From industry to kitchen

My father was cooking on Mother’s Day, as he does every year. Everything was ready except the salad. He reached in the fridge and pulled out a bag of fresh-cut romaine, arranged it on a platter, tossed on some toppings and drizzled it with olive oil and vinegar.

“You know,” I said, “that bag of salad you just used? That’s what my magazine is about.”

The look on his face is one I have seen a few times since I became editor of Fresh Cut. When I describe the magazine, people unfamiliar with the industry look a little confused, as in, “You mean there’s a whole magazine about cut-up lettuce? Really?”

It’s about so much more than that, I tell them, listing the various aspects: production, traceability, food safety, cold chain management, transportation, shipping, packaging, product development, marketing, trends, public policy, etc.

That point was only driven home at the United Fresh trade show in Dallas. It’s one thing to know the industry’s thought leaders as voices on the phone or in a webinar, or names in press releases and articles. It’s another to hear them speak, to witness the depth and breadth of their knowledge firsthand.

Listening to David Gombas and Trevor Suslow (UF’s 2012 Technical Award winner) during an educational session on cantaloupe safety rattle off facts, figures and analyses, Jeffrey Brandenburg discuss new product designs in fresh-cut, Rudi Groppe outlining innovations in processing, Dan’l Mackey Almy on the determined effort to bring salad bars to schools, Dan Vache reviewing strides in traceability, and on and on, it dawned on me.

The show was brimming with rock stars – the fresh-cut industry’s equivalent of The Rolling Stones. They’re really good at what they do, and their fingerprints are all over the industry. Individually, they make contributions to everything from food safety to public policy. Collectively, they form the bedrock on which the industry will continue to grow and prosper.

I came away from United Fresh 2012 blown away by the magnitude of the energy and scope of the fresh-cut industry.

And still, at its simplest, it really is about that single bag of cut-up lettuce, or carrots, or apples, or any number of fresh-cut products, rounding out a family dinner in a Michigan kitchen — or any kitchen, anywhere in the world.

                                                                                                                         –By Kathy Gibbons, Editorial Director