The possibilities are numerous for the marketing outcome of potatoes harvested this summer on the Eastern Shore. Grower-shippers cited a variety of factors that will influence each other as the Eastern Shore plans to begin its spud harvest in late June. At Dublin Farms, a potato grower-shipper based in Horntown, VA, David Hickman, Dublin vice president, said May 21, "I think the market will be fairly good. If North Carolina has its normal orderly marketing and moves a good part of their crop in June and the first week of July, I think July should have fairly good prices. We should have a

FRESNO, CA -- The California Table Grape Commission, here, engages in a variety of activities to keep fresh California grapes top-of-mind for chefs and consumers as well as for the food and lifestyle writers and editors who influence culinary trends. This year, those activities will involve high-profile exposure for California grapes at events ranging from Food Fête to baseball games. The grape commission is a regular participant in the annual conference of the International Association of Culinary Professionals. Following the recent IACP conference held April 21-24 in Portland, OR, IACP

NEW YORK -- The sky's the limit for Ocean Spray Cranberries Inc.'s new line of blueberry offerings. Literally. The Lakeville-Middleboro, MA-based cooperative that is best known for its cranberries recently began offering fresh blueberries, a blueberry juice- infused sweetened dried cranberry as part of its trademarked "Crasins" line, blueberry juice cocktails and sugar-free blueberry juice mixes. To promote the new offerings, Ocean Spray recently teamed with JetBlue Airways Corp., which according to the latter's 2009 annual report is "the seventh largest passenger carrier in the United States

Louis Hymel, director of purchasing and marketing for Orlando, FL-based Spice World Inc., is upbeat about his company's garlic program. "So far, the California crop looks nice but is a little late because of cooler- than-normal weather," Mr. Hymel told The Produce News June 11. "I believe that the market should remain strong as supplies coming from China will remain tight again this year, especially for big garlic, as they did during 2009 and the first half of 2010." Mr. Hymel had just returned from China, where he went to assess what to expect from the Asian nation's upcoming garlic season

Central California's summer non-storage onion production total for 2009 was slightly more than 7.3 million fiftyweight bags, down from slightly more than 8.2 million fiftyweight bags in 2008. The fiftyweight bag tally for 2007 was more than 8.8 million fiftyweight bags, said Wayne Mininger, executive vice president of the National Onion Association. The sliding production totals correspond with a drop in onion acreage under production. In 2009, Central California had 6,500 acres in production, compared with 7,800 acres in 2008 and 8,800 acres in 2007. Summer non-storage onion production is the

Spice World has introduced a new squeezable garlic product that it said is the next generation of garlic packaging, representing a new level of value-added convenience and usage. Packed in convenient 9.5- and 20-ounce squeezable bottles, the new product eliminates waste, mess and cross-contamination, and removes the labor-intensive tasks of cleaning, peeling and mincing fresh garlic. Spice World, which is based in Orlando, FL, has built a new state-of-the-art facility with the latest technology for processing and packaging. The new squeezable garlic comes packed 12 bottles per tear-apart