FOOD INTERNATIONAL

KIWIS AT 32nd Salon De Gourmets Expo

Adel, Amelia and Damon – NZ delegation in Madrid.

Would you prefer your YOLO fig fruit paste with or without seeds? What fruit will we combine with the mulberry for another fruit paste option? On Friday we sat down with the owners of Laguaparts Alimentacion to nut out new ideas for our YOLO fruit pastes.

We had a very productive exchange of ideas (“yes, we’d leave the seeds in the fig paste … gives a more natural and rustic appeal”) with owners, Mar Lavin Sanchez and Javier Garcia Gonzalez, followed by a factory tour and a typically long Spanish lunch. Totally enjoyable.

We left Zaragoza early for the 4-hour trip to the factory near Toledo. The motorway system is so impressive (“with a surface as smooth as silk,” Adel raves), and it all runs so fluidly. Can’t say the same for the dialogue between the driver and me as a navigator. Even with GPS, I’m challenged. But, then it is a female thing. Right?

Adel’s been doing business with these delightful fruit paste people for more than five years. Their fruit pastes have been very successful and sell well in New Zealand. Now we are going to expand the range on offer.

Mar and Javier took over the company in the 1980s with the guidance of Mar’s father, Emilio who had worked in the industry for many years. They started on a small scale, but as business flourished had a new factory built near Toledo 15 years ago. With a staff of 12, they now export their fruit pastes to several European countries, USA, Dubai, Mexico, Colombia and Australia. And we were one of their first export customers. 

We were really impressed with their immaculate factory facilities and they adhere to a very strict food safety programme. See the photographs of our grand tour and later lunch.

At Food International, we like working with this dynamic couple and love their products, which are consistently great. The pastes are just the right consistency, level of sweetness and flavour profile to make our YOLO cheeses sing!

We’ll be coming to you with more flavours and possibly different sizes soon. The 140 gm packs are produced exclusively for Food International.

And just a footnote: Holy Toledo, the historic town of Toledo is truly magnificent. We had a night there and want to go back…

Adios for now

Adel’s serious scouting for Spanish products began the day after we arrived in Madrid – on May 1 a national holiday for Labour Day. On Wednesday morning we drove to the beautiful town of Zaragoza in the province of Aragon for his first meeting with an olive company, Jose Lou.

The photo shows us both with Matie Lou, who runs the company with two cousins. The business was started by her grandfather in 1833 with a factory in the old medieval part of Zaragoza. It was relocated to a modern industrial zone in the 1980s.

Jose Lou handles a huge range of different varieties of olives – many grown locally and not available in other parts of Spain. The company also employs many different techniques for the production and sales of their olives from using many varied marinades (including an assortment of herbs grown in the region) to several stuffed options and mixes with other pickled vegetables.

A product that could do really well in New Zealand (Adel reckons) is a natural black olive (Empeltre) which is small, fleshy and has a tiny stone. It is sold in 210 gm glass jars – without liquid – and has a shelf life of up two years. No worries about the olive brine spilling through your picnic baskets or tipping through your fridge contents.

A unique green olive, which is synonymous with the region and a great favourite in tapas bars is the Campo Real. We’ve been trying to source this kind of green olive for New Zealand since trying it in Madrid on earlier trips. And Jose Lou will be able to provide us with this for food service and retail.

We can already visualise these amazing olives on our shop shelves and starring in local pantries 

Exciting times ahead for Food International. YOLO will be expanding to olives to complement our European cheeses. The perfect Mediterranean match.

So the mountain of samples to be hauled back home is building already – along with serious olive samplings for us both. Not complaining though! They are seriously delicious.

Kashkaval, Caciocavallo or Kasseri
27/04/18

I’m heading off to Spain soon to join Adel in one of his very favourite activities – sourcing more exciting products for our YOLO range for our customers.

We’re nearly packed and enjoying that lovely pre-travel buzz.

But, before we take off we’d like some feedback from you – our YOLO enthusiasts out there, affectionately known as YOLOers by the team at Food International – about naming an addition to our line-up of European cheeses.

Adel has been tasting different cheesemakers’ versions of Kashkaval, which is a semi-hard, yellow cheese (Made from cows’ milk) that is very popular in the Mediterranean and Eastern Europe. He’s very nostalgic about the foods he grew up enjoying in Egypt and this is one of them.

We’ve had some informal tastings with YOLOers and their reaction has been really positive – we know this cheese will be a winner here.

But, we have a small problem. What do we call it? This cheese is produced in Bulgaria, Lebanon, Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, Syria and Turkey and is known by an assortment of names. In the Balkans it’s mostly known as Kashkaval, in Italy it’s called Caciocavallo, and in Turkey it’s Kasseri.

We’re tending towards Kashkavel at Food Internatiional HQ. We like the hint of exotic mystique and hopefully this will be a cheese you’ll never forget.

We’d love to hear from you think and with your name suggestions. Email me (robyn.yousef@gmail.com) or Adel on (adel@foodinternational.co.nz) with your ideas.

CULTURE & CHEESE

Photography by Jude Madison.

The literary world came to Food International’s premises recently. Instead of the usual strident sounds from the forklift, orders being yelled out and the cheese cutting room in full working mode, the board room was filled with the melodic voice of famous Samoan writer, Sia  Figiel, reading from her latest novel, ‘Free Love.’

Food International’s Gladys Youssef took advantage of the recent mid-week holiday and a flying visit to Auckland by Sia to organise the reading.

An internationally acclaimed and award-winning poet, writer and painter, she won the Commonwealth Writer’s Prize for the Best First Book for the South-East Asia Pacific region with ‘where we once belonged’. She is the first Pacific Islander to win the prize and her work has been translated into French, German, Spanish, Catalan and Danish.

‘Free Love’ is Sia’s fourth novel and has been very well received by international critics. Local Samoan women who attended the reading (many had attended St Mary’s Convent in Apia with the writer so there was lots of laughter and nostalgia) described the book as: “an excellent read and very steamy.”

And of course, we couldn’t have a meeting organised by Gladys without wonderful food to complement the literary cultural event. YOLO cheeses were the heroes in a selection of yummy platters (prepared by Harvest & Gather) which showed just how artistic and versatile a selection of platters based on different varieties of YOLO can be.

As for the author, who has appeared at literary conferences and festivals throughout the world and performed her poetry at the Shakespeare Globe Theatre in London, life is taking a different turn. Sia is returning to live in Samoa where she plans to grow her own food and live off the grid.

We wish her well and recommend you pick up a copy of ‘Free Love’. Enjoy Sia’s elegant prose with a glass of something special and a platter of YOLO treats.

Dr YOLO (aka Adel Yousef) checks out the health of YOLO’s Mainland man, Keith Robinson, after YOLO Fever hit Auckland’s ASB Showgrounds  at the annual April Foodstuffs New Zealand Trade Expo.

Supermarket suppliers showed off their products to customers from throughout New Zealand with hundreds shown the ‘healing properties’ of YOLO Cheeses.

FECOTTA YOLO CHEESE – A World First

Food International has a world first with their Fecotta YOLO. Working with European suppliers based in Hungary, the Auckland company has created and patented a new variety of cheese – Fecotta.

Food International CEO, Adel Yousef, was looking for an exciting addition to the company’s range YOLO range of European cheeses when he came up with the concept of a new product which combines the texture of Feta with the taste of Ricotta.

After many trials, the Hungarian cheese makers came up with the perfect combination of both traditional cheeses and Fecotta was created.

This product is easy to cut (with less rind than Ricotta) and is ideal for salads, pizzas and grilling. It is less salty than other Fetas and other grilling cheeses. It also doesn’t crumble – making it easy to use, especially in salads.

Packed in a 225 vacuum pack in a display carton of 12 pieces, Fecotta, first hit the shelves in around Christmas 2017. This cheese is also made with vegetarian rennet – another big sales advantage.  It has been a very popular seller and particularly with the trendy “foodies” of New Zealand, who love to sample new products.

And as it becomes increasingly well-known,  Food International predict Fecotta will outsell many of the other Europeans white cheeses because of its versatility and dual nature combining two well-known cheeses.

As a healthy product (with 3g of fat per serving) it also reinforces the big move towards products which promote our good health and well-being.

Fecotta has a broad appeal (even little kids love it) is exciting as a world first with an international patent registered to Food International.