Addendum:

The next afternoon when I went to go into work, the tray with the peas in it and the peeled potato quarters and the carrot chunks and some more peas, too, all of that was still out on the pavement in the subway station near my house.

And, I noticed a few stray bean sprouts mixed in there, too, which made me think that this was somehow a tray of vegetables that a (Chinese) person had been carrying, though I couldn't quite figure out how bean sprouts would square with potatoes and peas and carrots all in a single vegetable mix.