Specialty Food Magazine is the leading publication for retailers, manufacturers and foodservice professionals in the specialty food trade. It provides news, trends and business-building insights that help readers keep their businesses competitive.
Issue link: https://specialtyfoodmagazine.epubxp.com/i/139333
Ayala's Sparkling Herbal Water. When pediatrician Ayala Laufer-Cahana launched her line of still waters as an antidote to sugary and artificial drinks, she looked no further than her kitchen garden. The garden's array of culinary herbs, when added to the water, helped to create a range of sophisticated flavors and aromas. Skip to the present: Ayala's recently introduced a line of sparkling waters infused with organic culinary herbs. With no calories, additives or preservatives, the bubbly beverages have a flavorful zing in four enticing varieties: lemongrass mint vanilla, cinnamon orange-peel, ginger lemonpeel and thyme-infused lavender mint. herbalwater.com Botanical Bakery Garden Shorties. Sondra Wells, the face behind this small bakery, is no stranger to botanical ingredients. Her entire business was inspired by a wellreceived batch of lavender shortbread cookies she baked for a party more than ten years ago. Since then, she has introduced herbs and floral ingredients into all sorts of baked goods, from cookies to cheese straws. These bite-size, square shortbread cookies, available in brown butter sage, chocolate chipotle and Thai chile, pair well with pinot noir or chardonnay. The bakery released another herbal-infused creation this year: Cheese Snaps, which come in cheddar chile arbol, parmesan rosemary, blue basil and toma dill pollen. botanicalbakery.com Coy's Country Northwest Lavender Sugar Cookies Baking Mix. When you're in the mood for a gourmet cookie, particularly one with natural ingredients and sophisticated flavor, the likely place to turn is a specialty bakery. But with this new sugar cookie mix, home chefs can whip one up—an entire batch, actually—with ease. Inside the package is a packet of all the dry ingredients needed for cookie batter plus a packet of frosting mix that, when mixed with butter and water, creates a light glaze to drizzle over the cookies. Both the dry mix and the frosting are infused with lavender, which transports them from simple sugar cookies to an elevated culinary experience. seattlegourmetfoods.com Grafton Village Cave Aged Vermont Leyden Cheese. Handmade with raw milk collected from small family farms sprinkled throughout the Vermont countryside, this buttery cheese comes to life courtesy of cumin seeds. The black seeds are sprinkled throughout the cheese, giving it a pop of visual interest while adding flavor and aroma. Made in small batches, the cow's cheese is matured in Grafton's aging caves for a minimum of two months, during which time the cheese mellows and grows in complexity. Pair it with a sturdy cracker for complex flavor, texture and punch. graftonvillagecheese.com Joia All Natural Soda. Sure, they're sodas, but these allnatural fizzy drinks have flavor (and ingredient) profiles that set them apart from traditional soft drinks. One such flavor, introduced last summer, is orange jasmine and nutmeg. It has a fresh citrus taste with hints of floral and spice and melds well with the 2-year-old company's line of sodas made with herbs, spices and fruit juices. The sodas have no caffeine, no preservatives and nothing artificial. Additional flavors include ginger apricot allspice, pineapple coconut nutmeg, lime hibiscus clove, grapefruit chamomile cardamom and blackberry pomegranate ginger. joialife.com Nantucket Butter Company Herbal Butter. New to the line of compound butters from this New England company is an assortment of packaged 3.5-ounce butters made with a variety of herbs: herbal garlic, tarragon, dill and lemon basil. One variety, Tarragon Treat, is made with a blend of tarragon, lemon, parsley, lemon zest, shallots and a dash of cayenne pepper, and goes swimmingly with beach barbecues and family clambakes. Inspired by the tastes of a Nantucket summer, the bold flavors and rich textures of these butters make them the perfect companion for a piece of freshly baked bread. nantucketbutterco.com Pietro Romanengo Rose Petal Syrup. Newly imported by Italian Harvest, this fragrant and flavorful syrup is made in an ancient factory in the heart of downtown Genoa, in Italy's Liguria region. It's an artisanal concoction made by generations of confectioners known for their candied fruits and flower petals, who collect rose petals from a variety of sources, including private gardens, convents and parks. One or two tablespoons over shaved ice, atop ice cream or drizzled into prosecco is all it takes to be transported to the gardens of Liguria. Also available from the Romanengo factory: Rose Petal Preserve. italianharvest.com JULY/AUGUST 2013 107