Produce Buzzers - A Podcast for Lovers of Fresh Fruits and Veggies

Corn is now the world’s most abundant grain surpassing wheat and rice by huge margins. Twice as much corn is produced annually as rice and more than one and a half times more than wheat. But it is not primarily used for human consumption. But since it is National Corn Month, we salute sweet corn as a mainstay for those summertime barbecues. Learn how to select and cook the perfect corn on the cob. And July 16th is National Spinach Day, so we salute Popeye’s favorite source of strength.

Mark Twain once wrote, “to taste watermelon is to know what the angels eat.” July is National Watermelon month. And this week we celebrate American Independence. Watermelons are always on the table at Fourth of July parties. So, we celebrate this fruit deservedly called “The Happy Fruit” in this week’s episode. Our guest is a seasoned veteran of the produce industry and has helped promote, market, and merchandise watermelons for over 25 years! Tune in to find out all about watermelons. And maybe most importantly, get some great tips for choosing a good one at the market.

June is National Mango Month. So, in this week’s episode, we celebrate this delicious and healthy fruit, one of the most popular fruits in the world, if not the most popular. Mangos originated in India and are considered a sacred fruit there as well as in other Asian cultures. We don’t know if mangos are actually sacred, but we do know that the experience of eating them is divine! And the health benefits are tremendous. Our special guest, Manuel Michel, executive director of the National Mango Board, joins us to tell us all about mangos. 

June is National Fruits and Vegetables Month. Our modern world is so blessed with such an abundant supply of fresh fruits and veggies. Not only in terms of quantity, but also with amazing varieties, and with supplies of almost all of them year-round. It is as if we have found the mythical “cornucopia” that Zeus, the leader of the Greek gods, head of the pantheon on Mount Olympus, created. The cornucopia is a symbol of never-ending supply of sustenance. So we thought it would be fun to tell the story of the origin of the “horn of plenty.” And it’s the season for two of our favorite tree fruits—cherries and apricots! Yummmmmm! And we will get another delicious recipe from Cynthia.

Every now and then, news breaks announcing an occurrence of food-borne illness in the food supply. These sometimes cause panic and inspire fear of buying fresh fruits and vegetables. As often as we hear about them, the reality is that they are very rare considering how much food is being shipped every day. This week’s guest is Tracy Fry of iFoodDS, a company that is pioneering methods to track every step of the distribution process for our fruits and veggies. The progress being made is making our food safer and safer. Tracy will tell us how technology is improving the safety and quality of the food supply chain, especially as it concerns fresh fruits and veggies.

This week, on June 10th, we celebrate National Herbs and Spices Day. So, we dedicate this episode to honor these delicious flavorings that make our fruits and veggies taste even better. To do that we have invited Melinda Richardson to join us on the podcast. She is an account executive at Gourmet Garden, an Australian company that is spicing things up with its delicious products that give you the flavor of fresh herbs, but in a way that makes them last much longer. Melinda is a veteran of the fresh produce industry and has a lot of information to share about fresh fruits and veggies. Do you suffer from “wilt guilt?” If you do, you will want to hear about their line of herbs and spices.

May is a great month for celebrating veggies! It’s National Salad Month, National Salsa Month, and National Asparagus Month. So, we dedicate this episode to them all. Learn about the history of salad. Surprisingly, it’s really quite interesting. And we dance around with America’s favorite condiment. No, it’s not mayonnaise or ketchup. It’s salsa! And then we tell you all about wonderful asparagus. It’s the perfect season for enjoying this unique veggie.

Beautiful spring weather is all around and we hope that is bringing you joy. And there is no greater joy of spring than the arrival of one of the fruits that have been most often cited by people as the most joyous of all fruits and veggies—strawberries! May is National Strawberry Month and so this week we have a very special guest who has to be one of the world’s leading experts on the fruit. Jim Grabowski has been the director of marketing for one of the most successful strawberry growers in the world for over 33 years! Well-Pict Berries. In this episode, he will tell us how strawberry varieties are developed, how they are grown, and what berry growers are doing to implement sustainable solutions.

May is Asian/Pacific Islander Heritage Month. This week we have a very special guest on the show that will tell us about the substantial contribution that Japanese Americans made to American agriculture, especially on the West Coast, from California through Oregon, Washington, and Idaho. Ron Inatomi is a third-generation (Sansei) Japanese American who has been working in the produce industry for over 40 years. In our discussion with him, we will learn how industrious the first- and second-generation Japanese Americans were and how they rose to be some of the largest growers of fruits and vegetables in the U.S. That was before the war. But after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, all of them were incarcerated and their lands were taken from them. After the war, many of them returned and started over from scratch and once again rose to prominence. It’s a sad but inspiring story.

Chip Carter is a natural-born storyteller. And he’s made a profession of it for over 30 years. He worked as a journalist for several prominent national newspapers before he decided to return to his farming roots and begin to tell stories about America’s farmers. At that point, he launched the Southeast Produce Weekly, a publication and Website that covered news about fresh produce in that region. Building on the success of that, he created a new television show called “Where the Food Comes From” which is about… well, the name speaks for itself! Season one is just finishing up and season two is almost ready to debut. The show airs on the RFD-TV network. Chip joins us to talk about the miracle of how our food gets to us and the heroes he has met while filming the show who work so hard to make it happen.