On the front Burner; Programs & People Summer 2004

On the front Burner

Ingredients Caldwell commercial kitchen heats up opportunities for entrepreneurs and a local food network

Tina Venable has a passion for breadmaking. “If I could just bake and nothing else, I would be so happy,” she says. Venable’s potato-basedbreads —among them pumpkin, confetti, and walnut-and-blue-cheese—have earned her a trail of devotees at farmers markets in Mountain Home, Hailey, and Eagle. But unless Venable can bake her loaves by the dozen in a commercial kitchen, her hobby won’t rise to a fulltime career.

Mandy Bergerson concocts a dozen different caramels, including kahlua, hazelnut, walnut, coconut, and brandyand- rum. She can pour about 60 candies at a time at her home in Caldwell, but to make more—or to sell them beyond farmers markets—Bergerson needs an FDA-approved facility.

Carol Southard, also of Caldwell, wants a place to bake her biscotti and develop high-end international seasoning packets.With a master’s degree in biochemistry (University of Idaho, 1996), Southard knows how to troubleshoot a recipe and maximize flavor, but she needs commercial-grade scales and other specialized equipment with which to conduct her R&D.

In Boise, Annette Nees painstakingly fills as many as 3,000 packets a year with exact quantities of huckleberry muffin mix, chocolate pie mix, pumpkin pie dip mix, among others. If she had access to a hopper, she could package all of her products in just three or four intense sessions a year.

Idaho’s hidden economy
Tina Venable They are part of what Malcolm Dell describes as a “hidden economy.”A professional marketer and executive coordinator of the Gift Marketing Institute, Dell estimates that as many as 300 Idaho entrepreneurs are producing baked, dried, and refrigerated foods for gift shops, restaurants, and grocers. “A lot of people stumbled into this business when the health regulations weren’t so stiff,” says Dell, of Orofino. “It’s a tougher business to get into now. Having a place to go and innovate, where professionals understand the production side of the business, is very important.”

That’s how the UI’s sparkling new certified kitchen will open doors for Idahoans. Part of the university’s Caldwell Food Technology Center (FTC)—which also includes packing facilities and a small pilot plant—the fully equipped 1,000- square-foot kitchen opened April 15, 2004, to an eager waiting list.Venable, Bergerson, Southard, and Nees wasted no time signing up.

Classes, advice, and a kitchen help startups’ profitability
Mandy Bergerson At $15,000 for an exhaust system and $5,000 for a stove, the cost of building their own licensed kitchens would quickly sour most startups’ profitability, says Jim Toomey, director of the UI Business and Technology Incubator, which encompasses the center. At the FTC, they can take classes in developing their food-product ideas and then start fine-tuning their production techniques, analyzing their costs, and projecting their prices.When they’re ready, they can begin producing as little or as much as their finances allow.

FTC Manager and UI Food Scientist Drew Dalgetty will help his clients clear food-technology and food-safety hurdles —including running basic product tests and assisting with recipe development, scale-up, and modifications for export markets. “Our clients won’t have to spend their own time figuring out how to do all of this,” Dalgetty says. “There’s somebody here who has done it before and has the resources to help them achieve that. That gives them a faster route to processing.”

Toomey will advise them on valueadded strategies, vendor sourcing, and business and marketing plans. Small business counselor (SCORE) volunteers, housed at the incubator, will provide insights and experience. Toomey anticipates that other incubator tenants—perhaps food consultants and executive chefs—will contribute to the center’s synergies.

In the not-too-distant future of the FTC, Toomey envisions fruit, potatoes, and other specialty crops—harvested from nearby UI research fields and orchards—developed into value-added products for local markets. He foresees vegetables—perhaps grown in a UI community garden—processed by area Hispanics into red-hot products for local aficionados. He crosses his fingers for experts in artisan cheeses, who might innovate fresh dairy products. And he sees pasture-poultry growers meeting with executive chefs and organic herb growers conferring with potential customers. In short, he believes the FTC can become the hearth of a re-created local food network in southwestern Idaho.

Opportunities; keeping dollars and jobs in the community
“We have the most diverse agriculture in the state,” Toomey says. “We can give growers better opportunities for fair returns and consumers higher quality and fresh products—and we can keep the dollars in the community.”

Mike Thornton, superintendent of the Southwest Idaho Research and Extension Center, agrees that the UI can effectively support agricultural communities in transition. “Traditionally, when most of the economy here was ag-related, we were very important in helping the economic viability of area farms,” he says. “Now, as those farms become smaller and more specialized, we can again play a major role in helping them be economically viable.”

“It’s a natural thing for our college to do,” says Toomey. “We already help people who are engaged in production agriculture, gardening, and food preservation. Food processing is a natural extension.”

For more information, see
http:// www.ag.uidaho.edu/ftc/.
Contact Toomey at jtoomey@uidaho.edu,
Dalgetty at dalgetty@uidaho.edu.

--by Marlene Fritz