris wondered aloud in the car ride back from New York. This was back in September I think. Chris loves the flavors of jerk rubs—the Jamaican spice mixes that are used to rub meat before smoking them. And we’ve never played around with the wide and delicious… Read More
10 March, 2020: I feel scared people I love might get sick. I feel scared I might get sick. I feel scared I don’t know how to get Clover through this Covid-19 outbreak. I’m taking more deep breaths than usual. You might be feeling some of these same things. Well, maybe not the last one about Clover’s future. But I… Read More
14 July, 2010: Hot weather + long days + lots of new hires = short term memory loss. Let me explain. Some of you may have met Mary. She’s one of the folks we hired in the last couple of weeks at the MIT truck. She’s a really hard worker, and she’s adapted to the truck really well. In the… Read More
9 March, 2020: Queen’s Green Farm in Amherst called us a few weeks ago about a bumper crop of rainbow carrots. These carrots are beautiful – red, purple, orange, yellow, even white. We’ve been using them wherever we can. Carrot salads at lunch. Carrot marmalade at breakfast. Rainbows in your crudité cups. One other obvious place to put carrots? The… Read More
6 March, 2020: What is a farmshare? A farmshare is a box of veggies, or fruit, or mushrooms, or FOREST edibles (more on that in a future post). But it’s far more than that. A farmshare is a partnership between you and a farmer. You pay money in the spring, they use that money to grow food, you get a… Read More
5 March, 2020: I love George Howell’s new vans. It’s like a coffee bag on the go! We spotted this one zipping around Cambridge from the backseat of Ayr’s car the other day. It made me crave a cup of Montecarlos. We’re getting new resupply vans at Clover and I think we’re going to move away from our all-white. The… Read More
2 March, 2020: Our latest experimental sandwich is the Mexicali Mushroom – a Baja-fish-taco-inspired creation. If you come by KND any day after 11am we’re testing it there. So how is it faring? Customers are saying it’s the best thing they’ve ever had at Clover. Wow. Repeat purchase behavior is one of the big things we look for in a… Read More
6 November, 2008: We’ve been so unhappy with our late start times we decided to park the truck, packed and ready to go, at MIT. Here it is, 2am. I called the cab company to get a pick up (T stopped running), and they wouldn’t. I asked why, and apparently they’ve had 2 muggings in Kendall Square. Crazy. I walked… Read More
27 February, 2020: David’s original version of the Gonzo Sandwich – Jan 14, 2020 Customers at CloverBBY are probably already aware, but we concluded our Gonzo Sandwich test last week. It unfortunately wasn’t selling as well as we’d hoped. David’s sandwich that he presented at food dev last month was AWESOME. Layers of thinly sliced, crispy seitan, tons of spices… Read More