Garden on the Run

Best place for fresh and quality fruits! Also, this boutiqie grocery store offers the best fruit plate platter for parties hands down! I love this place!
Thank Goodness ya’ll exist!

high quality produce here at a good price. Not the largest selection but I love coming in here. The salad is high quality and cheap. Also like the friendly service and small, but interesting selection of other items. Nothing frozen here, which encourages me to eat fresh and healthy.

Jackpot. Friendly, helpful, family-​owned fruit market. I came in the day before Thanksgiving and needed fruit to make a fruit salad for my Mother-in-Law’s the next day. Turns out they not only were able to make it up for me, with the most gorgeous fruit ever, but put it in their own beautiful ceramic bowl («just bring it back the next time you’re here» — really?! How trusting is that?!), and had it ready a few hours later.
Their prices are good, their fruit and vegetables are gorgeous, the personal service is something you will never find in a chain market. Don’t let Trader Joe’s or Whole Foods sway you. Stay local and keep this place here, you won’t be sorry.

This is the perfect fruit stand. Everything they sell is fresh. It is conveniently located adjacent to the Park Ridge train station making it easy for commuters. There is also ample street parking.
I go to this store several times a week. Aside from having excellent produce, there is also made-​to-​order salad dressing, multiple cheeses, and different types of pasta. The owners are always in the store, greet you with a smile, and treat you like a guest in their home.
Even though a brand new Whole Foods recently opened in Park Ridge, Garden on the Run, with his superior pricing, quality, and service is my choice for produce.

Please, try the Kale salad. Its so good for you and so very, very tasty. Next, try the Spring Chicken Salad: The mint is a nice surprise. The owner is a trained chef and it shows. I shop here almost everyday. Everything is fresh, reasonably priced and the service is friendly. I am ordering party trays for this weekend’s events can’t wait to enjoy it. This store and the owners are true gems in Park Ridge. The guacamole is terrific. Want chinese tonight? All your veggies are cut up ready to Wok. Everything I have tried has been amazing and so fresh. This place deserves our loyalty for sure.

Love it! Thanks to my neighbor’s recommendation, I am addicted to their chopped salads. Usually you can find them prepared ahead of time or you can call your order in to have it ready for pick up. I have also used them for catering and my customers are always impressed. I have ordered wraps (Chicken/​Avocado or Tuna) with a chopped salad for a group or just for our family. It’s a perfect place to pick up fresh produce or a quick prepared meal!

What a bright spot this place is, nestled in this stretch of businesses across from the train station. Great location, especially for the commuters of Park Ridge.
I stopped in here last week with a couple of friends who knew the owners so I had the privilege of talking with them during my visit. They really seem to have a passion to make this place work and definitely go to extremes to make shopping here an enjoyable and worth while experience. He made us some veggie wraps that were simply out of this world, and a smoothie better than I’d ever had before. Grab a sandwich while you’re here… you’ll thank me for suggesting it, I promise.
The produce is fresh, the staff is personable and the store is bright and clean. What more can you ask for?

I absolutely love this place — I think I was expecting high prices — but was so surprised. The stuff is fresh every day, has just the variety I need, and is so friendly! I love a place where I can shop 3 times a week for really fresh good quality produce. Their homemade salsa and guacamole are outstanding! It’s the «ma and pop» place that you wish were everywhere. I just feel good getting my food there — and it’s cheaper than Jewel or Dominicks certainly! (Just last week I stocked up on 99 cent ORGANIC raspberries! You can’t beat that — and you won’t have to deal with the «crapshoot» produce and even crappier overcrowded aisles of Jerry’s!)

I was going to give them 4 stars but due to the three preceding reviews for 5 stars, I’ll have to give it 5 stars too. I knew this place opened up some time ago but I was reluctant to check it out, given the stigma of a boutique grocer being expensive. Garden on the Run offers fresh produce like you’d find at a farmer’s market but available daily right in the heart of Park Ridge.
It bothers me when I hear eco-​friendly locavores talk about the benefits of locally grown with less food miles and pesticides. So why does it cost 2x or 3x more if it traveled a shorter distance and needed fewer chemicals? I could never make sense of that.
Well, here’s a place that has reasonable prices — better than Jewel or Dominick’s on most items AND superb quality. It’s not a big shop but it’s great. The shelves resembles an old-​time grocery store with bins for produce, rather than the mirror-​backed bins with overhead mist sprayers you see at most stores. This place is more like the grocery store people shopped at 50 years ago.
We stopped in to get raspberries — BIG raspberries, going for 99 cents a pack! They were so good we came back the next day and got some more to stock up. There’s also pasta, fancy jams and grain products. They offer fresh fruit smoothies too. I will have to try that next. And being a block south of the library on Main St., just off the Metra statrion, makes them a great convenience to the area.

Super cute atmosphere, think modern but customer service oriented mom and pop produce and essentials store. Friendly owners. Have a special request? No problem!

Only three times in my life have I had a carrot this tasty: Once, as a child, when my Uncle John plucked one fresh out of his garden, a second time at Wolfgang Puck’s Chinois in Santa Monica and last week when I served sautéed carrots to my very discriminating dinner guests.
In fact, everything I have had from this store is noticeably better tasting than what I find anywhere else. Better than Whole Foods. Better than Caputo’s. Better than Jerry’s.