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BY LORRIE BAUMANN Grocers should be prepared to see their center stores disappear within their lifetimes as the busi- ness of retail sales of consumer packaged goods moves online, warned Brandon Barnholt, Presi- dent and CEO of KeHE, as he spoke in early February to an au- dience of his customers and ven- dors at the annual KeHE Summer Selling Show. That online migra- tion of sales for consumer pack- aged goods was one of the trends that Barnholt believes will be most important to the grocery business this year. Overall, though grocers are facing chal- lenges from a rapidly evolving BY LORRIE BAUMANN Leelanau Raclette was just one of two American cheeses to bring back a super gold award from the 2016 World Cheese Awards. From the entire world, only 66 cheeses, out of 3,060 cheeses en- tered into the competition, were awarded super golds. "It's a big honor for us because we are such a small company, and there are not a lot of creameries from Michigan. It makes us feel so special. It was a huge accom- plishment for us to win such an award," says Cheesemaker Anne Hoyt, who owns Leelanau Cheese Company with her hus- Leelanau Raclette Wins Super Gold at World Cheese Awards Continued on PAGE 6 (Following Naturally Healthy) Continued on PAGE 6 (Following Naturally Healthy) Continued on PAGE 8 (Following Naturally Healthy) band John, who is also a Cheese- maker. "Every year we win some- thing; gold, silver, bronze, but this award is very rare, and we are very proud. It promotes lots of sales, and all our customers love it which helps keep us going. It's like winning at the Olympic Games." The Hoyts have been making their Swiss-style raclette in northern Michigan for more than 20 years. Their career together started after John, who'd left Michigan to travel through Eu- rope, met some Swiss cheese mak- ers, and decided to find out more about what they did for a living. "He attended an agricultural school in Switzerland to learn how to make cheese and started work- ing on alpine farms milking cows and making cheese. He specifically learned how to make raclette cheese, which is the traditional cheese from the Valais region," Anne says. It was while John was begin- ning his career as a cheese maker that he met Anne, who was work- ing as a shepherd. The two of them worked together on two alpine farms over the next couple of years, and then they decided that they'd like to strike out on their own. "John always wanted to come back to Michigan," Anne says. "We moved to Detroit, where John is from, and we got married." Award-Winning Salumist Curing America's Food KeHE President Expresses Optimism for Future of American Grocery Retail market, Barnholt is optimistic about the future of American gro- cery retail and its ability to adapt. While economists are pre- dicting that retail sales will increase by about 3.9 percent this year over last year, there's a question in the air about how much of that in- crease will be seen by brick and mortar grocery retailers and how much will be bitten off by Ama- zon, Barnholt said. While conven- tional grocers are scrambling to form digital relationships with their consumer customers, Ama- zon already has that relationship, he pointed out. "They've got $20B of food that they're shipping in middle-of-store products. That would be the equivalent of replacing 800 center stores of traditional gro- cery," he said. "I think we'd all agree that Ama- zon is just getting started." "Whatever you know about Amazon, you need to know that they're three steps ahead of you," he added. "However we're thinking about Amazon, they're further ahead of that." Despite that threat on the BY LORRIE BAUMANN Paul Theroux was riding the Trans-Siberian Express three days east of Nishni Novgorod, when he was offered manti by a passing stranger. Theroux described the manti as steam- ing meat-filled dumplings. "I knew the word because I'd heard manti for dumpling in Turkey and elsewhere," Ther- oux wrote in "Ghost Train to the Eastern Star." Some of this came back to me when I stopped in front of Kader Ucar and Hasan Ertas Continued on PAGE 7 (Following Naturally Healthy) A Taste of Anatolia from Ana's Apron (wife and husband) at the Winter Fancy Food Show. They were standing in front of a banner identifying Ana's Apron, and what they had on a table in front of them was a little plate of Ana's Apron Manti, which Ucar, who is Ana's Apron's President, described as traditional Anatolian-style manti. Anatolia is the Asian part of Turkey, she further explained. Ucar is also the Founder of Palo Alto Pasta Co., which owns the Ana's Apron brand. It's a woman-owned and operated business located in California's Bay Area. Ten percent of the BY LORRIE BAUMANN With the January 20 announce- ment of a Good Food Award for its Landrauchschinkin, a Swiss- style country smoked ham, Olympia Provisions, a Portland, Oregon-based salumeria, achieved a record for Good Food Awards in the charcuterie category, and salu- mist Elias Cairo solidified his po- sition as one of the top Good Food Award winners across all categories. His total now comes in at 11 Good Food Awards since his Loukanika, Saucisson d'Arles and Pork Liver Mousse were named winners in the inaugural compe- tition for both the Good Food Awards and himself. Olympia Provisions was one of 2,059 companies entering the 2017 Good Food Awards with en- tries in 14 categories ranging from craft beers to spirits. Of those, 193 companies were named winners in the competi- tion that honors the makers of food that's both delicious and pro- duced with concern for environ- mental sustainability, social justice and humane treatment of animals. Just to enter his charcu- terie in the competition, Cairo was required to pledge, among VOLUME 82, NUMBER 3 MARCH 2017 n $7.00 News ..............................................4 Ad Index .......................................11 Calendar.......................................11 www.gourmetnews.com G OURMET N EWS T H E B U S I N E S S N E W S P A P E R F O R T H E G O U R M E T I N D U S T R Y ® UPDATE: Fancy Food Show Wrap-Up SEE PAGE 9 (Following Naturally Healthy) RETAILER NEWS: Hewn SEE PAGE 8 (Following Naturally Healthy) NEWS & NOTES: IH+HS Preview SEE PAGE 4 SPECIAL ISSUE INSIDE: NATURALLY HEALTHY CLICK HERE TO READ THIS NOW!