Value-added processing of crops into “Farmers’

Market Frozen Foods”

Coordinator
Summary Nina Bruno
Summary Ambrosia Farms
Box 463
Bridgewater, NY 13313
We have provided an alternative for farmer's market produce in the form of a pure and natural Phone: 212-330-7272
frozen food line. We have received positive feedback on the gourmet quality and ease of use. E-mail:
The move toward promoting healthy food alternatives to the public is at a peak. ambrosiafarmsny@yahoo.com

SARE Grant
The SARE grant enabled us to pursue this idea with less financial constraints than we would $9,659
have otherwise encountered. We are pursuing additional funding for packaging, marketing, and
production. We are in a better position to recruit food venture capitalists to review our "value Project Number
added" ideas. FNE06-566

We encourage small farmers to contact us so they can participate in the "Farmer's Market Type
Farmer/Rancher Project
Frozen Foods" product line. We will replicate producation in selected locations across the
Northeast to satisfy demand. Region
Northeast
Goals
Report Year
2007
An objective of this project is to introduce more Northeastern farmers to the frozen food market.
One way to approach the market is by growing, processing, freezing, and packaging heirloom
vegetables. These vegetables are not strongly represented by the larger companies. As such,
Ambrosia Farms frozen meals feature fruit and vegetables grown from heirloom seeds, and
meals prepared with cultural authenticity reflective of seed origins.

Frozen food packaged goods are among the fastest growing processed food categories,
especially organic labels, and frozen is the largest category of overall supermarket sales. The
growth of this product line would benefit small (non-commercial) farmers emphasizing quality
over mass production. Using the farmer’s market concept, availability of the product increases
with farmer participation and locale. This project is presented as an alternative to CSA’s,
farmers markets, direct sales and predominant preservation methods – namely canned and dried
foods.

These vegetables will be grown in collaboration with other NYS farmers. The SARE funding
will assist to defray the cost of crops or “raw materials” that will be purchased at “farmer's
market” prices – a central motivation for this project. Frozen food is logical for Northeast
farms, enabling preservation of abundant harvests in the short growing season for availability of
locally grown products “year round”.

Additional business opportunities, such as restaurant quantity packaging, will be pursued. This
is beneficial because preparation work may be transferred from higher paying Metropolitan
areas to lower paying rural areas, very similar to what has occurred in the customer service
sector.

Farm Profile

Ambrosia Farms is a small farm located in New York’s Central Valley. We have been growing
heirloom vegetables for 20 years. The lush valleys of this region are still dotted with dairy
farms, apple orchards, and sugar maple producers.

Sustainable agriculture underlies all aspects of our farm practices from inception. We have
been lifelong proponents of the humane treatment of all living creatures, the preservation of
wildlife and habitat, open lands, forests, waterways, and natural vegetation. We use manure
from our horses and chickens and foliar sprayed fish emulsion; a mulch of grass clippings and
straw to prevent weeds; and plant with minimal concentration of items, companion planting,
crop rotation, and buffer zones in harmony with wildlife and natural ecosystems. We adhere to
ecological concepts as reported in the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment so that ecosystems
thrive throughout the farm property.

Participants

The project started with 3 farms scheduled to participate. This changed as schedules, priorities,
and weather patterns changed. We used the second approach whereby we would purchase
goods at market prices. The databases on the internet – farmtotable.org – are elaborate resources
for connecting farmers based on specific regions of the State. Most of the product was grown at
our farm since the initial production targets were feasible for us.

We had to do pre-production planning in enlisting local greenhouses for such items as heirloom
tomato plants. We provided seeds to two greenhouses who agreed to perform the custom work.
The greenhouses produced 4,000 custom tomato plants.

Project Activities

The “Tuscan Soup” product design includes pantano romanesco tomatoes, cannelloni beans, and
tuscan kale. This is an example of the cultural authenticity. Each vegetable is lightly cooked
and packaged individually based upon pre-determined portions. This type of processing
provides for the harvest and freezing of each crop based on their optimum peak of freshness and
maintained in pure form. The products are combined in the packaging stage.

The following are vendors used in the process. All seeds were purchased from heirloom seed
companies - www.rareseeds.com and www.landrethseeds.com.

A large capacity of grass clippings were collected with a “Trac Vac” and a Goossen bale
chopper – both were used to mulch plants for moisture and weed cover. While this is labor
intensive, we prefer this approach over organic herbicides or plastic.

As vegetables were harvested, they were cooked, frozen, and stored for packaging. We put
together 1,000 meals in multiple combinations and sold to existing customer base. Feedback
was overwhelmingly positive. We worked with the product extensively to test quality,
instructions for use, packaging and waste reduction, low energy inputs and outputs, and
optimum portion sizes.

A gourmet quality offering in frozen pizza - “American Flatbread” in Vermont – was used as a
model. They were generous with information pertaining to start-up process. They have been
distributed at various times by United Natural Foods, Tree of Life, Associated Grocers of New
England. About 70% of natural products sold at retail flow through distributors. They are
currently available in supermarkets such as Hannaford Bros Co and Whole Foods where they
net about half of the $10.99 sales price. They recommended we start with some independent
coops or bulk coop as well as a subscription to NATURAL PRODUCTS MERCHANDISER –
as an informative trade journal.

Sharing information on their production process was useful: “We freeze it in a roll-in freezer
right in the bakery. Not exactly flash but it does the job in about 10-15 minutes. We freeze one
rack of 30 breads at a time during the baking process, then we package them and put them in a
storage freezer. We don't cryovack, but just heat seal plastic bags around our breads.” We
recognized the simplicity and ease of operation and eliminated the flash freezer from our capital
budget.

Results

We met our goal to produce 1,000 meals sold to existing customers. We have enough prototype
left over to generate interest from potential wholesale customers and future collaborators. We
will continue to utilize samples through the 2007 harvest to gain customers in both the retail and
wholesale markets. The samples will be used to generate interest from farmers at farmer’s
markets and similar outlets.

Customers are overwhelmingly pleased and we expect to get advanced orders for next season.
We are working with a design company on the packaging. We are hiring a consultant to assist
with direct sales to restaurants.

CCE sent us the latest information on food analytical laboratories for analysis and nutrition
labeling. Since a critical aspect of this product line is in promoting the nutritional value of this
product – we look forward to results from a private lab analysis at a cost of $730. We will
report these findings to nutrition - based businesses.

Conditions

The 2006 growing season in Central New York area was overcome with rain and wet
conditions- resulting in reduced harvests across the spectrum. We had a surprisingly abundant
harvest in a very wet season.

Economics

“Farmer’s Market Frozen Foods “is still very much a “work in progress”. Revenues from the
2006 season are $7,000 calculated as 1,000 items * $6.99 each. The items were packaged in 3
cup portions weighing 1½ lbs in total. The labor cost to process the vegetables accounted for
12% of sales. The market price of vegetables is 25% of sales. Utility expenses are a
consideration due to the ovens, refrigeration and freezer storage. We have discovered that the
items have to be priced on the higher end to be profitable. The current price reflects our
research on other frozen food products as well feedback from customers.

Assessment

The increasing attention being paid to eating locally year round is a plus for this product. The
packaging is simple and includes a section to feature the farmer that grows the raw material for
that item. We think this lends itself to versatility and maximizes involvement of individual
farmers.

Overall, we have had as many successes as failures, but remain excited about the future of
“Farmer’s Market Frozen Foods”. We are currently taking advance orders on this season’s
product line.

Adoption

Participant recruitment will lead other farmers to use and save heirloom seeds in growing the
raw materials necessary for the production of this frozen food item.

Collaboration with other farmers proved to be more time consuming than anticipated. As
farmers change priorities or deal with unexpected events, planning proves to be futile. We
believe the growth of this product line will benefit from purchase of goods from existing outlets
- such as direct internet sales and farmer’s markets - rather than advance planning. We will
invite other farmers in different regions to use this model for local production.

Outreach

We spoke with people at the NYS Historical and Farmer’s Museum in Cooperstown to explain
the product in conjunction with their work in the seed preservation area. We offered prototypes
and samples to restaurateurs that work with small farmers. In the summer of 2006, we spoke
with the chef at the OTESAGA HOTEL in Cooperstown, NY to assess what was purchased
locally. In January 2007, we corresponded with the chef at the The Dressing Room in Westport,
CT regarding their menu item - heirloom tomato soup – and the potential for using frozen
tomatoes.

We mailed promotional materials to publications in the Northeast such as the editorial staff of
the NYT “Dining In”, “Connecticut Magazine”, “The Valley Table”, and “Food Arts” for
product exposure and acknowledgement of the SARE Farmer/Rancher grant.