January 1, 2020

Food Sources - A Food Sourcing List With Links For All Your Specialty Food Needs

Food Sources - A Food Sourcing List With Links For All Your Specialty Food Needs

Greg Buchold provides the following information and links for your food needs:
Pickles
My grandmother used to serve us a sweet mixed pickle with cucumber, onions, and cauliflower. I haven't been able to find the brand she used to buy but I did find a spicy version on Amazon from an Indiana company called Sechler's. They have some pickles with orange and lemon added.

Jams/Jellies/Sauces
A blackberry grower I found in Pike Place Market called Johnson Berry Farm http://johnsonberryfarm.com/ does single varietal blackberry jams like Tayberry, Boysenberry, and Marionberry. They also do chile versions of their jams. They sell their jams online in 3 packs that you can pick which you like. Everyone I've given these as gifts has loved seeing how each one tastes different.

Preserve Company (PEI, Canada)  has an apple curd that is great with cheeses like brie. 

Fox Meadow Farms Apple Cider Mustard that I discovered in Vermont is great on pretzels and for making a Vermonter sandwich.
 
Runamok Maple Syrup that is flavored with elderberry, bourbon, rye, rum, makrut lime, ginger, hibiscus, pecan wood, etc. is available through a bunch of Vermont country stores. I found it through Vermont's Own Products near Middlebury College https://www.vermontsownproducts.com/. Potlicker does beer and wine jellies. Lori Rocket is a cousin of the maker.
 
Above All Vermont https://aboveallvermont.com/ also has them, but their website only has a tiny fraction of the in-store offerings.
Woods Boiled Cider https://aboveallvermont.com/collections/food/products/woods-boiled-cider  (Add this to amp up your apple pies) 

I get Wild Huckleberry Syrup from Oregon Coast Jams through Made in Oregon. It's just berry juice and sugar not HFCS like the usual fruit syrups and has great flavor. I like to use it on berry pancakes and to amp up blackberry ice cream with this jam.


The Apple Barn in Tennessee has my favorite apple butter. I order some every September along with their apple fritter mix and make them for breakfast for a group of friends.  I found their other fruit butters to be less exciting. 
https://www.applebarncidermill.com/Apple-Butter-and-Jams?catPage=1&gclid=CMfN_bTl5rcCFWdp7AodZkcA3g  


My favorite pesto is La Favorita black truffle pesto from The French Farm. I recommend buying it at either their Easter or Christmas open house markdown sales. Some of my other favorite products from them include:
L'Epicurien sweet onion confit https://thefrenchfarm.com/lepicurien-sweet-onion-confit/ (great on burgers)

Trader Joe's Garlic Spread (Lebanese Toum sauce) is vegan and lasts a long time refrigerated. I put it in a lot of stuff.
 
British Food
Marrowfat dried peas, spicy Worcestershire sauce, Hayward pickled onions, etc. https://www.britishislesonline.com/food/groceries/ Their Rice Village location is only doing online orders or curbside pickup since March.
 
Grains
Generally I go with Bob's Red Mill from the grocery store for most grains and the tapioca flour I use to thicken berry pies, but when I splurge on grains I'm a big fan of Anson Mills for their heritage rice and corn products. Their grits and polenta have more corn flavor than most mills unless you can find corn that is stone milled in the winter to preserve the flavor. The grits have to be babysat and keep adding water though. I love the Carolina Gold rice and the Laurel-aged rice that they store with bay leaves. I like to use it to make a chicken bog or jambalaya. https://ansonmills.com/products

Beans
I bought Rancho Gordo beans online for the Native American Houston Chowhounds cook the book event. I was particularly enamored of their Oaxacan beans. Even just cooked in water they made a chocolatey pot liquor. I can't recall if it was Ayocote Morado or Rio Zape. Jay said they are traditionally cooked with ajo santo leaves, which he has in his yard. I also like Yellow Indian Woman, Vaquero, and Eye of the Goat beans.
 
Nuts
There's a longer and sweeter heritage varietal of hazelnuts that I found in Pike Place Market from Holmquist Hazelnuts. Bakers like to bake with these rather than the typical rounder hazelnut. When we visited Oregon we found a Marionberry pie made with a hazelnut crust that is like an upscale PB&J as a pie. www.holmquisthazelnuts.com

Snacks
We've gotten obsessed with popcorn this summer. The Popcorn in a Pickle from Trader Joe's is just slightly salty, so you can eat a lot of it. 
If you like kettle corn you would like the one from Popcornopolis.
Since we went to Canada we like ketchup chips. British Isles in Rice Village has them and some other meat flavored chips. https://www.britishislesonline.com/walkers-tomato-ketchup-crisps-13227921.html
Keogh's Roast Turkey and Secret Stuffing crisps from Cost Plus World Market https://www.amazon.com/Keoghs-Turkey-Secret-Stuffing-Crisps/dp/B018IUD9NI/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_bdcrb_top?ie=UTF8  

Cheese
Our friends Adam and Sara Hough after they moved to Washington state discovered Facerock Creamery's Vampire Slayer garlic cheddar. It's the most garlicy hard cheese I've had. They charge a flat fee to ship with freezer packs, so you want to order a sampling of cheeses to make the shipping costs reasonable.

Candy
The French Farm does nonpareils that are flavored with orange flower water and rose water. They also have fruit squares that are way better than the American equivalent. I bought a mixed fruit one, and they are great.
Pate de Fruits D'Auvergne https://thefrenchfarm.com/cruzilles-pates-de-fruits-in-purple-tin/ (like the gourmet version of Chuckles candy)  

Cost Plus World Market has a good variety of dark chocolate bars with unusual filling flavors like green tea, passionfruit, chai tea, etc. https://www.worldmarket.com/category/food-and-drink/food/candy-chocolate/chocolate-bars.do

Tea
I've bought a number of different caffeine-free herbal teas from Native American Tea and liked them all. We started with sleepy time tea and then expanded to drinking the other kinds this year. 

Bar Harbor Tea Company has the best blueberry tisane that's almost 90% dried wild blueberries rather than a lot of leaves like other brands. https://www.barharbortea.com/product-page/wild-maine-blueberry-fruit-tea

The German company Tea Gchwender has an outlet in Chicago that I order caffeine-free teas with fall/winter flavors like Rooibush apple streudel, Rooibush eggnog, Rooibush cinnamon plum, Fireside Glow, Advent Fruit tea, Luigi Amaretto, and spring/summer Rooibush panna cotta rhubarb (my favorite), acerola fruit tea, and fruit paradise tea. Some teas only available for specific seasons and they do sell out. I've made some cocktail bases including rum punches using a portion of brewed teas or as a simple syrup.

Harney & Sons tea from either British Isles or Kuhl-Linscomb. My favorite ones so far are Paris, litchi, and the hot cinnamon spice (I get wrapped sachets so they don't lose their potency). I get the hot cinnamon spice one in the winter and it's great to drink for sore throats because it's got clove in it.

Holiday foods
Chapel Hill Toffee (pecan and dark chocolate) is available at Christmas time from the Phoenicia location in west Houston near me. It's made in Chapel Hill NC where I went to school. It's thin and a soft brittle not super sticky like some toffees. Order direct in the winter https://www.chapelhilltoffee.com/purchase/

Since I used to live in North Carolina I got used to eating Moravian cookies and sugar cake in the grocery stores there. My favorite flavor is cranberry orange, but it's hard to find in Houston. Bering's and Central Market usually have several other flavors.

It's a tradition in my family to bake a mincemeat pie for Thanksgiving. I prefer the Borden dried package versus the more acidic one in the jars at the grocery store. They store forever, so I buy them whenever I find them in the HEB and Kroger markdown/returns aisles.

Every year I buy my Christmas stollen from Guglhupf German Bakery in Durham NC. The owners moved there from Germany so they make better tasting ones than the ones at Cost Plus World Market or Central Market. https://guglhupf.com/

Central Market sells several varieties of pan forte in different sizes.

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