Teaming Up with Women-Owned Food Businesses - April 2021

Working with other women-owned food businesses has been at the top of my list of things to do and focus on for the past year. It was totally perfect when last summer, a friend I studied abroad with in college reached out to let me know she started working as a wholesale rep for a fruit preserves company in Michigan. We reconnected on the ins and outs of small food businesses and the tough work that is sales. In doing so, Kristen and I thought it would be a fun and delicious opportunity to partner together on a new product.

We are thrilled to have our names on this product along with Cellar Door Preserves, a woman-owned preserves company that sources fruits from farmers across Michigan’s fruit belt on the west side of the state. This part of Michigan ranks #2 for most varieties of produce grown in the country - just behind California!

For this strawberry preserve, whole Michigan strawberries were cooked down with sugar and Piment d’Ville to make a deliciously thick and spoonable spread. It has an incredible sweet heat that’s great with soft cheese, on a crusty piece of bread, slathered on a biscuit, spooned over ice cream, or even mixed into a cocktail. I’m planning a personal pancake breakfast soon and am going to top the pancakes with it.

We’re planning for more collaborations like this in the upcoming year, working with other women owned food businesses, and sharing those that we're working with or admiring in the small food world.

Like Chef Kiki Aranita’s recent launch of Chili Peppah Water made with our whole Espelette and Ancho chiles! Kiki made the tough decision to close her beloved restaurant Poi Dog in Philadelphia last year and pivoted to bottling the sauces that make her Hawaiian food so special. Her sauces, the chili peppah water and Maui lavender ponzu, feature ingredients sourced directly from farmers. You can read more about Kiki’s pivot in last week’s Philadelphia Inquirer!

Kiki’s fiancé, Chef Ari Miller, uses our chiles in a variety of his dishes in his pandemic restaurant pivot Frizwit (Think philly cheesesteak but 100000000x better). (Fun fact - Gideon and I had dinner at Ari’s restaurant the night we got engaged!)

We're excited to be included in Martha Stewart's Father's Day Gift Guide, which was recently updated and includes our 3 pack of spices from across the farm. We're in great company on the list, and excited to head towards grilling season and developing some new recipes for the summer!