My earliest Hanukkah memories are of standing by my grandma’s side as she fried up mountains of her mouthwatering latkes. She was “old school” and would buy piles of potatoes from the local grocery store (bodegas in the Bronx tended to only carry conventional Burbank russets). She would painstakingly peel them, grate them, put them thru the food processor, add some salt and chopped onions, and lay them one at a time into a sizzling oil-filled skillet. Every surface of her kitchen would soon be covered in paper towel draped plates, soaking up the excess oil from the finished latkes. If I behaved and helped out, I would get to try a few steaming samples.

Fast forward to the present and Whole Foods Market shoppers have a number of great food options for their Hanukkah needs. Our produce department regularly stocks many delicious varieties of organic and conventional potatoes, from the standard Burbank russets, to red creamers and purple or yellow fingerlings. The adventurous souls can even substitute some Hanna yams for a sweeter latke experience.

In the grocery department, we are also working hard to make Whole Foods Market a Hanukkah destination. Expanding our selection of kosher products that meet our strict quality standards has been a challenge, though. Many suppliers still use artificial preservatives and other ingredients we will not carry in our stores. That’s why we are excited to announce that Streit’s has agreed to take the artificial additives and preservatives out of many of their products. Streit’s is a well-known kosher foods producer, the only family owned and operated Matzo producer in the U.S. – they are still based in the Lower East Side of Manhattan.

We’ve partnered with Streit’s to bring the first ever sulfite-free potato pancake mix to market. The “clean” potato pancake mix will be featured at our stores this holiday season, and Streit’s has been converting their whole production line to move away from artificial ingredients. In addition, we will be carrying their traditional matzo ball soup mix, as well as a mix made with whole wheat flour.

Our partnership with Streit’s is having a nice ripple effect on the kosher food industry as a whole. Andrew Lansman, head of kosher distributor A&L Foods, puts it this way: “Five years ago, kosher manufacturers didn’t even care about being all natural. Now, most are trying to reformulate their product line so they can be all natural. If they do have clean items, they are promoting it on the packaging and in their sales presentations. In addition to the reformulation of existing products, many new items have been developed because of Whole Foods Market’s influence, including many whole grain and organic products. If a new item is being developed, the first question the kosher manufacturer will, of course, ask is if they can do it kosher, but the second question they will ask is if they can produce it clean.”

Aaron Gross, President of Streit’s, sums it up: “Being a family owned and run company, we have a strong sense of holiday and place great importance on family gatherings. We understand the importance of providing healthy products that use clean nutritional ingredients while still placing a strong emphasis on traditional kosher meals.”

In addition to having these convenient and all natural Hanukkah staples, we also carry plenty of other holiday treats and side dishes. Traditional toppings for latkes include kosher applesauce and sour cream. Most of our stores carry Eden and Santa Cruz organic apple sauces, and for kosher sour cream needs, you can’t beat Organic Valley or Nancy’s.

For the sweet tooth, we also carry some cool stuff, including Elyon Kosher Marshmallows, which go great over sweet potato pie. We are also carrying Whole Trade Guarantee™ and Organic Kosher Hanukkah gelt (chocolate coins) from Divine Chocolates, who ethically sources cacao from cooperatives in Ghana. And we even have kosher, fair trade and organic candy canes, made by Pure Fun confections.

From the old school to what’s new and cool, Whole Foods Market is committed to making Hanukkah festivals more natural, organic, convenient and best of all, fun for the family.

Neil Fusco knows tomatoes. A trained chef and restaurateur, he is a native of the legendary San Marzano region of Italy. Growing up around some of the best tomatoes in the world, it is fitting that Neil would eventually come up with pasta sauces of his own.

“Since the 1800’s in southern Italy, my family has farmed the world’s best tomatoes, the San Marzano variety. These are the tomatoes that I use to make my Cucina Antica brand of cooking sauces as well as my new Monte Bene pasta sauces.” The tomatoes are grown at the foot of Mount Vesuvius in southern Italy, giving the San Marzano tomatoes a truly light, fresh and sweet flavor. Neil’s original brand, Cucina Antica, is sold at Whole Foods Market stores nationwide and is made from 100% DOP San Marzano tomatoes. It is one of our best selling all natural, artisanal pasta sauces.

Neil has now taken his passion for pasta sauce to another level, with a new brand that blends San Marzano tomatoes with locally grown tomatoes from farms in New Jersey. Dubbed “Monte Bene” or “Mountain of Good,” Neil’s new sauce is not only more affordable but it also reflects his desire to promote ethically and sustainably sourced products.

You may be thinking: “New Jersey tomatoes? You gotta be kidding me!” New Jersey is actually the birthplace of the U.S. tomato industry. For a century, millions of cans of brand name soups were made with tomatoes grown, processed and canned in New Jersey. The desire for lower cost raw materials and higher profits moved much of the tomato industry to the sunny valleys of California, leaving behind both farmers and boarded-up factories.

But with the rising interest in local foods and farmers markets, New Jersey tomatoes are making a comeback. Last year our Northeast Region worked with Rutgers University and local farmers to bring the Jersey Fresh™ brand of canned tomatoes into our stores in that area and it has been a stunning success.

Neil’s Monte Bene brand builds on this positive trend, by partnering his expertise directly with a number of New Jersey farmers who take pride in the quality of their product.

Farmer Joe Leone, a third generation farmer from Clarksboro, NJ, says that the great tasting flavor comes from picking ripe, red tomatoes. “We do not pick tomatoes that are half green; only those that are ripened on the vine and picked at maturity.”

Farmer Ed Byrnes of Pilesgrove, NJ, has been farming since 1986 and is pretty enthusiastic about Monte Bene as well: “There is nothing better than a Jersey tomato! You can taste the difference in flavor between tomatoes from New Jersey and tomatoes from other states due to the soil.”

And the expert himself, Neil, says, “New Jersey tomatoes are the most flavorful for sauce making in the U.S. due to their low level of acidity, allowing for a naturally sweetened, well balanced fruit flavor. I chose the New Jersey tomatoes in making Monte Bene pasta sauces because the tomatoes are farm-fresh picked, processed within 12 hours of harvesting and travel a short distance to where they are jarred. This method makes for a truly homemade flavor pasta sauce.”

Monte Bene, a great tasting, artisanal pasta sauce with the goal of doing good for the common good, is available at Whole Foods Market nationwide.

And that is a good choice. Naked Juice has taken a lead in the food industry in terms of scrutinizing their carbon footprint. They are making some cool choices to improve the sustainability of their production facility, their juice bottles and even the tasty stuff inside the bottles. Here’s how.

Their first big move will actually be that: a relocation into a brand new LEED certified production facility. This means they have met some pretty stringent criteria for water and energy efficiency, use of recycled building materials and waste reduction. Whole Foods Market has also gone through this certification with some of our new stores and it’s quite an accomplishment!

Next, Naked Juice announced that they will be the first national beverage company to use 100% post consumer recycled plastic, or RPet. This means their bottles will be made from previously used bottles. This is pretty important for a few reasons. Most drink bottles are made out of #1 Plastic, or PET, and this is one of the most prevalent and easily recycled plastics. The folks at Naked Juice estimate that once they complete their transition, they will be able to reduce virgin plastic use by over 8 million pounds. This also translates into over 57,000 barrels of oil a year that they will not be importing.

As you know, there is a lot of plastic in the environment – including an area in the Pacific Ocean called the North Pacific Gyre, where many tons of plastic bottles have ended up. Naked Juice estimates that if you took a 55-story building and stuffed it full of plastic, it would equal the amount of plastic they will be keeping out of the trash stream. Not only that, their leadership serves as encouragement for other big brands to use recycled plastic and create a bigger market for RPet.

And that ain’t all, folks. Naked Juice has also decided that they will become the first major American juice company to partner with Rainforest Alliance to certify the tons of bananas used in their juice. Rainforest Alliance is an independent nonprofit working to ensure that the folks who grow your food use sustainable environmental and agricultural practices while gaining better livelihoods and working conditions. They are one of three certifiers who are part of Whole Foods Market’s Whole Trade Guarantee™, which guarantees that the products are ethically and sustainably sourced. Rainforest Alliance’s green tree frog logo can be found on many of the chocolate, coffee and produce items that we sell. Naked Juice’s decision means that over 20 million more tons of sustainably grown, fair trade bananas will be produced every year.

Whole Foods Market is proud to partner with cool vendors such as Naked Juice, whose commitment to quality and sustainability sets new benchmarks in the natural foods industry.

I get to see a lot of cool products in my job. One of the coolest products we are currently carrying at Whole Foods Market is Siggi’s Skyr. Not only is it a great yogurt but the back story is awesome.

Skyr is Icelandic-style yogurt, a traditional delicacy that is thicker and higher in protein than most yogurts. It is made from skim milk and has almost no fat. Think Greek yogurt that has adapted to survive harsh arctic winters … hardier and refreshingly sour, with 16 grams of protein, zero saturated fat and just 120 calories per 6 oz serving.

Siggi Hilmarsson grew up in Iceland and was homesick one holiday season a few years ago. He had grown up hearing about his grandmother’s skyr and decided to try his hand at making some of his own. In 2006, he started selling his own brand of skyr.

I first heard about Siggi’s skyr when I was the grocery coordinator in the Northeast region and a frequent visitor to the downtown NYC farmer’s markets and cheese shops, where Siggi had premiered his creation. It soon ended up on my desk during a new item meeting with one of our dairy distributors. I loved the hand labeled package, the simple list of ingredients, including the agave nectar used for sweetness, and that he used five distinct bacterial cultures. Carrying his product was a no-brainer, but Siggi did not yet have capacity to supply us, so we had to wait.

In the meantime, Siggi partnered with some dairy farmers in upstate New York to produce more skyr. Upstate New York is a legendary region for milk products, with a true sense of terroir and a history of sustainable dairy production that goes back to the colonial era. Siggi was able to find some like-minded farmers whose hormone- and antibiotic-free milk would be ideal for such an artisanal product. Consistent with his locavore and eco-friendly tendencies, Siggi also started using yogurt cups with 50% less plastic, packed in a recyclable cardboard sleeve.

Once Siggi was ready, we decided to launch his products in several dozen stores on the east coast. The response was overwhelming and Siggi had a hard time keeping up with demand. In fact, he had to build a whole new production line to supply our skyr-hungry customers!

Despite sporadic supply issues, sales were huge and the legend of Siggi’s Skyr spread westward. Our regional buyers have a lot of autonomy in selecting what goes on our shelves, and they keep an eye on what’s moving in other parts of the country. When they spot a hit, they work to pick it up and bring it to their customer base. And that’s what has happened with Siggi’s Skyr. And so, starting this month, Siggi’s Skyr will be available in most Whole Foods Markets nationwide, in six fantastic flavors and two convenient sizes.

From a downtown farmer’s market to national distribution, Siggi’s is a real life example of how Whole Foods Market and our great producers are working together to bring the best stuff to our customers.

Most of us know So Delicious/Turtle Mountain because of their coconut and soy-based frozen desserts and yogurts, which have revolutionized dairy-free and soy-free diets. And now these creative minds have done something cool and unique in the world of milk. They have taken coconut milk out of the Asian foods aisle and put it into the familiar gable topped cartons that normally accompany breakfast cereal.

Kevin Brouillette, Turtle Mountain’s Vice President of Sales, told me that his team “was blown away by the taste and versatility of coconut milk.” Not only does it looks like milk visually but the fatty acids in coconut milk give it a smooth, creamy texture.

Known as medium chain fatty acids (MCFA’s), these fats are a reason why coconut has been a dietary staple around the world. Many traditional cultures attribute coconut with health benefits. Western medicine concurs, with studies showing the antiviral and anti-inflammatory properties of MCFA’s. And best of all, unlike the long chain fatty acids that most of us store in our love handles, MCFA’s can be utilized as energy.

Whole Foods Market is the first national retailer to sell So Delicious Refrigerated Coconut Milks, and we currently sell three flavors nationwide: Plain, Unsweetened and Vanilla. They are gluten-free, vegan and fortified with calcium and Vitamin B12.

Or, as my wife said, “This stuff rocks.”

It’s safe to say that here at Whole Foods Market, herbal and botanical ingredients are a pretty basic part of what we are about. We even have a whole section of the store dedicated to medicinal herbs and supplements, called Whole Body. And over in the beverage section, some forward-thinking vendors are using herbal and botanical ingredients to make functional drinks more interesting.

One such product line is Solixir, a blend of sparkling spring water, fruit juice and a unique formulation in each of its three drinks: Blackberry Chamomile, Orange Maté and Pomegranate Ginger. Solixir was developed by an expert herbalist, Amanda McQuade Crawford. Amanda says, “Solixir is a truly exceptional drink with natural botanicals like Lemon Balm, Panax Ginseng, and Elderberry that I have been prescribing to my clients for 20 years.”

Solixir, with over 1,700mg of these standardized herbal ingredients per can, has no added sugar and stacks up at less than 60 calories. According to Amanda: “At Solixir and in my own life, we keep rooted in respect for ancient wisdom, growing with current science to make sure our beverages deliver on the promise of herbal medicine and the needs of consumers for a beneficial and great tasting drink.”

My personal favorite is the “Relax” Blackberry Chamomile. I am a big fan of chamomile, especially after a long day at work, and I like the mild tartness of blackberry and lemon juice. Not too sweet and just a little sparkling. This is good stuff! You can find Solixir in most of our stores.