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

This week we are delighted to have Robert Schueller of Melissa’s World Variety Produce back on the show. He has been dubbed “The Produce Expert by countless consumer and national trade publications along with TV and radio personalities.

There is probably no one on the planet who is more of an expert on produce than Robert because his company sells over fifteen hundred different varieties of fresh fruits and veggies from all over the world. He has written several books on fresh produce including Melissa’s Great Book of Produce which tells all about some of the most exotic fruits and veggies from around the world.

This week we are going to focus on veggie side dishes for all the upcoming holiday meals But as you might expect, a Thanksgiving, Hannuka, or Christmas meal featuring fruits and veggies from Melissa’s might be a little different than the traditional ones we serve up in America. And while Melissa’s does sell all those traditional fruits and veggies, they have some very interesting alternatives to give your Thanksgiving meal an exciting twist. Robert is going to tell us how to have a “Fresh and Modern Thanksgiving.”

This week we are launching a new segment for the podcast that we hope will become a regular feature throughout each season. As our regular listeners know, all of us Produce Buzzers like to cook. None of us are professional chefs, but we are all “foodies” and have a good sense of what makes a good dish and how to pair those dishes to make a good meal. So, I am confident that each of us could stand his or her own on a show like the “Iron Chef.”

So today on the podcast, we are going to play our version of the Iron Chef that we call “The Veggie Iron Chef!” Each of our contestants will receive three random ingredients and they will have to come up with a recipe using those ingredients before the end of the show. Their ingredients will be chosen by our “Veggie Wheel of Fortune!” This is a roulette wheel with ten veggies on it. We will spin it and whatever veggie it lands on that will be the veggie our contestant will have to work with. We also have a “Spice Wheel of Foturne” and a “Fruit and Nut Wheel of Fortune” to select the other ingredients. Those also have ten ingredients each on the wheel. They can also use any other ingredients that they want to add to the dish to make it more interesting or flavorful.

Edwin will be the primary judge of the recipes they create and award points according to his superb taste and sophistication. But he will be making the rules up as he goes along, so don’t pull too hard for your favorite Produce Buzzer or you might be disappointed!

And one surprise element in our game will be that, after they create their recipes, the Produce Buzzers will see what Artificial Intelligence (AI) would do with their ingredients. Can they beat ChatGPT?

Now all the veggies on our Veggie Wheel of Fortune are in season now in the Fall, so hopefully listeners you can be inspired by our work today to create your own fall veggie dishes.

We haven’t yet had an episode on the podcast that featured packaged products of fruits and vegetables. But that doesn’t mean we don’t think there are not any good ones in the produce aisle. Pre-cut, prepared, and pre-packaged fresh fruits and veggies have gained a lot of popularity with consumers over the past decade and for good reason. With our lives becoming busier and busier, these products can save a lot of time on getting the evening meal on the family table. This week we have a guest who is going to tell us about some fantastic and delicious treats that can really spice up your meals with hardly taking any of your valuable time.

Today we welcome Tara Murray, VP of Marketing for Fresh Innovations and the ¡Yo Quiero brands based in Texas. The name of the company and the brand are spot on because they are truly creating some very innovative products that will make you say “¡Yo quiero ¡Yo Quiero” when you see them. They specialize in all kinds of avocado dips including a package of fresh avocado that’s nothing but avocado. But they have also created some other delicious dips. Bean dips, cheese or queso dips, salsas, and many more combinations that will truly spice up your plate. And they are all fresh, natural, and clean with no preservatives or chemicals. They truly belong in the produce aisle.

Tune in to hear about their revolutionary and safe way of packaging these products without needing heat or chemicals to preserve them and ruining their delicious flavor. And Tara will reveal an exciting new product that will be in your local produce aisle very soon.

Watermelons are never out of season. And today we have a special guest to tell us how that can be and why you should be including watermelon on your shopping list all year long. She will reveal some surprising info about them that will convince you of this.

Rachel Syngo is Chief Marketing Officer of Melon 1, the oldest and largest shipper of watermelons in the U.S. She has real passion for the work she is doing, which is why we are delighted to have her on the podcast to share that since we are all about passion for everything fruit and veggie.

Rachel joined the Melon 1 team in 2016 and is central in the sales and marketing for the company. She is the 8th generation in her family to work in American agriculture, and in watermelon farming. Tune in to hear where and how watermelons are grown. You will learn how to choose a good watermelon and how to cut and store them. You will get real insight into the lives of watermelon farmers and the challenges they face.

This week the Produce Buzzers are going to take a walk down memory lane and reminisce about the wonderful food we grew up with in Western North Carolina which always featured lots of fruits and veggies fresh off the farm.  

To help us do that we have a very special guest returning to the program. Our guest today is our cousin Colette Worley. Her mother was our father’s sister. Her family owned a very popular restaurant in our hometown of Hendersonville, NC, called “The Tasty Treat.” You could get just about anything you wanted to eat at their café, but standard fare was a daily specials board with a choice of several meats and two or three veggies to go along with it. You don’t see restaurants like that much anymore. But in the 1960’s and 70’s when their restaurant served the area, these were very common. 

Today we are going to have Colette tell us about the restaurant and some of her memories from those days and then she is going to share with us one of her favorite veggie sides that you could have ordered at The Tasty Treat and how to prepare them. And she will also tell us the method her husband Wayne uses to can an heirloom green bean called Morgan Beans.

Season Seven Episode Two

A mother and daughter-in-law share how their love of fresh fruits and veggies changed their lives. A conversation with a professional dietitian and her favorite patient. This week we have a very interesting mother-in-law, daughter-in-law duo as our guests. Both of them have a passion for all things fruit and veggie and are going to share that passion with us today and explain why fresh produce not only brings great joy, but is key in maintaining and bolstering your health.

Stephanie McBurnett is a registered dietitian who is doing some very important work to get fruits and veggies recognized as a crucial factor in treating chronic diseases such as diabetes, heart disease, and inflammation. She works  for the non-profit organization Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine which is dedicated to the promotion of plant-based diets for the prevention and treatment of chronic diseases

Our guest this week has spent his career at one of the largest and premiere fruit growers in the nation. Mac Riggan, the director of marketing for Chelan Fresh and the “Joyfully Grown” brand, joins us to tell us the story of the Chelan Fresh farmers.

Chelan Fresh is a shipper of apples, pears, and cherries owned by the farmers who grow the fruit. Their farms are family-owned, many of which are now being led by the fourth, fifth, and even sixth generations of those families. Sons and daughters have followed in the footsteps of their parents and grandparents, in some cases great and great-great grandparents. Growing fruit and growing it well is just in their genes.

Tune in to learn about why the foothills of the Cascade Mountain range in central Washington state has ideal fruit growing conditions. Learn about how the apples are grown and delicious new varieties are developed. And hear their family story that inspired the name of the “Joyfully Grown” brand.

We have a very special guest returning to the show this week. Lori Taylor is the Founder & CEO of The Produce Moms®, a global community on a mission to put more fruits and vegetables on every table. She has been making a great impact in getting more people to eat fresh fruits and vegetables through the wonderfully creative content on her website theproducemoms.com. Lori is also a fellow podcaster as the host of The Produce Moms Podcast. Over the past month she featured a very interesting series there on the subject of “Food As Medicine.” We are going to ask her about that and how the idea is getting a lot of attention across many professional and scientific disciplines. More and more, doctors are prescribing fresh fruits and veggies to solve and prevent health issues and insurers are beginning to pay for them. It’s an exciting trend that is building great momentum.

This week we are delighted to have Robert Schueller, Director of Public Relations at Melissa’s World Variety Produce, back on the show. Robert has been dubbed the “Produce Expert” by the media since he has unique access to such a wide variety of fruits and vegetables. He has written several books about the cornucopia Mother Nature has to offer in the world of fresh produce.

In this week’s episode, Robert is going to tell us about some strange but wonderful exotic fruits. These fruits are freaky and look so strange. Eating them is an adventure too. We will learn about lychees, rambutans, passion fruit, and “the queen of fruits,” mangosteens. Listen to learn about their unique look, unsurpassed flavors, and how to get inside them to eat them.

Artichoke season is here and in full swing. The origin of these deliciously creamy and rich flavored vegetables is an interesting journey around the Mediterranean to the modern world. And has for thousands of years been associated with romance. In this week’s episode, we are going to get an in-depth look at this veggie, which technically is a flower!

This week’s guest is Mark Munger, Senior Director of Marketing for Ocean Mist Farms based in Castroville, CA in the Monterey, CA area. The company has been around for almost 100 years and was the first to grow artichokes commercially in the U.S. Today they are the leading grower of artichokes in North America.

Mark worked for Theresa’s Nolan Network alongside Rick, Cynthia, and Edwin in the early 1990’s. He was a valuable part of our team of merchandisers representing our clients of companies and commodities on the West Coast. Since that time, he has been a rising star in the produce business. He will tell us all about artichokes. Learn about how the unique climate of the Bay Area of California allows the top quality veggies to grow there. The name Ocean Mist is a clue to why that area is called the world’s “salad bowl.”