Oser Communications Group

GOURMET NEWS OCTOBER 2019 www.gourmetnews.com SUPPLIER NEWS 1 1 Maine's first bean to bar chocolate manu- facturing company, Bixby & Co., is looking for wholesale opportunities for a new fall/winter collection of luxury bonbons. Bixby was founded by mother-daughter team Kate and Donna McAleer in late 2011, and its products are manufactured in a 125- year-old former ice plant located on the working waterfront on the mid-coast of Maine. All bonbons are made with non-GMO and gluten-free chocolate. They also incor- porate local Maine ingredients such as blueberries, lavender, roses, honey, straw- berries, maple syrup, sea salt, potatoes and more. New for fall 2019 are the following bon- bon flavors: Maine Blueberry Jam, Espresso Tahini, Maine Maple Vanilla, Coffee Brandy Truffle, Pecan Pie Truffle, Cranberry Orange Smash, Maine Apple Cider Caramel, Fig and Balsamic Truffle, Peppermint Dark Chocolate and also Champagne. Bonbons are available in six- piece collections with a suggested re- tail price of $16 or 12-piece collec- tions with a $32 suggested retail price. Choose from all of one flavor or assorted flavors. Bixby & Co. is committed to fair- ness, sustainability, minimal environ- mental impact and community enhancement by sourcing ingredients lo- cally and seasonally. The company makes luxury chocolate confections that are clean and natural, with a conscience. For more information, visit www.bixbyco.com or to place a wholesale order, call 207.691.2634 or email info@bixbyco.com. GN Luxury Bonbon Collections Feature Flavors of Maine cheeseballs and mixes for treats like Mis- sissippi Mud Cake, Chocolate Cobbler and Chocolate Gravy – everything that a home cook would need to put a dinner party on the table in a flash, according to Kay Allison, the sister who handles the marketing and technology duties for the company. Her sister, Claire Easley, is the com- pany's product developer and the one who had the idea to start a gourmet food business eight years ago after she re- tired from teaching. "Claire just has always liked to cook," Allison said. "When we first started, I was just going to make labels and help Claire." Easley had a collection of recipes passed down from her mother, fa- ther and grandmother that included fam- ily favorites as well as experience working in a local gourmet food shop that had given her in- sight into retailing. In Kay, she also had a sister who'd been doing pho- tography for 30 years and was willing to shoot pictures and design la- bels for her. Since she also had experi- ence making websites, she could be drafted to that too. The two of them de- cided to form a partnership in which each would contribute their own skills. "You do your thing, and I'll do mine. I don't step on her toes, and she doesn't do my computer work," Allison said. "My sister's the product developer; I'm the computer lady, and we have figured out that if I can make some- thing, anybody can – and that's true!" Newer products include Cherry Vanilla Bagel Spread and Waffle Topper, White Chocolate Bread Pudding Mix, Cheesy Cheddar Potato Soup and Cheddar Broccoli Soup, while best-sellers in- clude a Southern Chicken Salad mix; BLT Dip mix, which can also be used as the seasoning for a cheese ball; and the sea- soning for a Gourmet Gumbo. The prod- ucts are made in small batches and shipped from Coldwater, Mississippi. For more information, visit www .southernsistersgourmet.com. GN BY LORRIE BAUMANN Two former elementary school teachers have made a tiny town in northern Mis- sissippi their headquarters for making Southern-style hospitality a convenient option for home cooks across the country. Their Southern Sisters Gourmet offers starter kits for Southern-style entrees, jams and jellies, mixes for dips and Southern Style from Mississippi Sisters partnerships and friendships. Allen Ben- ton, Owner of Benton's Smoky Mountain Country Hams, smokes Olive and Sin- clair's cacao beans that go into the brand's Smoked Nib Brittle. Some of Witherow's Kentuckian distiller friends came down to the factory with used bourbon barrels; he aged some cacao in them, and the result was the Bourbon Nib Brittle. Pappy Van Winkle sends some its own barrels to Olive and Sinclair so they can order their own version of the brittle, and local brew- eries make some flavorful stouts using these Nashville nibs. Olive and Sinclair also produces the Seersucker Candy Co. line, which in- cludes the Original Seersucker, a choco- late sphere with sea salt chocolate ganache inside. Muzzle Loaders are a new take on the bourbon ball, filled with liq- uid salted bourbon caramel, and Cherry Bombs are like cherry cordials, but have a pickled Maraschino cherry inside, which is coated with buttermilk fondant and a dark chocolate finish. All of them are packaged in a recreation of an old gramophone tube, in a celebration of Nashville's music scene. Other creations include Chocuterie a small-batch product that looks exactly like dried salumi inside and out, but is actually chocolate made with other ingredients, de- pending on when it's made, and the fresh limited-edition bars. "When I started on this, I wanted it to sound and feel timeless," Witherow said, from classic packaging to stone-grinding the chocolate, the name of the company and the flavor of the product. "It's gone over well for us." For more information, visit www .oliveandsinclair.com. GN BY GREG GONZALES Olive and Sinclair is the first and only bean- to-bar brand in Tennessee, using Fair Trade and organic chocolate from the Dominican Republic, Guatemala, Ecuador and Mada- gascar. "We're first and foremost Ten- nessee's, and arguably the South's, first bean-to-bar chocolate company," said Owner Scott Witherow. While bean-to-bar is nothing new in itself, Witherow's creative take on chocolate and infusion of South- ern-inspired flavors bring something new to the confection world. Some of these infusions are the result of Olive and Sinclair Puts Southern Flavor in Gourmet Chocolate MISSISSIPPI MUD CAKE CHOCOLATE GRAVY GOURMET GUMBO CHERRY VANILLA BAGEL SPREAD SOUTHERN CHICKEN SALAD

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