Mary Woltz is not shy about about expressing her opinions. Ask her about bees
(she calls them ‘the girls’) and she’ll launch into a detailed explanation of why
she thinks bees are the hardest working members of the food chain.
She should know, Mary is a bee-ologist. OK, that’s not a real word, but it’s an
apt description of this bee keeper from Sag Harbor, New York. Her knowledge
and understanding of bees makes her honey some of the most sought after on
the entire eastern seaboard.
She named her business Bee’s Needs because that’s exactly her attitude when
it comes to her girls. She places the needs of the bees before anything else.
She’ll allow things like sleep and eating slide if maintenance is required on her
one hundred plus hives.
Ms. Woltz has taken the idea of a CSA (community supported agriculture) and
twisted it slightly to present one of the first (if not the first) CSA featuring honey.
Her version of a CSA is community supported apiculture. Email her at mgwoltz@optonline to find out about her program.
“I’m unconventional in many respects,” said Woltz. “I was taught that if you care
about the bees, they will look out for you. The bees’ needs come first.” And she means it.
This guy is all about helping you to eat locally. He buys local vegetables from
his neighbors at the Union Square Greenmarket, dunks them in way tasty brines,
adds fresh herbs, spices, and other delicious accoutrements and before you
know it–another batch of Rick’s Picks has been born.
Harkening back to the original reason for pickling, partners Lauren McGrath and
Rick Field are preserving the bounty of the harvest. They offer not only the kinds
of traditional tastes we all know and love, but they rock green beans, okra, beets
asparagus and curried green tomatoes. Their flavor profiles are in the forefront
in the pickled genre–you don’t see these combinations just anywhere.
The folks at Rick’s Picks are picky about their ingredients, their process and are
extraordinarily enthusiastic about their wares. And why not? These jars contain
some of the best tasting, turbo-charged flavors available anywhere.
This woman is on a mission. She wants people to discover the kind of Indian
food she grew up eating. Her father, a native of Kerala in southern India, knows
all the ins and outs of this sophisticated cuisine and has passed his knowledge
on to her. In Woodstock, New York she (and her cohorts) are producing fresh
simmer sauces and chutneys that have to be tasted to be believed. Using only
the freshest ingredients and painstaking manufacturing processes, she brings
a modern vibrancy to her family’s recipes.
Maya Kaimal Fine Indian Foods is in a unique position. Located in the fresh,
refrigerated section (of the stores stocking her products) these simmer sauces
and chutneys are most likely the only ones to be found there. It’s not often that a
food product has such a distinctive situation.
Her story was shot in and around Woodstock, New York.
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