Celebrity chef product endorsements are expensive propositions. Famous spokespeople like Bobby Flay, Rachael Ray, Paula Deen and Emeril Lagasse, who have achieved near movie-star status, cost about as much for an appearance as a college education. For a name endorsement on a product, their agents would negotiate a percentage of every piece of fruit or vegetable produced for the duration of a contract. But those in the foodservice industry can certainly benefit by staying informed about this growing segment of the culinary industry in order to stay updated on food trends of the day. One chef to

When a "Today Show" nutritionist advised viewers to avoid certain conventionally grown fresh produce items because they may be unsafe, it was "so over the top that we had to respond," said Teresa Thorne of the Alliance for Food & Farming. The July 6 show featured New York nutritionist Joy Bauer, who listed the fruits and vegetables that contain the highest amounts of pesticide residues and urged consumers to buy only organically grown commodities for safety reasons. In the segment "Is Organic Worth the Extra Green?" Ms. Bauer called a "dirty dozen" list of fresh vegetables and fruits "must

GONZALES, CA -- Foxy Foods has added to its line of fresh vegetable trays with a new personal, single-serving size featuring three different vegetables and Hidden Valley Ranch dressing dip. The new eight-ounce "Foxy" vegetable snack tray includes broccoli florets, sliced celery sticks and baby carrots, accompanied by a two-ounce container of Hidden Valley Ranch dressing dip. Designed as a healthy snack alternative, the "Foxy" vegetable snack tray is available nationwide and complements a full line of conventional and organic fresh vegetable trays from Foxy Foods. The new "Foxy" vegetable snack

Salinas, CA-based D'Arrigo Bros. of California has introduced a new product: premium cut tops broccoli rabe, packaged under its "Andy Boy" label. Margaret D'Arrigo-Martin, executive vice president of sales and marketing for D'Arrigo Bros. of California, told The Produce News July 10 that the broccoli rabe product would be introduced at the Produce Marketing Association's Foodservice conference in Monterey. "Four or five years ago, broccoli rabe was a 15-pound loose product," Ms. D'Arrigo-Martin said. "Now it's a smaller cut using the tips - not the whole plant." The product is iceless, which

RIVERHEAD, NY -- Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale, a tale of a fateful trip. It started from a Long Island port aboard a not-so-tiny ship. For those who grow up on the east end of New York's Long Island, fishing is in the blood. For Paul Visentin, fishing was not only an activity, but it also led to an unlikely career in produce. "I started fishing when I was two years old," Mr. Visentin said. "You can't live on eastern Long Island without fishing." During his summer breaks from the University of Delaware, Mr. Visentin, 27, said that he worked as a mate on a charter fishing boat out

The Perishables Group, a Chicago-based independent consulting firm specializing in the fresh foods industry, formed an information sharing agreement with Giant Food Stores to provide data and tools to implement a customized perishables performance tracking and category development program for its operating companies. The agreement will enable Giant, its Tops division and supplier partners to gain new insights into category performance across the perishables departments including produce, meat, seafood, deli and bakery. "Information to strategically analyze perishables performance has not been