Local food: Premium pickles go beyond a pucker

Listen to what some people have to say about Veggie Bites:

"I hide them in the back of the fridge so kids won't eat them all."

"I came to the Farmers Market two years and tasted them and started crying; they were so good."

"I put them in a different container than the one they are sold in so that the other people in the house won't see the container and eat them all."

"They remind me of my grandmother's pickles."

"They're the best I've ever eaten." The makers of Veggie Bites hear that one a lot.

Ron Curtis and Melody Daacon are the team behind Veggie Bites, primarily known for its pickles, but also a company that pickles many things.

What sets Veggie Bites' pickles apart from all the others in glass jars on grocery shelves is the way they are made, the reason you'll find them in the refrigerator case and not on the shelf.

Curtis uses a cold brine process to preserve the pickles (and everything he sells). There is no canning or fermenting. The vegetables they sell have no preservatives and no artificial colors or flavors.

"When I first developed this process I took it to MSU to make sure it was safe," Curtis says. "They told me I couldn't do that. It wouldn't be any good. I took it to 10 different people and they each one had a different reason why it couldn't be done. I let them try some. They tried them and liked them. I told them everything they had eaten was six months old and they said, 'Oh. I guess you can do that.'"

Since the vegetables are not cooked as they would be if they were canned they maintain a crispness that other pickled vegetable cannot.

"You don't have to cook them at 180 degrees so they can sit on a shelf for three years. When you cook them it takes away their crispness and releases other harmful toxins. Cold water processing is actually safer than canning," Curtis says.

The vinegar and salt brine combined with refrigeration can keep the pickled vegetables fresh for six to nine months.

Refrigeration keeps the pickled vegetables fresh, but the need to keep them cool also presents distribution issues for Veggie Bites. Curtis says transportation with refrigeration is so costly that it makes it difficult to ship them very far and still remain profitable.

"If someone in Kalamazoo could come up with a refrigeration distribution company it would be a gold mine for them," says Curtis. And it would be a financial boon for small local food companies that need to keep their products cold.

For example, to be sold by the Spartan grocery chain food must first be shipped to Chicago and then back to Michigan. The cost of a truck that has a constant cold temperature is astronomical, Curtis says. "There's no money in it for small companies."

Despite such concerns, Veggie Bites currently are found in about 50 locations across Michigan. Pickles spears are the company's biggest sellers, but they pickle a wide range of vegetables including asparagus, green tomatoes, beets, kohlrabi, radishes, cabbage, carrots and cauliflower.

Curtis loves to try new taste combinations and has pickled pineapples, grapes, and apples. He's found celery doesn't pickle well and though pears taste great they don't look appetizing.

He also likes to the variety that comes with adding onions and garlic or jalapenos.

Whenever possible local vegetables are used. When in season, cucumbers come from the Russell Farm in Parchment. Cucumbers go to Harrison's Packing Co. in Kalamazoo which cleans them, sorts them, and puts them in Veggie Bite brine.

The pickles then come to Curtis' licensed facility for further preparation.

Daacon has worked with Curtis for about two-and-a-half years in food prep and sales. Since she started she has been working on getting the pickles into more stores. As Curtis has allowed her take on more responsibilities, Daacon says she has gained more confidence in what she is doing with the business and found out how much she loves it.

"I love pickling things," Daacon says, "love our relationships with farmers and love that what we make is healthy."

She also has had fun getting the pickles out into the community. She went back to the elementary school she attended in Parchment and taught first graders about pickles, let them taste mild and spicy pickles, and read to the them from the children's book Picklelicious. "They were having a blast," Daacon says.

And when they found out she went to their school when she was young they wanted to know if she went to college. They were impressed to find out she did.

She also takes the pickles to classes on how to eat well where the instructor says you can eat as many pickles as you want.

Such connections work for a small company like Curtis Fresh Pack Manufacturing LLC, the maker of Veggie Bites. "We're a bit old fashioned and not flashy," Daacon says. "We don't have a big marketing budget."

Even so, some important customers have come to realize the value of the premium pickle offered by Veggie Bites. Bell's Eccentric Cafe now serves the locally made pickles and Whole Food recently gave the company permission to sell its pickles in their stores.

"No one else makes a pickle like it," Curtis says. "I'm not afraid to say it's the best in the state. I'll compare it to anybody's. If you've tasted my pickles you won't want other pickles."

Kathy Jennings is the managing editor of Southwest Michigan's Second Wave. She is a freelance writer and editor.

Photos by Erik Holladay.