Which came first the Pickle or the Egg? It all started in 2008, when a friend eating one of my Mellow Mustard Pickled Eggs told me that these were awesome pickles and that I should go into business making them. From there, it egg-sploded into not one, but two businesses: a Pickle Cannery and an Egg Grading Facility.
Trained in the agricultural field with lots of experience canning and preserving products for my family, I thought how hard could it be to run my own business? Who knew the challenges I would face – government regulations, inspections, labeling restrictions and so much more. But with perseverance and the help of Community Futures I have succeeded!
The Pickle Cannery is situated on our farm, where we make 22 different types of pickles from our Tangy Asparagus Dilled Pickles to our Sweet Cinnamon Pickled Beets. All the vegetables and egg products are produced or grown on our farm or purchased from local farmers. The pickles are available in various stores in the East & West Kootenays, including Ferraro Foods in Trail and Ellison’s market in Nelson, in addition to sales from our on-farm store.
Our Egg Grading Facility is a government inspected egg grading facility where we clean, grade and pack free range eggs from our home grown birds. This is an egg-cellent business if you want to keep you hands busy – we gather, wash, candle and weigh each egg then place them into cartons to send to the stores. We have our eggs in 7 different stores in the Kootenays including Overwaitea Foods in Creston marketed under The Egg Patch name.
