Emmy's Organics

Why We Changed Our Bank

2011-12-09T09:39:00.000-08:00

A few people have asked questions about why we changed out bank from the Bank of America to our local bank, Tompkins Trust Company. Well its pretty simple. After doing a little research we realized that keeping our money at the BOA was not what we are about. Though we import almost all of our ingredients from other places, we still believe in contributing to our local economy as much as we can. By keeping our money with the Bank of America, our business' money is circulating amongst Wall Street banks and potentially risky investments. By keeping our money more local, our money is circulating to other local businesses and strengthening our local economy. Yes, I have already noticed that there certain fancy features that are not offered on our new bank's online service. But, I am willing to give this up for now knowing that I can see more of an impact of where our money is going.

Perhaps it is nice to know that when you purchase some of our products, a fraction of your money is going to some real people (us) and a community of people doing some really great things (Ithaca pride, right here!). There are a lot of choices to make when you are running a business and "doing the right thing" often comes up. I would like to think that our hearts are in the right place and that we continue to make choices that are both best for our business and our community.

I found this website very helpful, incase you are interested in learning more: Move Your Money.

Thank you for your support.

It is because of you that any of this is possible.

A Blog About Teeny

2011-11-17T06:26:00.000-08:00

Teeny and I went to college together at Ithaca College. She was an acting major while I studied Theatre Management and Dance. Though we both have a strong affinity for the arts, our paths have taken us to another passion: food.

When Teeny shared with me about her true passion for pie-baking and that her dream was to learn the craft and eventually open a pie shop, I couldnt help but recognize that feeling that Ian and I had almost three years ago about following our dreams to share our food with the world. A few months ago, Teeny quit her job and is now taking her dreams into her own hands!! Her business is called, Teeny Pies (appropriately). She is embarking on what she calls the "Tour of Pie," where she is visiting a different bakery every month, apprenticing, learning the craft of pie-baking and small business. Her goal to is be on tour for an entire year!! Being without a paying job now, she is going to places where she has friends to stay and has also created an indie go go campaign, Tour of Pie, to help her along the way.

We had the pleasure of hosting Teeny at our house and at the kitchen during the month of October. It was so great to have her and to watch her in action! How could you not support someone following their dreams and putting themselves out on a limb?? Help make Teeny Pies come to fruition.

Please check out Teeny's campaign, Tour of Pie and contribute!

Also, check out her facebook fan page and her tumbler page, they are really fun to look at!!

See you next time!

love,

Samantha

Plugging Away

2011-10-20T11:34:00.000-07:00

We certainly are plugging away. New ideas, new actions, new schedules, new new new. Our new packaging arrived last week and we are so pleased with how everything turned out. Incase you arent caught up, our community made this new packaging campaign happen. This past December we launched our campaign "Gift to Greatness" to raise money to hire a designer, find a new material and printer to re-vamp the look of all of our products. We raised $15,000 in 31 days. Amazing. Since then we have been working with all of these amazing people and we have finally achieved our goal. The packaging is here and soon enough our new look will be seen on the shelves of (hopefully) your favorite health food store. It is the most beautiful packaging that I have ever seen (there is even a picture of Ian and I on the back!!). The goal of our campaign was to increase the strength of our brand, so that it can continue to be a name that people trust and love. We also know that with more attractive packaging, that more people will notice our products, learn about what we do and support our business. So here we go. A new beginning begins. I would like to thank every single person who donated, shared and supported our campaign while it was going on. NONE of this could have been done without you and we are eternally grateful. You have made a dream come true. Thank you.

Here are some other new things in the works:

Our amazing landlord here had a beautiful roof built off of our back door so we can now load pallets more comfortably in the Ithaca elements...(snow).
We hired a new production person who will be making everything.
Our website is (still) new.
We are going to build a little room in our kitchen for all of our dehydrators.
Our new granola packaging will be rolling out next week.
We will be selling goods at the Chocolate World Expo in White Plains, NY on November 6th. Thanks to Vanessa Barg for telling us about it!!

Pretty exciting stuff. It feels so great to make changes and progress as we continue to recreate this dream of ours. I cannot express my gratitude for your support and encouragement. I am learning so much that to do anything we must share it, get the support from others and hold ourselves accountable for what we say we're going to do. This business is a great example but it applies to any area of life. What commitment can you share today that you are going to make happen?

All my love,

Samantha

How to Eat Sprouted Sunnies: Tutorial #1

2011-10-11T17:44:00.000-07:00

Our new sprouted sunnies are the bomb. I am loving them and putting them on EVERYTHING. Here is Tutorial #1 on the best ways to eat them...

SPRINKLE ON A SALAD! THEY ADD THE MOST PERFECT CRUNCH!

TAKE ON-THE-GO AND EAT PLAIN! (school, work, movies...anywhere. a great nosh...)

The Albany Vegetarian Expo

2011-10-03T11:06:00.000-07:00

Here are some pics from this fun event this weekend...

We had such a great time! We got to meet so many health conscious people who LOVED our products, including some familiar faces like Noah (picture 2), who thoroughly enjoyed the samples. We did an interview for a vegan radio show and Ian scored a free pair of fancy vegan shoes. It was such a success that we are looking into doing the Boston Vegetarian Expo at the end of this month. More to come on this!

We're Doing Things!

2011-09-27T14:10:00.000-07:00

I am so excited. I might say that a lot but it is true. There is something really amazing about creating things. You get to KEEP creating and then re-creating and so on and so on. That's what we are doing and the energy is good! Yes there are issues and downfalls, but we keep going and that is why we are successful. First of all, our new website launched last week. I was so excited about that that I posted a video about it on our new YouTube Channel! So fun. There will be more videos featuring recipes, news and all kinds of fun things. Really excited to exercise my imovie skills. Our new packaging will be here October 12th. That day cannot come sooner because I have so may ideas, so many people I want to send them to, so many pictures to take...ahh! So as you can see, I am excited.

We've gotten some amazing press in the past few weeks about our indie go go campaign. We recorded an interview for a video series with the Huffington post (coming out next week), were interviewed for a BOOK coming out called "Funding for Food" AND our campaign was linked to the WHITE HOUSE BLOG! We had no idea that our successful campaign was going to bring so many perks! Now I must shout out the amazing people at IndieGoGo. What amazing and supportive people all working to help people following their dreams--Thank you so much for sharing our story and what we do with people!

This weekend we are taking a short trip to Albany to vend at the Albany Vegetarian Expo on Saturday. Very excited for a little road trip and to meet some new people and be OUT there. I really love doing things like this and seeing everyone's reaction to what we do and what we are about. The above photo is from a demo we did at our local co-op, Greenstar. Always so fun.

I am going to be doing a lot of blogging, videos, newsletters, all that stuff and I wanted to know what do you want to see from us? What types of posts and videos do you like the most? I would love to hear your feedback!

Cant go 30 minutes without feeling so much gratitude for this opportunity to grow, contribute, make mistakes and have fun!

Thank you for being a part of it.

love,

Samantha

Emmy's as the Emmy's??

2011-09-20T10:55:00.000-07:00

We went to Ian’s mom’s house to watch the Emmy’s on Sunday night and we were so surprised to see that they are now using our Emmy’s (our) font for their logo. It was such a strange experience to see, well, our logo flash up on the screen numerous times during the evening. On one hand, we thought this was excellent, so much exposure for our brand, though in a very incorrect platform. On the other hand, will people now associate that font with the Emmy Awards and get confused? Does it really matter? Probably not. But we could help but discuss what the impact might be. What do you think?

We are still plugging away at our website. There is a lot more to do than we thought but we are very close.

I just got off the phone with a woman who is writing a book called Finance for Food. She just interviewed me about our crowdfunding experience, so cool! In other news, we just created a brand new YouTube Channel where we are going to start sharing food, lifestyle and business-running videos with you! We are excited. Who knows where to start first…

Talk to you soon!

Love, Samantha

End of Summer

2011-08-24T11:07:00.000-07:00

Wow, it's amazing how fast it went by. The cooler air rushing in sure is a reminder that fall is coming. Both Ian and I had a small break in life/work with two different ailments: me with lymes disease and Ian with a fractured foot. I've got to give a big shout out to our employees, Kara and Daniel, who held it down on the days when BOTH Ian and I couldn't come in. Its an amazing feeling to have such loyal, pro-active and reliable people working with you. The end of the summer is always a little bit slower for us. Its a really nice time to work on our side projects! We recently moved our office up above our kitchen. Incase you didnt see our picture on facebook, its a beautiful bright orange and it has a window! Its a really nice shift from the other office which was beginning to feel very dark. At first I thought it was weird to be so separated from the kitchen, but now I am finding a lot of peace up here. I look forward to getting a lot done in this space!

After starting our new packaging project in January, we have finally completed our designs and they are now in process to get printed and shipped. The only bummer is that we have to wait until October for the delivery. I promise you, they are gorgeous!! We will not be revealing the designs until we get them in, so hold tight!! This is a true re-creation for our company and I am very excited to see what the reaction will be. Our website is still underway...I am predicting we will be launching it in the next two weeks. Lots of new features and ways that we can express who we are as a company and all of the things we make!! Yes.

It feels really good to be making this progress. I feel like we are constantly re-inventing the ways that we do things, but changing the image is going to be really new and refreshing. To me, this change represents how we can recreate ourselves in any moment, choose to do something differently. We do not need to be stuck in one way. This idea has been on my mind lately. I realized that being able to re-invent yourself: your views, your look, anything about you, is how we stay inspired and stay "in the game." There have been days here where I feel as though I have lost interest or enthusiasm. Usually when that happens, I have to take a look at myself and see where I am not re-inventing my work here or my inspiration outside of my work here. So I recreate who I am for this company on a day to day basis. There are days when I take on that I am the company marketing person and that's who I am for the day. The next day I am a secretary, an office decorator, a bookkeeper, the list goes on. This keeps me excited and inspired to keep growing what we have started and I've got to say, it really works. This idea applies to pretty much any area of life. Like, exercising! I know there are people out there who just lose interest, get bored of their workout routine and fall back into unhealthy habits. I admit this is me too! But when I re-invent what I am doing and how I am doing it, I get inspired again. Say one week, I take on lots of yoga. Another week, I take on running. Or the next is a combination. You get to say what inspires you and how you will take on whatever game you are playing. Do you have something in your life that resembles this? Some part of your life that just "fizzles?" Feel free to share here and how you take on getting past the "fizzle."

I want to thank and acknowledge you for supporting what we are doing! It cannot be done without a community of people believing in what you're doing. Thank you for believing in us. Also, thank you so much to all of the people who helped us reach over 1,000 facebook fans this month!! Wow. That was a goal that we were dreaming about! Thats so many people!!!!

Stay tuned for the next update.

Lots of Love and Well Being to you.

Samantha

Summer

2011-07-13T13:03:00.000-07:00

Hi Everyone,
We are having a very exciting summer. We have been plugging away at a few projects and completion is in sight! Our packaging designs are complete and we are now just waiting for the finals of our new nutrition labels to put on them. They are just lovely! We have also been working on a new website. We are not 100% satisfied with what we've got because we have had customers who have not been able to load all of the pages. Also, we are improving our online store, big time. Right now when you purchase something it takes you right to paypal to put it in your cart. On our new site, you can add to cart easily and only do the checkout at the very end. Does that make sense? Is this too dorky to share? Oh well.
Just two weekends ago we had the privilege of vending at the band, Phish's, Superball IX in Watkins Glen, NY. Their production team tries to support local businesses wherever they go, so they set up a separate Farmer's Market for local producers whenever they throw a festival. The opportunity was huge because the location of the market was amazing and we were able to bring a car, have camping space and see the shows. The only problem was that I had four family members coming into town that weekend already! I quickly asked on facebook if any of my friends would be willing and almost immediately my friend Kate said that her and another friend Alex were totally in. They were driving up from the city Thursday night so Ian and I brought a trailer out to the festival and set up our booth and a tent for the ladies. The energy was amazing there!! Not only was it in such a beautiful spot but the people were so excited to be there. Festy-goers galore. To get ready for the festival with product we came up with a few really fun ideas. In addition to our main line of products we offered two flavors of trail mix, sprouted and flavored seeds, a variety of nut butters and brought out are newest flavors of granola. To highlight our nut butters and chocolate sauce we decided to bring some fruit with us. My friend Cody and I went out and picked 15 lbs of organic strawberries and Ian and I went to Wegmans (this is our local grocery store) at 12am the night before and bought 90lbs of organic bananas. Kate and Alex are at the festival, they are all set up, I am showing my family around Ithaca and I get a call after only two hours of the festival, "we are almost completely out of fruit." TWO HOURS! I apologized to my family and made the trip to Wegmans again. This time for the strawberries (no time to pick!) and twice as many bananas. Ian and I borrowed my Dad's car and ran the fruit out. They were stocked. Needless to say, this happened every day of the festival. Our products were selling pretty well but no other vendor at the festival had fresh fruit!! So we sold a lot of fruit. A LOT! Kate and Alex did not know what they were in for. They put in three long, hard days selling our products, schmoozing with customers and doing a lot of heavy lifting. We could have not asked for more perfect festy-salesladies. Thank you, you two. My family weekend did not go as planned, but it was still a lot of fun with the time we had together. See the picture above and check out Kate looking sassy in the Emmy's booth! I would also like to give a shout out to local Ithacan artist Meghan Wood, who painted that amazing backdrop. We love it so much.
Because of the success of the festival and our new products, we are moving forward with them and offering them on our website and to local stores. Check them out, we've really got the summer (and probably other seasons) snacks down!
Upcoming is the Natural Products Show East in Baltimore as well as the Vegetarian Expo in Albany in October. Also, Ian is going on another motorcycle trip next month. Ill keep you posted on that!
Thank you for supporting us and what we do. It is not possible without YOU.
love,
Samantha

p.s. I wanted to share a fun recipe that evolved at home the other night. Ian bought me a soda-maker for my birthday so I could make seltzer instead of buying it. It is a really fun tool! I made a homemade gingerberry soda float for dessert one night. Check it out:

3 parts pure organic blueberry juice
1 part seltzer
splash of ginger juice (I juiced this myself with our juicer)
two scoops of vegan vanilla ice cream (my favorite is the "vanilla island" from coconut bliss)
top with berries
enjoy!!

The Gift of Community

2011-05-12T06:24:00.000-07:00

I am still in shock about this one: We met two new friends at the Farmer's Market a week and a half ago. Their names are Rhea and Thom. They got to know us through Ian's celebrity brother Conor. We got to talk to them for a while and of course, we were close friends in about five minutes! They purchased some of our stuff and went home. The next morning, I got a missed call at the office from Thom and then he called again. He had so much energy in his voice and he was talking about so many amazing ideas about how he wants to demo our products and how he and Rhea are going to get Emmy's into Wegmans (our local supermarket chain which now has 80 stores in the northeast). Of course, I am really excited too because we have tried on numerous occasions to get into Wegmans and have not been successful thus far. I had no idea what they were going to do, but I knew it was going to be amazing because of their enthusiasm and heart about the whole situation. They were also making a game out of it, making it fun and playful. So here's what they did: Rhea, who is a beautiful and powerful writer(check out her Blog: The Road is Life), wrote three letters. Each of these expresses a different "argument" or point of view on why Emmy's belongs in the Wegmans stores. They are the most amazing letters, I got teary-eyed when I read them. They all have a place where people can sign and then the idea is to send them in to the corporate office. Not only this, but they started taking the letters to their respective areas of work, to their families, friends, everyone and started the SUPPORT EMMY'S ORGANICS: WHERE FOOD AND LOVE MEET Campaign.

As I said, still in shock. Still just amazed by the power of community and what we are capable of. Still amazed that these two people are so inspired and enthusiastic about what we do, that they are playing this huge game FOR us. I guess following your dreams is contagious! Wow. Thank you so much, Rhea and Thom and thank all of you-because we wouldnt be here, having a campaign made to support us, without you! I ask that you check out the campaign above and check out all of the options on how you can help us get into Wegmans. A little bit goes a long way.

Love and Gratitude,

Samantha

Showing Up

2011-05-02T10:14:00.000-07:00

We (as always) have a lot going on! Just this past week alone, went by so fast and we accomplished a lot. We moved into our new place (home), I did a demo in New Jersey and we started our season at the Ithaca Farmer's Market. I am still looking back thinking, "how did that all happen?"

I had a great demo experience and learned a lot. The first part of my demo day was with the employees of the store. This all went down at the Whole Foods in Edgewater, NJ. My Father (and demo assistant for the day!) and I presented a collection of macaroons in an upstairs conference room for the employees with a few other companies. This was a really cool opportunity. I got to share about our company and educate them a little bit about us. I brought a basket of Emmy's pins and handed them out for them to wear on their uniforms. The rest of the day was spent doing a customer demo in the store. Also, very cool. I love talking to people about their food choices and why they love certain products. I learned the most from some of the other people doing demos though. A lot of larger companies hire outside companies or create new branches that only do demos. It's smart: people try your product and then they buy it. More sales=bigger growth and opportunities. I have always thought that we could only do a demo if we were to personally do it, but I am starting to feel differently. One of the demo people told me that a certain successful snack company multiplied their demo budget by $100,000 the same year they blew up big time. This was super inspiring and we will be scheduling a lot more this year (maybe not multiplying by $100,000 just yet)! I will make sure to update our facebook page on when they will be so check for stores in your area.

Our first farmer's market day was on Sunday. Ian and I realized that it's so important for us to be there. We feel that being at the market is a way for us to fully be with our community, hear what it has to say and have fun with it!! We also get to make money, which builds our business. It's a win-win. There were a few days last year when we got overwhelmed and would skip the market. This year, we (or a special back up guest!) will be there every Sunday from now until September, so you know you can always find us there! Our booths change every week, so we will be posting that on facebook every Sunday morning. Please come see us, we have a new display this year that's beautiful and much easier to carry! Just as I wrote this, I remembered when we took about twice as much in number and weight to the market and we would take everything up and down the stairs to our basement kitchen. We sure have taken on "work smarter, not harder" in so many ways and we continue to take on that practice.

I recently saw a TED talk featuring Elizabeth Gilbert who wrote "Eat, Pray, Love." Watch HERE. She talked about how she has shifted her view of the word "genius." She used to think that only certain people WERE geniuses, but lately from research and self discovery she has realized that genius is something that we all have and it comes and goes. The most inspiring part for me was when she said that when creators feel daunted when they feel as though their genius is gone, they need to keep doing the work. Keep showing up and your genius will show up again. You do your part and your genius will come. I can absolutely see how this has shown up for Emmy's. Ever since day one, we have treated this business like the real thing. We would wake up every morning and show up even if we didnt have a lot of orders, equipment or money. Because of this, we have had those moments of genius, where the work just pours out and all of a sudden so much has been accomplished. Other times, we continue to work and the genius doesnt show up, it feels "harder," but we still do it anyway. Needless to say we have shown up and I am so proud of us. This also reminds me of a Landmark Education distinction "Be Your Word." If you continue to be your word, in every area of your life, you will see amazing results. This gives your words power, so next time you say "I am going to make a million dollars," you better look out. But this takes showing up and doing your work too. Every time you say, "Ill call you later," and you dont, you are not being your word. Try to think of every little area where you are not being your word and clean it up. Call someone back and say "sorry for not calling you back" "sorry I came five minutes late." It takes something, it feels annoying sometimes, but the more you show up, the more magical results you will see.

Today I am taking on a 10 day master cleanse/juice feast! What are you taking on today?

Thank you for continuing to follow our journey. YOU are what makes this all possible.

I love you,

Samantha

New Direction

2011-04-11T10:15:00.000-07:00

After four months of working to get our Organic Certification, we have made a choice to not get it! There is no regret for me. We shaped up our kitchen big time and our practices are much more professional. The process allowed us to raise the bar.

After calculating the percentages that each ingredient makes up in our products, we found that the macaroons are 96% organic. This is enough to get you that seal that everyone recognizes. What we found out last week is that if one of the ingredients that you use that is not organic is something that you can source as organic, you are unable to get certified. This applies to us, unfortunately. The almond meal that we use is a non-gmo almond meal that is produced is a facility that only handles almonds. We love the consistency. We looked into getting organic almond meal and found that the consistency was not the same. In addition, the price is twice as much. We would be forced to raise our prices and change the texture of our product. Is it worth it? I dont think so. Do you? We wanted to get this certification so our products might appeal to people who shop for the USDA seal. In the end though, I think that people can already recognize that we are committed to quality and organics by reading the list of ingredients on our packages. There is another certification available which is non-gmo and we are going to take that route instead for now.

In other news, we will be offering a spring fudge special. We make amazing fudge and like to sell it for special occasions. It should be up on our website tomorrow, so check back with us. Also, are you following us on facebook? We are pretty active there and we would love for you to join our fan page. Click HERE if you're a yes!!

A special thank you goes out to all of the people who took our survey! It was an awesome experience to get to know you. Thank you for making a difference for us. We are going to keep the survey up there to keep collecting this great information. Always feel free to share on our blog too! We love hearing from you!

We feel really good about our packaging re-design and we are moving forward! Cant wait to see the first draft from our designer!

That's all for now.

all love,

Samantha

p.s. We got that house that I wanted to rent and we're moving next month!

Heading to Spring..

2011-03-29T13:06:00.000-07:00

Outside of Emmy's, I am trying to let go of some attachment I am feeling for a house for Ian and I to rent. We just saw it and there are other people who have already applied to live there. Nothing is settled, so I am taking some deep breaths to let whatever will happen, happen.

Inside of Emmy's is quite bustling. Our trip to California was a huge success! We had a great helper and fun companion with us at the expo, Conor Gaffney, the greatest older brother a person could ask for. He helped us try all of the new vegan goodies and we all got inspired by the packaging. What we took back from the Expo was the new material that our new packaging will be made of! It's a gorgeous, home-compostable material that you can print on! Yes! This will give us so much more space to express our company on our packaging. There is another exciting tidbit that I cannot fully share at this point. BUT, I will reveal that we will be testing out a new ingredient in ALL of our products! When it's finalized, I will share, but for now it isa secret. We are also going to be exhibiting at the East Coast Expo in September! This will be a whole new project to take on!

We have been working really hard on the organic certification, our new packaging, testing some new products (ooo!!), keeping our kitchen efficient, choosing if we want to re-do our website and keeping up with orders. The design process has been really challenging, I find myself getting stuck because I am afraid of make the "wrong" choice and ruin everything! The fact that we are paying money for this and we are basically re-creating our image feels like a major move. I can see that both Ian and I are a little timid. In response to this, we decided to create a survey, so we can better understand our customer. If you haven't taken it yet, please do! http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/J6L55W2. We are at about 66 responses and we are shooting for 100! This whole process has been great for us to sit back and think about what we are really committed to with this company and what message we want to be putting out there. What we know for sure is that we are committed to simplicity, ease and enjoyment. What is it that you are committed to? What is your life for? Your work for?

Ian celebrated his 28th birthday yesterday which Conor mentioned is his "saturn return" (if you follow astrology). This is supposed to be a period of major changes. Although it's not MY saturn return, I can absolutely see that changes are coming for Ian and Emmy's and therefore, me. Even possibly and new cool house...if it's meant to be!

We have also started a newsletter! This is a monthly or maybe bi-monthly email that you can get that will have a little update about us as well as some form of offer or deal at our online store. If you haven't signed up for that either, join us! http://emmysorganics.us2.list-manage1.com/subscribe?u=e8f630a3e72c12f104167fa3f&id=38c31003e7.

Check out the pics above of Ian and I with health food celebrity, Patricia Bragg of BRAGGS liquid aminos, apple cider viegar, etc. As well as the brothers, Gaffney rocking out at the expo.

In this time of spring and new changes, it's really amazing to know of the support around us. Thank you for keeping up with us, for believing in us and for sharing us! You are the reason why this is possible. Thank YOU.

I love you,

Samantha

California

2011-03-11T20:27:00.000-08:00

Hey Everyone!

Its been a little while. I am drafting this email on our flight from San Francisco to Long Beach, which is near the Natural Products Expo. I am excited.

We've had an awesome trip so far. It's been the perfect blend of Emmy's and family. We started in Los Angeles where we attended the opening of the first LA Cafe Gratitude. The night was beautiful. What a great community we get to be a part of when we're on the west coast. The cafe is beautiful and the menu looks even more beautiful! If you are in the LA area, please go check out the cafe in Larchmont Village. In LA we stayed with Ian's brother, Conor, and ALL of the other Makepeace Brothers plus Ian's mother!! There were seven of us in their apartment. So much fun. Please also check out the Makepeace Brothers. They are amazing and I am so proud of how talented and devoted they are.

We traveled to Oakland where we had been staying at Ian's Dad's house for the past few days. We did two demos while we were there. One at the Rainbow Grocery in San Francisco and the other at Good Earth Natural Grocery in Fairfax. Both of them were extremely successful. We got an awesome response from everyone that tried the macaroons and it showed because both stores were selling them fast! It was great spending the time in the stores and looking at all of the products that we dont have on the east coast. We are pretty serious about our time in grocery stores! I imagine it's pretty funny to watch us, because we are constantly analyzing a products ingredients, packaging and price. Way fun for us! Aside from all of this we spent a lot of time with Ian's Dad, Bill, and his partner, Susan. We also got to see the Makepeace Brothers play a show in San Francisco!

There are quite a lot of products that we dont get to see in Ithaca because its not a major city and because the raw, vegan and gluten free selection is not AS available..for now that is! It's so much fun to try new brands and eat different produce. I get a little crazed over the raw vegan chocolate bars, fresh dates and amazing juice bars. Being able to buy my favorite kind of chocolate bar (by Coracao Confections) in a big grocery store feels so decadent! We are going to get even more of this over the next few days at the expo. There is going to be SO MUCH to see that we wont be able to see it all. We are coming up with a game plan tonight so we can do all of our planned meetings first before we just walk around and see what everyone is up to.

Before we left we had been training our newest (and second!) employee, Nis, to make macaroons. Training someone is a true test of patience and communication skills. Nis is awesome and he totally got the hang of it before we left. This is the first time that both Ian and I have been gone from the kitchen at the same time for more than three days! Macaroons were still being made and our amazing Daniel was packaging, sending out orders and managing the kitchen. This is a huge accomplishment. Go us! Plus Daniel and Nis! We look forward to continuing to teach others how to run our business even if there will be mistakes and communication errors. If you want to play a big game, it's not going to be easy! I keep reminding myself of this. What big game are you playing? What challenges come up? We are committed to growing this company so everyone can get to know and trust the food that we make.

We are also continuing to work on our branding project. Megan, our designer, has been drafting logo ideas and we have been giving feedback and researching all of the options. I am learning so much about design and power of type face, placement and color. Our goal is to have our new packages printed and ready to pack by the early summer. Here we go.

Believe it!

2011-02-09T13:15:00.000-08:00

Hey Everyone!

There are so many things I want to say, I apologize if I am jumbled! So much is going on here, it is very exciting. This week so far, we had our second employee, Nis, start work, we got a bigger mixer, we got a lead for a distributor that may get us into WEGMANS and we are getting a lot done for our organic certification. It's only Wednesday!

Nis is doing awesome, it's such a cool experience to teach methods that have been so natural to us for so long to someone else. It is just perfect timing in many ways. I notice that the more we grow, the more I am needed to be doing office work. Since the macaroon machine is working, Ian is doing all of the macaroon production and I help out from time to time. Now, Nis will be doing production three days of the week which will put Ian and I managing the production work. Wow! I can continue to focus on the office and Ian will be able to work in here too. Together we can explore various ways to increase sales and follow through efficiently. It will be an awesome shift for us and help us grow.

Juliana, our food safety expert, has encouraged us to start documenting EVERYTHING!! All of those little methods that we have been doing. This includes the methods that we use to train new people, how we wash everything, what we do if there is a malfunction in the kitchen, job descriptions, etc. etc. etc. We need all of this documentation to get certified plus SO much more than what I listed...they want EVERYTHING IN WRITING!! It's crazy and tedious. Although it feels like we've been putting things together forever (which is really not true), I am very aware of how all of this documentation is adding value to our business. It's not just the organic certification that will add value. It's all of the processes being documented and implemented and keeping clean financial books. I am learning that implementing unique processes and being able to teach them to anyone is extremely valuable. I am so grateful for Juliana pushing us to get all of this together.

I dont care if this is premature, but our amazing broker, Todd, had us send samples to a distribution company in Syracuse. He called us on Monday and let us know that the company LOVED us. Not only that but that this company is very closely connected to Wegmans, not just the ones in upstate New York, ALL of them. There are 77. I am so excited!! We sent out a ton of samples that they requested to show to Wegmans. There is a process ahead, I am sure, but I am feeling confident that Wegmans will fall in love with us. We have tried to get in on three other occasions. This is the one!!! I request that you think good Wegmans ju ju for us. Feel free to say affirmative statements such as "I cant wait to buy Emmy's at Wegmans!" or "I want Emmy's, let's go to Wegmans." Whatever you like!! I will keep you in the loop!

Valentines Day is on the way. We are still selling our amazing Goji Love gift bag on the website: http://www.emmysorganics.com/valentines-day/. We've been selling quite a few! I am so warmed by all of the direct online orders that we've been getting. What an honor to be creating something that people love!

Our design process is underway! We are supposed to get some initial ideas from our designer in the next two weeks! Exciting! Also, we are having new nutritional labels and allergen statements done and those are almost complete!!

In other news, our trip to California is less than a month away. I am so looking forward to the sunshine and inspiration. I really cannot wait. The winter has been long and a little break will be so rejuvenating!

Thank you for creating us as a success!! You are making such a difference us...I could just hug you!

I love you,

Samantha

P.S. I am very excited to offer our first Emmy's newsletter! I have been wanting to do this for quite a while! Now, you can receive updates, news and discounts right to your email box! Please follow this LINK, sign up and join us.

WE DID IT!

2011-01-27T09:05:00.000-08:00

Wow, what an awesome month this has been so far! We reached our goal for our campaign!!! What an amazing experience. To simply ask and then receive. I am blown away every time I look over our list of contributors! It brings tears to my eyes knowing how many people support our business (emotionally and financially)! We have been busy preparing the "gifts" that our contributors receive as a thank you for their donation. Its been really fun putting them together and writing notes to everyone! A very special thank you goes to the list of contributors below: thank you for making such a difference for us. We are grateful for your generosity and encouragement!!

ZIA ANGER

BILL GAFFNEY

SUSAN LEE

KATE JAFFE

LARRY KAPLOWITZ

ANNE EARDE

SIMEON MOSS

CHE BROADNAX

CARY MOSIER

CHRISTOPHER OCHS

SUSAN STILLMAN

LISA BLOOM

KATE FRASCA

STEPHEN ABRAMS

SARA BENSON

WM LAWSON

DANAE RINGELMANN

MICHAEL COLDWELL

JENNY SWIFT

SAVERIO CASTELLI

KRISTINA GENOVA-NILSEN

JOBY JOSEPH

SHAUN BEYMOLLA

CHAYA SPECTOR

CODY CURRIER

BARBARA TAYKAN

ANDREW RHODES

SARA FAY

ARIELLE WEBB

PATRICIA WOODY

FIONA WOODS

AYA MEGAN MARIE

CHRISTINA LAMOTHE

TONDRA LYNFORD

HILARY DAVIS

SARAH COLDWELL

JESSICA SCHNEIDMAN

TOBI FELDMAN

CATHERINE FREEDMAN

AARON MORRIS

WILLIAM MARSHALL

TEDDI ROGERS

MARGARET FARADAY

FENG MU

SUSAN NAGLE

RAVEN PRICE

JEFFREY TITTLE

BRADFORD KRAKOW

DANA ZALAZNICK

KATHARINE KELLY

LAUREN FRASCA

ETHAN ASH

RICHARD J SMITH

CAROL CHERNIKOFF

JILL WOLFE

DONALD BARTOLONE

MERRY ANN JACKSON

KATHLEEN HAGENDORF

TONI DESROSIERS

GAYLA DEBOSE

JAMES GOULD

RALPH CUTLER

JENNIFER TT CAMBRAS

COLIN SMITH

BRIDGET O'CONNOR

EMILY DEAN

ERIN CALLAHAN

JASON DESMARIS

VANESSA WILLARD

MEG YOUNGER

KEITH GOULD

MARIA ROSAS

KIRSTEN ABRAMS

VICTORIA LYNFORD

AMY COHEN

ELIOT RICH

JESSICA ENGLISH

BLAKE MYERS

BILL LAM

SOPHIE SIDHU

GEOFF HOWELL

KAREN LAMBERT

TRACY MCQUAY

CONOR GAFFNEY

TRISTAN PRETTYMAN

That's not even everyone (there are some anonymous contributors!). We have chosen a different designer to re-brand our company. We are very excited to work with Megan, a young and talented designer based in San Francisco. Her work is amazing and we are confident that she will help us take our look to the next level.

In other news, we have been working with our dear friend Juliana who is an expert in food safety. She is helping us with our application to get Organic Certified currently. Wow, it is so much tedious work. They really need EVERY kind of documentation possible. From suppliers to a map of your production facility to a list of the soap you use on your dishes! We are grateful for Juliana and her wisdom, this project would not be underway without her. Thank you!!

We also just bought our tickets to Los Angeles in March! We will be attending the grand opening of Cafe Gratitude in LA. This will be a longer trip for us, almost 12 days! After the opening we will be headed to the bay area to set up some new accounts, do some demos at whole foods (where we should have product by then!), meet with our designer and see Ian's Dad! THEN we will be attending the Natural Products Expo in Annaheim. We decided not to exhibit there this year as the cost is SO high. We are going to walk around, get inspired, talk with some of our suppliers and make connections. It's going to be an awesome trip, I am so excited.

As Valentines Day approaches, we have created a special gift bag for the occasion please visit our STORE and pick up a Goji Love Bag for yourself or a loved one.

I love you, thank you so much for your support.

Samantha

Happy 2011!

2011-01-05T09:28:00.000-08:00

Hi Everyone!

Happy New Year! We are so excited for this upcoming year. I have been thinking a lot about all of our growth this past year and what happened. Some highlights to list are that we:

Went to our first expo

Got a new big mixer

Took out our first loan

Purchased our macaroon machine

Moved into our new space

Took on national distribution

Passed on our bag labeling to Challenge Industries

Created our Chocolate Chili macaroon flavor

Hired our first employee

Entered our SECOND Whole Foods Region

RE-Designed our Website

Purchased 3 large commercial dehydrators

Started our first campaign (its still going!)

These are just to name a few. There is a picture above of one of our new equipment purchases (provided by daniel k, packaging extraordinaire!). Who knows what 2011 will bring? I am excited about our new branding and packaging design project. Our campaign is going so well!! We have just over two weeks to collect $1738. I am so blown away by the support network that we have. We are both so grateful and excited every time someone contributes. Its a little celebration each time. What an honor, acknowledgement and awesome way to bring in the new year. Thank you for sharing, contributing and just being who you are!

Aside from the re-branding project that the campaign is supporting, I am looking forward to an awesome kitchen staff, west-coast distribution (being a NATION WIDE brand), some more trade shows, custom designed boxes to send to stores, organic certification, non-gmo certification, an Emmy's newsletter and new product pictures....to name a couple.

What are you creating for your 2011? Business or Personal? Share on the blog or send an email. Setting an intention for a day, month or year is a powerful tool. The more times you share your intentions with others the stronger the creation is. The more people you have "on board," the more of a support system you have of people who will keep you in the game. We support you and your intentions, just as you have done for us. Feel free to share them!!

I LOVE YOU. Happy New Year.

Samantha

Our Campaign

2010-12-22T08:59:00.000-08:00

Hey Everyone! We have launched our very first campaign to raise money to re-brand Emmy's Organics. What a cool experience it has been so far. Ian's brother, Conor, recently used the "online campaign" method to raise money for his band (the makepeace brothers). They had so much success that we thought it would be a perfect idea to raise funds for this project we have been planning over the past two months. Conor was in town visiting to screen his film (may i be frank), and helped us create a great video with our pitch. Thank you, Conor!

I ask that you, too, contribute to our campaign. Click above, check out our pitch, watch the video and pick out some fun gifts you will receive in return for your donation.

We are loving that this has become a community project! Even if you can contribute $10, you will look at our fresh look and know that you were a part of that. Another way to help is to forward the campaign page to your friends and family. We are over 1/3 there and every contribution makes a difference. Every time we get one, we jump for joy!!

With all of these contributions coming in, it was a challenge to really receive them. Sometimes, as humans, it's not so easy to receive generosity or acknowledgement. Or, at that, make powerful requests of people. We have taken on receiving and requests and look what is showing up! Giving up all of the "im not worthy" conversations leaves us with gratitude, love and a fast forward on our project. All we had to do was ask! Where in your life could you make a request of someone and fully receive their contribution?? Please share on our blog!

What a dream we are living. Following our dreams with an incredible community behind us.

Thank you for being a part of it.

I love you,

Samantha

The Macaroon Machine and Happy Winter

2010-12-16T08:39:00.000-08:00

Hi Everyone!

Happy cold weather here in Ithaca. I am surprisingly enjoying the cold weather. There are so many fun challenges to keeping warm and I am finding them fun (I cant speak for Ian, who does not feel the same as me!). My diet has consisted of a lot of citrus, soup and root vegetables. Yesterday, we had our very first holiday party here at Emmy's Organics! I mean, every company should have a holiday party. Being that we are a three-person company, Ian, myself and our absolutely amazing packaging manager, Daniel, I had to plan something on the smaller side. I asked Mandy, of The Good Truck, here in Ithaca if she would make us a fabulous lunch of homemade corn tortillas and yummy vegan filling. I invited Ian's mother, Emmy of course, as she is our number one support person and Conor, Ian's brother, in town from California, who also gives us so much (surround sound in the kitchen!). What an awesome afternoon we had.

The biggest shift around here is that the macaroon machine works!! It has taken many months of trial and error, but we have finally gotten to where we need to be. The mold (shape of the macaroon) is not our original shape, so our macaroons will be looking quite different from now on. They are now like mini-hockey pucks! It's taken a little bit to get used to them, but I am slowly falling in love with them. They are much easier to pick up and have a nice clean shape to them. Even better is that our hands are now free from hours of scooping by hand. This is really creating sustainability in our business. It would be really hard to train someone else to scoop the way that we did, not to mention unhealthy. Now we are really ready for increased production. All we need is a kitchen employee, for one example. We had someone lined up to come in and start, but he had another job offer that worked better for him. It was kind of a bummer, but we are ready to find exactly who we need. I feel even more confident, now that the machine is working! I am attaching a picture of myself scooping (as a goodbye to the scoop!) as well as a picture of the new shape. Cant wait to hear what you think!

Today, we are working on a campaign that we are launching to raise money for our new branding and packaging design project. We have been working really hard to get all of the pieces together to get this moving and we have everything except the funds. Being that we took out a loan to pay for our macaroon machine, we are reaching out to our communities to help support this project. I will be sharing more about this project when our pitch video is completed and when we have all of the information in one place.

In the meantime, please check out our new online store we have some great holiday specials and a beautiful gift box that would make anyone so so happy!

Thank you as always for your continued support, we could not do this without you.

I love you,

Samantha

From The Kitchen!

2010-11-30T14:05:00.000-08:00

Hello All!

Check out Ian holding that big scoop of coconut! Ha! Great picture. Today is the first day that we are opening our "showroom" space to the public as we are participating in Local First Ithaca's Local Lover's Challenge (more info below). This is the perfect opportunity for us to give the open showroom a shot.

One of the most important pieces of advice that I can give on starting your own business is to surround yourself with people who are specialists in areas that you are not. This is how you learn! Ian and I were getting really excited about the idea of a "store." What a fun project! Putting up walls, building shelves, displaying products (my favorite). But we never really stopped to think about what our main goal was. It wasnt until our accountant (a very important specialist!!) slowed us down. We have been working so hard to get our name out there and to build our brand. Putting a lot of time and energy into a retail space is not really what we want. Although the idea is very tempting and I love any excuse to be social, it would be counter productive on the road we are heading down right now. Who knows for the future.

For the time being, though, we are getting a little taste with the Local Lover's Challenge here in Ithaca. We will be open today through saturday 12-6pm. Please stop by! We have some really great stuff available.

Aside from the change of plans and our struggles with our macaroon machine (will post on this later!) I have been very excited about our new WEBSITE!!! What an awesome improvement from our old one. I am loving this new online presence. The most exciting part is the online store. I have been really happy putting together our new "Ultimate Gift Box" which includes an Emmy's Tote Bag! This is so fun for me, I love it! The bags were silkscreened by our friend and Ithaca Mogul, Jan Norman of Silk Oak. Check her stuff out, it is amazing.

There is a little snippet from the Emmy's Kitchen!! Please leave us a comment and tell us what you think of the new site! Also, check out the Local Lover's Challenge.

We love you.

Projects!

2010-11-15T07:15:00.001-08:00

Hi Everyone!

There is a series of changes happening for us at Emmy's. Lately, Ian and I have been realizing how much our special projects get pushed to the side because of our production. We have been reading this awesome book (which I recommend to anyone!) called the E Myth Revisited by Michael E. Gerber that has been an amazing inspiration. What we have been getting from it is that a lot of small businesses fail because the owners (or entrepreneurs) are spending too much of their time working as technicians (or macaroons makers, for us), rather than expanding their business. This is so true for us. Because we are making food for the majority of the day, all of our projects are done at night, they're rushed, don't get done on time, etc. We have a lot of stuff that we want to do!! So, we are in the process of hiring some amazing and supportive help in our kitchen.

Seeing the importance of these projects has allowed us to give a little more time for them over the past two weeks. We have been redesigning our website. Please check it out and give us some feedback! Especially check out the "where to buy" section. We have been collecting lists from our distributors of all of the stores they are selling to. Looking at that list is a huge acknowledgement of what we are creating. Thank you!!

We are also working on the front of our kitchen space because we will be opening a little Emmy's Boutique in the next two weeks (hopefully!). We have been receiving some awesome support on this, especially from our super talented and handy friends. Our friend Nick Gilbert is an amazing artist and builder. He created our very first Emmy's custom shelf for our local Co-op. We are taking that original shelf in our place and Nick is making a new one for the co-op. There is a photo above of him and his amazing shelf! We love it.

Our friend Colin Smith, contractor and song-writing extraordinaire, designed and built these amazing walls for our store that can fold in to themselves. This way, when the store is not open, we can let is all of the light from the front of the space. He is a genius! I got to go and pick out the wood. It looks awesome. You can get an idea from the picture above.

Ian has also designed some cool looking labels that we are using for some holiday bags. Look out for them on our website store. I will be announcing new stuff here on the blog.

Well that is a little peep into what's going on these days. I will be in touch soon!

I LOVE YOU AND I AM SO GRATEFUL FOR YOUR SUPPORT.

Samantha

New Kitchen Tour!!

2010-11-05T09:59:00.000-07:00

Hi! Here is the tour of our new space! We have been here since August so we are pretty cozy and moved in. If you check out my older post with the other video tours, you can see the amazing progression that our business has gone through. Guess what? None of it could have happened with out you, our support. Please check it out and feel free to leave a comment! We love hearing from you.

Talk to you soon!

love,

Samantha

Natural Products Expo

2010-10-25T18:15:00.000-07:00

Hello!

So two weekends ago was the Natural Products Expo in Boston and we were there! The expo is for industry people only. So that includes wholesalers, brokers, retailers, importers, packaging people, etc etc. The reason why we hadnt done one before was because of the price. It is so expensive to present there! This year we were asked by one of our distributors if we wanted to share a space inside of their booth. It was perfect. We ended up with half of a folding table inside of a booth with all kinds of products in it. Our table was right up front so were able to sample our stuff.

We had an awesome experience. Not only did we receive great feedback and support from retailers ("oh, I carry this stuff! cant keep it on the shelves!"), but we were able to walk around and see all of the other products there. We tried so much new stuff so we didnt even buy ourselves lunch or anything! I really felt like a little fish in a huge ocean! Some of these companies are huge. So huge that they spend tens of thousands of dollars for these amazing booths with endless samples and demo people. I was very impressed by all of the work that went into each one. I will attach a picture below of one of the fancy ones--FAGE yogurt. The comparison of that picture to our little table is so cute. I am so proud of us.

We came back from the expo feeling so inspired. Inspired by this game we are playing called "business." We have so many plans that we are now acting on to take our business to the next level. Here we go! One piece of advice that we recently received was that we should consider changing the name "macaroons" for our macaroon product. We need something more creative and us. Not sure what that might look like, but if anyone has any ideas, please feel free to comment your ideas or email them to blog@emmysorganics.com.

Thank you for following and supporting this blog. I am loving the practice of stopping to reflect on all that is going on. So thank you!! None of this would be possible without all of our support out there.

i love you,

Samantha

Our Award!

2010-10-22T04:55:00.000-07:00

Last we received an amazing award from Challenge Industries. What an honor. We have been working with them for almost half of a year now. If you are not familiar with Challenge Industries I really encourage you to check out their website www.aboutchallenge.org. Their main goal is to generate employment for people with mental and physical disabilities. We have been dropping off large quantities of blank bags and macaroon/granola labels and their employees have the job to place the labels on all of the bags. What was becoming tedious work for us is now really fun work for the people at Challenge. Perfect. So I guess the work is really really fun for everyone up there because we got the news that Challenge Industries (which is a HUGE organization) had voted for us for their "Best New Business Partner of the Year" award. Last year the recipient was Tompkins County!!!! It was such exciting news. The award ceremony was last week. On the meal option card it said steak, fish or lasagna, so Russ, our main contact and head honcho up there (picture above), had them make us a special gluten free vegan meal to have! We were able to see and acknowledge all of the other award winners, which included their employees and staff, receive their awards too. I was so moved throughout the whole thing, breaking into tears left and right! I was (and still am) so blown away by what this company does for people with disabilities and our community. Getting this award helped me get how much we are apart of Challenge and what they are creating. In my acceptance speech (I was a little nervous and shaky!) I said "One of the best things about owning your own business is being able to make a difference in your community." That is ringing so true to me these days and I am very excited for the future.

Thank you for your love and support,

Samantha

THE MONTH OF SEPTEMBER

2010-10-13T07:56:00.001-07:00

Wow, a lot of you may be wondering..."where did she go?" I am here! Alive and well. The month of September was a whirlwind. As I mentioned in an earlier post, Ian left for the month to fulfill on a lifelong dream to ride his motorcycle across the country and back. I had no qualms about him going, I want everyone's dreams to come true and I was excited about what the month could bring me. We spent weeks making extra product so we would have a stock ready and I wouldnt have to be making so much each day. I got a little hiccup of fear before he left. "Can I handle all of this?" Ian calmed me down saying "dont worry, I have calculated how much we need in advance so all you'll have to worry about it packing orders, making cake, decorating the kitchen and the farmer's market." I thought "wow, that does sound great..." and carried on. Ian left for his trip and although I was sad to see him go, I was curious about what the month would bring me. Like, a new womanly connection to myself, some time with my friends or maybe a juice cleanse!

Well, Ian or I could not have been more wrong on our predictions. The day after he left we got 3 ENORMOUS orders that wiped out our back stock and then some. WOW! What a rush! The rest of the month continued to provide huge orders. What we didnt realize is that September is a huge month in our industry! What a lesson to learn. Our back stock was to carry us through a month like August which was nothing compared to what I experienced. I became a work horse! Getting into the kitchen as early as possible and staying very late at night and requesting help from anyone who could come by! Every order was this combination of excitement and fear. I have honestly never pushed myself so hard in my life. I would make these long lists of things to do and accomplish all of it in a day. Though I was running on little sleep and mostly adrenaline, but I was so proud of myself! It turned out that September was the biggest month that we have ever had. EVER. I handled it all by myself and I am blown away by the accomplishment. I thought the month would bring me something completely different. What I ended up with was an awesome sense of ownership and pride. I was able to see where my weaknesses were and where I once relied on Ian to take care of things. How great. I feel so much more confident in what I am doing here!! Great. Confidence in the unknown always leads to the perfect experience.

Ian also had the time of his life (email blog@emmysorganics.com if you have any questions for him!) which was worth every second of the month!

Thank you so much to all of you for being patient with me as I disappeared from the blog world for a little while. I am so grateful for your confidence and belief in us! Thank you thank you I love you. I will be back so so soon! Lots more to talk about like the award we received last night and the Natural Foods Expo that we are attending in Boston this weekend!

Stay Tuned.

LOVE,

Samantha

Renovation Photos

2010-08-30T20:12:00.000-07:00

Well we are fully moved in now. It is amazing. We have so much space!! It did take quite a few steps to be here and some photos below illustrate the process. I knew very little about renovating, but this gave me a little more knowledge as to why you put plywood down, how to paint a floor, how to take out nails, etc. I am not a pro but I know who to ask. What amazing support we received throughout this process from friends, professionals and family. We could not have done it without our community. I will be posting a video of what the space looks like now in the next week. Thank you for being a part of this!

love,

Samantha

Goodbye 707: The Before and After

2010-08-25T22:02:00.000-07:00

Wow wow! So much has been going on. We are in our new space. The move was so much easier than I thought it would be and we had so much support. We have been working really hard and everyone that comes by is amazed that we are up and running so fast. I totally credit Ian for his drive. He just amazes me and he can make anything happen! After some searching I finally found this video that I made when we first moved in to our old kitchen space in February 2009. I almost started crying when I saw it..we had so much less stuff and I was so excited! I took another video of the old space before we moved out last week and the change is amazing. What a cool way to acknowledge all of the progress that we've made! Please watch both videos...it is way inspiring. Also, my commentary on the older one is really funny...I am so happy that Ian's dad, Bill, still had this around!

Now, how we left...

Photos of the renovation and new space coming really soon!

So much love,

Samantha

Transition Time

2010-08-02T06:28:00.000-07:00

Wow! Every time that over a week has gone by since my last post, SO much has happened. I love it!! Im just going to dive right in...

Our new machine is (almost perfectly) working. We are waiting for a new part to come in that will make things perfect. Instead of making every flavor of macaroon a day, we have shifted to making one or two flavors a day but making almost six times as many as before. It's great. We can make so much at once now! This is great because about two weeks ago (on the first day of grassroots, an amazing music festival in our area) we received our first order from Barnes and Noble. Yup, that's right! The bookstore. The very big bookstore. We were placed within all of the stores that are located on college campuses. It's perfect for us. The first order was for 30 locations! They tried a case of three flavors of macaroons- coconut vanilla, dark cacao and chai spice. We haven't heard much yet, but I cannot wait for the feedback. When Ian and I heard the news, we were screaming and jumping and going nuts!! I called a lot of people. How exciting! It was great. We got the account through our broker, who has helped us make so many cool connections. We are way grateful to him. So I will keep you posted on the progress of that!

The great news came and it was grassroots time. There were so many family members and friends in town and a lot of work to be done. The weekend was a whirlwind. Of course with all of the excitement came some mistakes. Two of our orders got sent to the wrong place, Ian got sick, I got sick, etc. It was great. Every mistake or let down has taught us so much. There are times when something like this happens and we get scared "omg we're not professional enough" "how could i let this happen?" "this is all my fault" etc etc. All of those thoughts come up. But, the more that it happens, the less I take it personally and the more I am able to simply get in action around it. Whatever it may be. For example, calling and apologizing, taking responsibility. It feels so much better to get it out there and not hold anything inside. Then we move forward, rather than lurking in the past. This is such a big help with any kind of situation.

Anyway, what is going on this very week is that we now have access to our new space! Ian's dad, Bill, has come to town from California to help us renovate and move it. What a guy!! The yucky indoor/outdoor carpet has been removed by Ian, Bill and Daniel. Ian has some scary battle wounds from the task. Now we are figuring out plumbing and getting our new floor down. Just being in the empty space felt great. I have no idea what it's going to look like in the end, but I know it's going to be great. I will be posting pictures of the transition as it goes along. The pic above is our blank canvas, an empty room with no carpet. Here we go.

Thank YOU for reading and following what we are doing and creating! It makes such a difference to have such an amazing support network. We would not have all of our success if it was not for you! Feel free to share your thoughts/comments here. We would love to hear from you.

I love you,

Samantha

p.s. I would like to apologize to our loyal Ithaca Farmer's Market customers. We have been pretty inconsistent with our attendance in the last two months. I apologize and will update online if we will be there or not each week! Thanks!

BIG DAY!

2010-07-16T05:02:00.000-07:00

We had a big day yesterday! It felt awesome: it was so hot in the kitchen and we were working really hard and sweating like crazy. Anyway, the biggest thing that happened is that we used the new macaroon machine. Pretty sweet. There is a short video above of what the macaroons look like once they are pressed. More videos to come! It was very strange using it for the first time. There were so many expectations to battle and new methods to use. During the first batches every other macaroon was not looking right and we had to throw it back into the "hopper." That was scary.. "did we make a mistake" "are we going to fail" "will we lose a lot of money?" All of those thoughts came up. The machine is BIG and heavy and after using it for a few hours Ian concluded that it really works to it's potential when we have A LOT of macaroon batter in there...as you can see in the video. So it looks like our production schedule will be changing. Instead of making all or most flavors a day, we will be doing only one or two and just filling all of our dehydrator space with single flavors. This is going to change things significantly, especially how much storage space we need. August cant come sooner, we are really ready for this move!!

On another note, we dropped off samples to our local Wegmans supermarket yesterday. It is such a great store and it is a dream to sell our stuff to them. At first we submitted ourselves to the corporate headquarters in Rochester and we were denied. This time someone recommended that we go through our local store's manager. So we had a few conversations with and finally met Gary yesterday and he will be communicating with the corporate buyer now. Think positive thoughts everyone! If you live in Ithaca, it would mean so much to us if you recommended our products with the manager there! The more requests there are, the more they will see a need for our stuff.

So many exciting things happening. None of which would be possible if it weren't for our amazing and supportive community. What a place to start a flourishing business! Thank YOU for your support by simply reading this blog and being in tune with us. We love YOU. What are you grateful for today? Let us know, right here.

We're Moving!

2010-07-13T19:50:00.000-07:00

It's official. Emmy's Organics is moving. Starting August 1st we will be starting work on our new location in downtown Ithaca. Right now, the space holds an office that does medical billing. But soon enough, we will be transforming it to our new, beautiful kitchen. Ian and I went over there today and took some measurements. It was the first time that I could really picture what it's going to look like and I am so excited! Although I will very much miss some of the amenities that we enjoy currently. Like being in the same space as family and being partially underground (free A/C!). But it feels like time for us to go and claim a space for ourselves and take a big step forward. As the floor plan (which Ian just designed) shows, we will have some retail space, windows, an eating/relaxing area and tons of work space. I think we need at least one purple wall. I am so so grateful for and inspired by the progress we have made in such a small amount of time.

Some other projects that we have been thinking about are hosting raw food prep classes and giving kitchen tours!! Pumped on that.

On a separate note, Ian and I went to California this past weekend for his Dad's birthday celebration. It was so fun. We were in Oakland and San Francisco. I was just amazed by all of the produce! Aside from spending time with friends and family I got to eat at Cafe Gratitude for the first time! Dream come true. All of the servers sang happy birthday to me as I was served a piece of their raw tiramisu. We also ate at their newest restaurant called Gracias Madre. All fresh, vegan mexican food which knocked my socks off. If you are not familiar with either of these restaurants please check out www.cafegratitude.com and check out all of the amazing things that these people are doing for the world. I was so inspired and happy to be eating so well. What a trip! Happy Birthday Bill!

Anyway, we missed the market last week but we will surely be there this weekend. Sorry to anyone who came to find us!

Talk to you soon! Much love from me.

More Cake!

2010-07-05T17:45:00.001-07:00

Incase you didnt see the blog comment, I have been asked to do my first wedding cake job! It seems crazy since I just started working on all of this cake business. But I guess that's what happens when you have a clear dream. It's just perfect, the wedding is in October so I have plenty of time to plan everything out. This is going to be the most amazing cake ever. I know it.

This past weekend was my birthday weekend and what better way to celebrate than making cake. I was inspired and followed (almost entirely) the recipe for chocolate raspberry cake in the Sweet Gratitude raw dessert book. I had so much fun and it turned out beautifully. The layers were quite even and it tasted amazing!!

Aside from cake, Emmy's experienced a slowed down month. The first in quite a while. From what everyone says, this is usual in the month of June. It was weird at first. We kept thinking "are we doing something wrong?" "is this distribution thing wrong?" "shouldn't we be more busy?" At some point we chose to give up this conversation and enjoy ourselves!! Not to say that we havent drummed up some new business this month and are steadily planning our move to the bigger kitchen. AND I took a drive to go and pick up our new machine a few weekends ago. We are almost up and running! Waiting for one last part!! The last piece of news is that Ian will be traveling for over one month in September. He is fulfilling on a dream of his to ride his motorcycle across the country and back. So it looks like I will be the solo boss lady for a little while. The idea is a little intimidating. There are definitely certain jobs that Ian is much better than me at (like lifting large buckets of agave!). But what an opportunity this will be for me to grow as a business owner. I am way excited. The pics above are my birthday cake.

Farmer's Market Shots

2010-07-05T17:16:00.001-07:00

Madison!

2010-06-19T13:49:00.001-07:00

This picture is of our biggest ice cream fan, Madison. Her and her family are loyal visitors at the Farmer's Market and Madison ALWAYS gets vanilla ice cream. Last week, Madison and the fam came to visit the kitchen for the first time and picked up a stock of ice cream to take home. I cant wait to hear how long it lasted! How wonderful to be making such great friends.

If we do choose to do a little retail store in our new space, it would be so fun to pack pints of ice cream and do some other flavors. We have been talking mint chip lately-as the mint in Ian's mother's garden is quite abundant right now.

Talk to you soon!! Happy Monday!

A Thursday Update

2010-06-17T05:28:00.000-07:00

One of the most exciting new developments over the past two weeks is our new partnership with Challenge Industries (http://aboutchallenge.org/CI-final/). This is an amazing organization based right in Ithaca that provides jobs to people with mental and physical disabilities. Challenge provides rides to work, paychecks and a wide variety of jobs for the people that work there. It was Ian's mother's idea to contact them about the possibility of labeling bags for us. This came up because Meryl (or Emmy!) has been our sole bag-labeler for almost a year. She is amazing and can label bags so fast. But in the end there is only so much that one person can do without hurting their wrists (this is a front and back label for each bag for seven flavors of macaroons and small bags of granola!). I think we can say the same about scooping macaroons! Anyway, we went up and visited Challenge and we were blown away by how many services and jobs that they offer!

Needless to say our bag labeling test was perfect. The bags looked great and they were done so fast. I am so excited to be able to contribute a job for them. Also, all of the money that we pay them goes directly to their employees. They feel so accomplished getting a paycheck! It is so beautiful! Please check out there website above to learn more about what they are doing for our community. This is amazing stuff!

I love watching our business expand in such a way that it contributes to more and more people. This is fun. Much love to you.

p.s. the picture above is our order board. whenever we get an order, big or small, we put it on a slip and tack it on the board. it always feels great at the end of the week to "clear the board!"

p.p.s. did i mention that our new space might be able to handle a small retail store??

Fair Share Fiesta!

2010-06-12T13:58:00.000-07:00

Just want to extend the invitation to the Fair Share Fiesta on Tuesday evening. All of the proceeds are going to the Healthy Food For All program-which subsidizes CSAs for lower income families. There is going to be amazing food, latin salsa instruction and a latin dance party after!! So much fun!! Please contact me if you have any questions!

Raw Vegan Strawberry Shortcake!

2010-06-07T20:28:00.000-07:00

Here is the back-wards process of my very first professional cake job!

The recipe was inspired from a Cafe Gratitude cookbook "Sweet Gratitude" (its amazing, I highly recommend it to anyone!!). I have been feeling so inspired by cakes and cake decorating lately. I have been reaching out to some of the connoisseurs of my community and even had my first lesson last week. So it was perfect when the request for a birthday cake for 15-20 people came along!! I got so excited to use some of my new skills and planned out the time to make it step by step. I had so much fun! It turned out beautifully! I can (of course) see where I have a lot of room for improvement. That's the most exciting thing about it: I have so much to learn and I will be able to monitor my progress in so many ways.

Thanks for reading!!

Scooping and Snacks

2010-05-27T19:56:00.000-07:00

Scoops

Below I am adding a video of scooping! This is what we are currently doing to form the macaroons. Making them doesnt take too long, but scooping very large quantities can take some time. Now you can get a sense of what we do during most mornings!! We make it pretty fun and it is quite meditative.

...I think it's funny that "my generation" is playing in the background...

Snacks

After the car ride this past weekend, I wanted to share some snacks that I have been enjoying on the run. I am all about crunch. 1) "just tomatoes" dried peas 2) sunflower sprouts 3) "nature's path" mesa sunrise cereal 4) kombucha. yum. What do you grab on the run?

The Weekend

2010-05-25T19:35:00.000-07:00

Hello! I know that it's Tuesday, but I feel like the weekend just ended. Ian and I drove back from a weekend down-state yesterday. Marian covered for us at the market which was such a treat. I heard that she was making a special peppermint ice cream sundae...she gets real creative with those sundaes!! We knew we were in great hands.

Aside from having a great weekend with my family, we went to test out a new machine for forming macaroons. What a cool experience. We got to bring all of our ingredients and actually make macaroons in a test kitchen facility. We put the batter into this machine...and it worked!! It actually worked! This machine can make about 3200 macaroons in one hour. This is seriously going to ramp up production. I am so happy that we have found something. In past posts, I mentioned another macaroon machine. The other machine was a failure. It did not work and we are in the process of returning it. It has been quite a few frustrating months trying to get this other one to work, contacting the manufacturers, etc. We finally had to say "no more" the machine does not work and we need another one. Once we declared that, we had some space to start looking again...and voila! I will upload some pictures from this adventure tomorrow. Side note: one of the salesmen was a famous pastry chef who went on tour with Julia Child!! I felt like I was in good hands.

I am really excited about the possibility of this machine. Mostly because it will take so much less time to make macaroons that we can make so many more and spread the love further and further! This is getting serious. Did I mention that we found a new space?? More to come on that topic.

Well that is just a pinch of the latest news at EO (should we start abbreviating like that?)

love.

Feelin Abundant!

2010-05-15T10:54:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

We are getting ready for the Farmer's Market tomorrow. I was just wrestling with our little ice cream maker which makes such a load roar as it churns our cashew-coconut delicacy. After a week of a little experimentation, I realized how many special and amazing things that we have to offer tomorrow. I have a recent new fascination with raw vegan cake. Not sure why. I was never a cake kid or anything. But making raw vegan cake is SO fun and it comes out just like...well...cake! Anyway, our first special is a "double chocolate pod" that we will be serving with fresh strawberries. One layer chocolate cake, one layer chocolate cream, one layer strawberries. Yum. The next special is a take-one brownie experiment. We really want to do a brownie that is so good that we want to package it and send it to stores. I used a different technique and looked at a few recipes and made a "cashew crunch brownie." They are pretty amazing...very thick and chewy. Im not sure if this will be the final recipe (actually I'm sure its not) but they are just delicious. Tomorrow we will offer the brownie by itself or with vanilla ice cream and chocolate sauce for a brownie sundae. Man, that will be good. Lastly, we made a few Key Lime Pie last week after Ian's brother, Conor, bought way too many avocados and then went back to California. What a perfect opportunity for Key Lime Pie!! This is such a favorite at the market and when the sun is shining, who could resist? I posted pictures of our three super special treats for tomorrow above. Below I will write the full menu for tomorrow:

Macaroons

Granola

Chocolate Sauce

Peppermint Chocolate Sauce

Cashew-Macadamia Butter

Brownies

Vanilla Ice Cream

Chocolate Ice Cream

Goji Cheesecake

Lemon Cheesecake

Chocolate Strawberry Cheesecake

Key Lime Pie

Chocolate Cheesecake

Double Chocolate Pods

Goji Fudge

Peppermint Fudge

Chocolate Fudge

Mocha Fudge

Strawberry Smoothies w/ fresh almond milk

Man! That's a lot!! Please stop find us tomorrow and enjoy some of this abundance. We love you. I love you.

Samantha

community!

2010-05-07T15:54:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha..duh)

Hello Blog-Readers!

I am just so inspired that people read this blog! An amazing woman named Sheila simply walked into our kitchen today. The door is on the side of a house, pretty isolated, so I was shocked that she found us. She basically shared how her and her partner are really inspired by what we are doing and that she wants to help. She shared "oh, and I saw on your blog that you got a new table...and I have one that you might want." I just got so excited about blogging in that moment. I want everyone to be able to know what's going on with us! It will be so exciting to look back on these posts too. So thank you for indirectly joining the Emmy's Organics community. By knowing what's up with us, you are one with us!! How exciting! Thank you thank you thank you.

This week flew by and felt really relaxed. I am noticing that we have these weeks that really push our limits. Then we have a pretty large but not CRAZY week, it feels so easy. We are really getting this stuff down. Like it was just no big deal that we sent out 28 cheesecakes and 110 cases (12 packages each) of macaroons on Wednesday. All sliced, packaged, labeled and boxed. Piece of cake. Ha.

It is becoming pretty clear that we are growing out of the space we are in. Not to mention that we are downstairs and the big orders are getting a little crazy going up and down. So we are looking! We have found some great places. Some the price too high, some need too many renovations. What we want is something 1,000-1,200 sq feet, open space, windows, good sink hook-ups and good electric. If you know of anything that is $1/sq foot or cheaper, let us know!!

The other amazing thing that I want to say is that I have been so present to all of the people that contribute to us. Ian's dad, Bill (picture above), just came for his second week long trip to Ithaca from California. He came to simply help us out with moving plans. He helped organize our thoughts on what we really needed for a new space, hooked up our new sink, organized our kitchen, talked to plumbers, contractors and landlords. I mean, can you believe it??? On top of all of that, we just had a ton of fun...eating good meals and watching movies. Thank so much, Bill, I love you so much! There are so many people like Bill in our lives that contribute so much and I am so grateful!!

So now I want to hear from you. Lets begin to share with one another.

Who contributes to your life and how? It could be as random as the man who makes the coffee you buy every morning or your sibling who calls you every day. Please share!

Be well and have an amazing weekend.

Please note- it may snow on Sunday which means that we will NOT be at the Farmer's Market.

Love you all,

Samantha

Farmer's Market 2010!

2010-05-01T21:17:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

Holler. First day of the market is, well...today! In just a few hours we will be getting up to claim a booth at the Ithaca Farmer's Market. We will be attending this year on Sundays with nice weather. There is a chance of thunderstorms tomorrow but we're going anyway. We made some ice cream today as well as almond milk to make smoothies. Ian designed a spiffy new menu for us to take. We are ready, are you? I would just like to point out that right as we started our business it was our dream to vend at the farmer's market. And here we are, in our second season. Totally confident in what to bring and how much. Living your dreams is way fun, how are you living yours?

Look forward to seeing you tomorrow!

love,

Samantha

Spring

2010-04-06T19:04:00.001-07:00

(post by Samantha)

(photo by Marian Flaxman)

I am laying on my couch right now with a blanket over my legs. I just had to pause for a minute to think "what do you really want to say right now?" I think when I go to write a blog post, I make up that it's supposed to look a certain way and I should be depicting my company in a certain way. But I am moving those thoughts aside so I can just be...myself. Isnt that what a blog is for anyway?

Today was such a cool day. Two really great things stick out. One was that our new broker, Todd, received a last minute invitation to attend a Distribution trade show for all of the colleges in the NorthEast. This means that all of the people who buy products to sell on campuses in the NorthEast will be there. He said "the only catch, is that it's on Thursday and I need samples!" It was very exciting. We understood what a great opportunity this was so we jumped up and down for a minute and started getting things together. Our products are perfect for college campuses! How cool is this gonna be?

The other great thing is that we got an email today from a contact at Foodzie.com (an online store where we sell our products) saying that InStyle magazine wants samples of our chocolate sauce to review. It is so funny that all of the magazines are in to the chocolate sauce. I mean, it is amazing, but so is all of our other stuff! This was another exciting moment because, of course, when do they need it by? THURSDAY! Hilarious. So instead of sending just the sauce, we put together the deluxe box of....well, everything. Who knows. I love InStyle and I know they will love us.

Something that comes up for me when all of these exposure-opportunities arise is a question of legitimacy. The standards for what qualifies a raw food are pretty vague right now. I am hearing more and more and how certain ingredients which are marketed as raw may not be at all. What I am committed to doing is to ask questions and learn as much as I can about the source of all of our ingredients. Another topic that has been brought to my attention is the healthfulness of agave nectar. This is a whole other story, but I just want to say that I am aware and diving in! If you have any words of wisdom about anything, please feel free to email us at blog@emmysorganics.com. We would love to hear from you.

Happy Spring Everyone! What an amazing change of season.

with love,

Samantha

BIG Update!

2010-03-14T18:45:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

Wow, I cannot believe a month has gone by since the last post. SO much has happened and time is flying by. The biggest change to happen is that we are now selling our products through distributors (except in Ithaca, of course!). The change that comes along is huge. The past two weeks have been crazy and I think the easiest way for me to illustrate this is by making a list:

our batches are WAY bigger

we are buying way more ingredients (we ran out of coconut oil last week, so I had to drive to CT to go get some more!)

we bought two new 24-tray dehydrators

we had to buy our own shipping boxes (we recycled old ones until now, pretty good for a whole year!)

our office is outside of the kitchen now

our printer broke down

we figured out how to make 90 lbs of granola at once

we have had two weeks of 18-hour days

we are looking at a bigger space

we are selling our cheesecake by the slice

our local co-op, Greenstar, saves our butt when we run out of stuff (and sold us a great new work table)

we just had our first dinner at home in such a long time and it was great!

there was an article about us in the Ithaca Journal (thank you, Aaron!)

there was an article written about me in the Record Review (my hometown paper...thank you Jessica!)

i stopped wearing cute clothes to the kitchen

our orders have quadrupled (at the least)

Well thats the brief update. It is really important to me that our community knows what's going on. The past few weeks have been very intense and it is so easy for me to disappear!

The picture above is from the day that Ian and I drove to Pennsylvania to buy our new dehydrators and our shipping boxes. It was quite an adventure because on the way, my car broke down. Once we had it towed to one place, then another, and finally got it fixed, we arrived to get the boxes ten minutes before the warehouse was closing. We took a look at our order and realized that all of the boxes were not going to fit! We took about half the boxes so we could fit the dehydrators and had the rest shipped. We got home that night at about 1am, totally proud that we made it through our Pennsylvania adventure.

I will not be a stranger!

Thank you always for your support. It is because of our community that we have such success.

with love and gratitude,

Samantha

And the winner is...

2010-02-11T06:41:00.000-08:00

...Evan Thomas, for his poem, "An Ode to Mint Chip Macaroons". Check it out!

An Ode to Mint Chip Macaroons

Oh, Mint chip macaroons.

While our lips have never touched,

You've touched my heart

With the thought

Of your cool taste.

May your spearmint

Never pierce

My heart,

But your cacao

Nibble at my ears

Should we ever meet.

Thank you to Evan, and all the amazing poets who submitted love to the contest. We had so much fun reading them all!

The Fall In Love With Emmy's Contest!!!

2010-02-03T20:40:00.000-08:00

(post by Samantha)

Valentine's Day is not complete without a fun contest and a chance to win some amazing delicious food. Here is how our "Fall in Love with Emmy's Contest" works:

Between now and February 8th, email us a love poem dedicated to your favorite Emmy's product. A sonnet for chocolate sauce? A macaroon haiku? You decide. Then, the Emmy's team will carefully select the most creative, brilliant, and loving poem to be the winner! The winner will be announced on Febraury 10th, and their poem will be featured on our facebook page, as well as our blog! The winning poet will receive a free package of their favorite Emmy's product, which will be sent out to be received in time for Valentine's Day!

1. Write your love poem dedicated to your favorite Emmy's product

2. Email it to blog@emmysorganics.com by February 8th.

3. Cross your fingers and linger in the possibility of winning the contest! The winner will be announced on February 10th.

So get creative and fall in love. We cannot wait to read your poems!

A Request for Requests!

2010-02-03T20:30:00.000-08:00

(post by Samantha)

What I am starting to learn about the food retail world, is that store managers and buyers always listen to their customers. It is so cool. So I am making a request of anyone who reads this. If you have a great health food store, coop or grocery store that you think is place for our products, please go in and request Emmy's Organics to a store manager. We are really excited about spreading what we make to as many communities as possible and cannot do it without you.

Thank you so much for your amazing support!

Samantha

Paradise Health Fair

2010-01-26T20:41:00.000-08:00

(post by Samantha)

Hi Everyone!

I would like to announce that Emmy's Organics will be doing a demo at the Paradise Health Fair at Nimble Fitness Studio (42 East 12 Street, NYC) this Sunday from 11am - 4pm. It is going to be an amazing event. There will be health representatives from all ends of the spectrum including yoga instructors, nurses and foodies. There are going to be prizes, giveaways (including free yoga classes, im finding those!). So come check us out.

Talk to you soon!

Sun in Winter

2010-01-24T07:18:00.001-08:00

(post by Samantha)

The winter is upon us here in Ithaca and Emmy's is as wonderful as ever. Not only has our Chocolate Sauce been featured in VegNews, but it was also featured in Gluten-Free Living as well. We had no idea. We sent them a sample of the sauce a long time ago. I kid you not, Ian and I were grocery shopping at our local co-op (Greenstar) and Ian just opened up the January issue of Gluten-Free Living to the page where our sauce was. It was so famous and cool!! Two magazines in one month! Who knew that it would be the chocolate sauce too!?? So funny.

Ian and I had the opportunity to go visit my father and step-mother in Florida a few weeks ago. They were staying on the west coast of Florida for two months this winter and there was no chance that we could pass up some family and sunshine time. Our real test was, could Emmy's run smoothly without us being there?? There was a ton of planning before our departure date. We got present to a couple of things that only we know how to do. This was such a wonderful practice for us to place things out of our hands. So with the help of Emmy, Marian and Mandy, we were able to take our very first trip away from the kitchen/office. It was wonderful.

Our trip was amazing. It was a little cold for a few days, but the sun was shining and that was all that mattered. We were able to research some new store possibilities and Ian made calls and got us in to the rest of the Fairway Markets in NYC! My dad connected us to a grocery buyer in Florida at a store called Baileys (thanks Dad!). We also got a ton of orders while we were gone. We should go away more!! We know what we need to change so that going away will be even smoother next time. It was so nice to come home with a little sun and a fully functioning kitchen!

Anyway, we are moving around the office again! Making room for more things. There should be rumors spreading about a new product next month. I have NO idea what it could be!!

Thank you for reading this blog! I love writing and updating you on this crazy, fulfilling and fun adventure that is Emmy's Organics. Make sure to check out our website and store for specials and new products. http://www.etsy.com/shop/emmysorganics

Also, if you would like to get on an email list to receive other updates via email, please send your email address to info@emmysorganics.com

Thank you again!

With love,

Samantha

FAME!

2010-01-03T20:29:00.000-08:00

(post by Samantha)

Well we got some major fame this month with a featured product pick in VegNews Magazine. I cannot tell you how amazing it feels to be in there. What an awesome way to start off the new year! Thank you to Nydia Williams who took the beautiful picture! Go pick up a copy and check it out!

love,

Samantha

Happy Holidays!

2009-12-28T14:53:00.000-08:00

Hi Everyone!

Thank you for being a blog-reader! I wanted to write and say Happy Holidays to all. We have been having an amazing few days hanging with friends and family which is the greatest thing ever. We came back to the kitch yesterday to get ready for our week here. We really missed it and it feels great to be back.

We are thinking about some new flavors for the new year. Please feel free to email us at info@emmysorganics.com with some ideas!

Wishing everyone health, joy and fun this holiday season and in the new year.

with love,

Ian and Samantha

Update!

2009-12-14T11:50:00.001-08:00

(post by Samantha)

Well the cheesecake is flying at Greenstar! That is my first update. All is well at Emmy's Organics. We have been really cracking down on creating schedules for production, packaging, shipping, meetings and playing! We recently hired our amazing friend, Mandy, to come in and make macaroons with us. She is the very first person that has learned how to make them! Its so cool. With her making them and Ian and I scooping we are just unstoppable! We also have the amazing Ricardo packaging for us. What a dream team...especially when you throw Meryl and Marian in the mix. I am really excited about how our company is evolving and all of the opportunity that comes with the evolution.

Today we were thinking about the Farmer's Market and how on the first day we did it we prepped all night making gallons of almond and coconut milk. We were so crazy! We had so much left over! Just thinking about that time reminds me that anything is possible and mastery comes with time, patience and practice. There is no way that this company would exist if we hadnt just gone for it. All of the other details are learned from failures/shots in the dark and look where we are now. I cant wait to read this blog post in a few months and feel the same way looking back.

I write today from a Shortline bus. I have been traveling once a week to New York City for a Landmark Education course that is five months long! I have been driving every week which is wonderful but I have been craving a break from driving. So I got on a bus today that has internet on it! How luxurious to do work on the bus. I am loving it!

The pic above is our granola! I had some recently and remembered how good it is. I love how crunchy is is and how it's not too sweet. I love the pieces with big chunks of dates in them. Its lovely with almond milk too. The pictures above are some of my favorites! They were taken by Jake Forney...our super talented photographer friend. Hire him!

Stay warm! Talk to you soon.

Samantha

Not Quite Cheesy

2009-11-14T06:39:00.000-08:00

(post by Samantha)

Hello!

I am so pleased to announce that you can now buy our cheesecake by the slice as well as our fudge by the piece at Greenstar Co-op. We dropped off our first order on Thursday and 10 slices were sold in less that 24 hours. I am so excited about this. I see it as such a New York City "thing," where you can buy raw vegan meals by the serving to go. So G-Star is so hip and we are too. What an amazing treat to pick up!

We are eagerly awaiting our macaroons machine which is coming in less than two weeks. I am starting to become present to how much other stuff I will be able to get done when there isnt as much scooping to do. I cant wait.

I am getting really excited about the holidays this year. I feel more excited than I have ever been. Just yesterday our beautiful and talented friend Nydia Williams (photos above by her, design by ian) shot some photos of our holiday season specials. We are doing two holiday bags each of a dozen macaroons: one that is just chocolate and vanilla and the other is all of our flavors. Mint Chip, Chai Spice, Lemon Ginger and Chocolate Orange. They are bagged and tied with a glitzy gold ribbon. Fabulous! Our other super special creation is a Peppermint Chocolate sauce. Ian has been wanting to do this for a while. He made a batch yesterday and I kid you not, it tastes like Andes Mint Chocolates. The ones they leave on your pillow at hotels...or at least they used to do that. Maybe one day it will be a jar of our chocolate sauce instead. How amazing would that be??? A girl can dream... ANYWAY, these new products are not on the website yet, but they will be in the next two days. So check them out at http://www.etsy.com/shop/emmysorganics.

Soon, we will also be doing e-newsletters that you can sign up to receive on our website.

Much love this lovely Fall,

Samantha

Opportunity

2009-11-04T20:29:00.000-08:00

(post by Samantha)

Hello wonderful, amazing people!

Thank you so much for reading this blog. It has been a little while since the GreentFest. The Festival itself was such a success. We established ourselves with the Maryland community. This is so perfect because after the festivals we received orders from a slew of new stores in that region. This is all thanks to Marian. Her parents live in Maryland and she knows the lay of the land. She knows of all of the health-minded stores and is committed to getting our products there.

Our customer list grows everyday. Including today! We are really working on the workability of our business. Today Ian and I made around 1500 macaroons all by ourselves. Its amazing what two people can do! We've gotten pretty good at it. In December, that is all going to change. We will be receiving a major piece of machinery that is going to scoop our macaroons for us! The machine has the capability to scoop 2500 macaroons in ONE HOUR! Today we spent over three hours scooping our 1500. We are going to have so much more time. I think that both Ian and I would love the time to catch up with customers and move forward on other projects. Another change is that we are moving into house together on Lake Cayuga. That is another change that I am looking forward to.

I have been super inspired about business especially since my involvement in Landmark Education. I am currently involved in a course where I am commuting to New York City once a week. It may seem crazy but I have been learning so many amazing technics for living my life powerfully. It has brought me so much which is why this commute is no big deal. I am so grateful to Ian and Marian for allowing me to rearrange life so that I can go there. Ian has been DJing...on his radio show at a club in town. We had a great Halloween! He has also been riding his motorcycle often especially since he purchased a heated jacket liner which will extent his riding season. Go Ian.

So what else is new? We have been honored to be chosen by an Ithaca College student, Drea, who is interested in photojournalism. She did her midterm project on us and wrote an amazing article with beautiful pictures. She is also using us for her final project. We are so flattered and so excited by her work. What an opportunity to have some professional articles and photos to use for various projects! The photo above is by her, Drea Kasianchuk.

Other news is that our chocolate sauce is going to be featured in VegNews Magazine! Check out the review and picture (taken by Nydia Williams) in the January/February issue. How cool is that? I feel so famous!

So there is a little update on the lives of Samantha, Ian and our Emmy's Organics family! Talk to you soon!

We Are Players

2009-10-10T19:17:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

Hello Everybody!
So at this very moment, I am sitting in the kitchen of Marian's parent's home in Maryland. Today was our first day at the Greenfest in D.C. It was amazing. Walking through the exhibitor booths is almost overwhelming with amazing-ness. There are so many people in this world following their passions and committed to a green planet! I cant believe that it is actually happening right now. In order to prepare for this festival, we had to get busy! We brought on average four hundred packages of each flavor macaroon! When we were unloading the car yesterday, I really got how hard we have been working! That's a lot of product for a small amount of people and I am so proud of our company for playing so big. Now that we are here, and I have been talking to guests and exhibitors and have realized that we have really done it! We are players in this industry. Everyone was so excited about our products and just wanted to know everything about us! It was a great day and I cannot wait until tomorrow! Its really fun to be like, "yea, this is my company!" Check me out right before we started at the festival this morning!

Ian will be at the Farmer's Market tomorrow with the REAL EMMY (his mother). Please go out and support! I have no idea what he intends on bringing tomorrow but I can promise some macaroons, granola, nut butters, chocolate sauce and brownies. I know there will be a slew of surprises! Thank you so much for being a part of this dream! We are so blessed to have unlimited support from our community and beyond!
Talk to you soon. Much love.

Happy October

2009-10-04T05:55:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

It is officially fall. So beautiful! We are packing for the market right now, but I wanted to post our menu for the day. The cold weather makes me want to eat chocolate. The nutritional benefits of raw chocolate are outstanding and really invigorate the body. We made a large batch of brownies yesterday (my favorite!) to welcome in the fall weather. So stay warm with some chocolate. See you soon!

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Ithaca Farmer's Market Menu (10/4/09)

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Pies: $6 per slice

Chocolate Chip Cheesecake

Chocolate Strawberry Cheesecake

Chocolate Cheesecake

Raspberry Cheesecake

Ice-Cream:

$5 cup

$3 kids cup

$4 cone

Chocolate

Vanilla

toppings: $1 each (goji berries, cacao nibs, coconut, sprinkles)

Macaroons: $0.75/ea. or $4/half dozen

Mint Chip

Lemon Ginger

Dark Cacao

Chocolate Orange

Chai Spice

Coconut Vanilla

Super Fudge: $1.25/ea. or $7/half dozen

Goji Berry

Chocolate

Granola: $8/12oz bag or $5/bowl w/fresh almond milk

Cookies: $1 each

Almond Cookie

Brownies!

Almond Date Energy Balls ($ .75)

Chocolate Almond Date Energy Balls ($ .75)

Nut Butters:

Cashew ($12)

Macadamia Cashew ($8)

Chocolate Sauce: $8/jar

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Playing Big

2009-09-19T20:58:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

Hi Everyone! So many great things are going on here at Emmy's Organics, inc. We have been playing really big with our wholesale business. We have been sending samples out to some amazing places. I never knew this, but each Whole Foods Market is catered to service it's demographic. So, many of these stores are completely different from one another. After some research and help from our amazing friend, Keeli, we found some stores that will fit our product perfectly. Also, I was just buying some fruit at Wegmans, our local supermarket, and realized that they started carrying a line of coconut ice cream and some raw granola. I literally stopped dead in my tracks and exclaimed, "oh my gosh!" I am so inspired! Wegmans supports a lot of local businesses. I know they will love us. Monday, I am dropping samples off and the magic will happen. I love the idea of getting in to these larger stores! This is big time exposure for us and what we are all about. I just got a picture of a mother putting three-packs of macaroons in her young child's lunch box. Wow. I am so excited about this! There are literally not enough hours of the day...we have so many ideas! This upcoming week we are going to be training two friends and employees, Adria and Zia, on the actual production of macaroons and granola. This is also very big! I would like to give Zia a shout out because she has been such a hardworking and inspiring member of our little community. She is so willing to help and gives us amazing feedback...helping us become more and more efficient. Go Zia! I am going to put her picture above. That's how much we love her.

Today is the market. It has been freezing in the morning, but after that it is supposed to be beautiful. We will be bringing some peaches grown in Ian's mother's back yard to put in smoothies. See you tomorrow and thank you for your amazing support.

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Ithaca Farmer's Market Menu (09/20/09)

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Pies: $6 per slice

Goji Cheesecake

Strawberry Cheesecake

Chocolate Cheesecake

Drinks: $6 per 16oz

Peach Smoothie

Berry Smoothie

Ice-Cream:

$5 cup

$3 kids cup

$4 cone

Chocolate

Vanilla

toppings: $1 each (goji berries, cacao nibs, coconut, sprinkles)

Macaroons: $0.75/ea. or $4/half dozen

Mint Chip

Lemon Ginger

Dark Cacao

Chocolate Orange

Chai Spice

Coconut Vanilla

Super Fudge: $1.25/ea. or $7/half dozen

Goji Berry

Peppermint

Mocha

Granola: $8/12oz bag or $5/bowl w/fresh almond milk

Cookies: $1 each

Almond Cookie

Cashew Cookie

Coconut Squares

Almond Date Energy Balls ($ .75)

Chocolate Almond Date Energy Balls ($ .75)

Nut Butters:

Cashew ($12)

Macadamia Cashew ($8)

Chocolate Sauce: $8/jar

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Sunny Days

2009-09-05T16:03:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

Well this has just been the most beautiful week ever! So much sunshine! I love it. Though we spend a good amount of time in the kitchen, we have been taking snack breaks outside. After hearing the great news about Whole Foods this week, we have been making a ton of food. When I think back to the very beginning, I can really see how much more efficient we are about production. For example, the new norm for us is making four batches of each macaroon flavor when in the beginning we made one at a time. The set up and clean up is also extremely smooth and familiar. It feels really great. We will be sending out our first Whole Foods order at the beginning of next week, so if you are ever in Princeton, NJ, pick up some of our goodies!

To celebrate Labor Day, we are bringing a batch of popsicles that we made earlier this summer. The market is going to be lovely, I cant wait. See you tomorrow!

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Ithaca Farmer's Market Menu (09/05/09)

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Pies: $6 per slice

Chocolate Goji Cheesecake

Blueberry Acai Cheesecake

Drinks: $6 per 16oz

Peach Smoothie

Berry Smoothie

Ice-Cream:

$5 cup

$3 kids cup

$4 cone

Chocolate

Vanilla

toppings: $1 each (goji berries, cacao nibs, coconut, sprinkles)

Macaroons: $0.75/ea. or $4/half dozen

Mint Chip

Lemon Ginger

Dark Cacao

Chocolate Orange

Chai Spice

Coconut Vanilla

Super Fudge: $1.25/ea. or $7/half dozen

Goji Berry

Peppermint

Mocha

Granola: $8/12oz bag or $5/bowl w/fresh almond milk

Cookies: $1 each

Almond Butter Cookie

Brownies

Almond Date Energy Balls ($ .75)

Chocolate Almond Date Energy Balls ($ .75)

Nut Butters:

Cashew ($12)

Macadamia Cashew ($8)

Chocolate Sauce: $8/jar

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Wow Wow!

2009-08-29T20:45:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

Has it really been 20 days? I have missed our blogging! I dont even know where to begin. Well the most exciting piece of news is that yesterday, Emmy's Organics was approved for its very first Whole Foods Market order. This is truly a dream come true! I mean, WHOLE FOODS! The market in Princeton, NJ will be serving up some Emmy's in the next week or so. It was such a beautiful coincidence that one of Ian's childhood friends, Keeli, works at the very Whole Foods Market that we had been working with. She has been so supportive and amazing and I would like to acknowledge her for that! Thank you, Keeli! One step before Keeli involves the lovely Marian, who was the one who went in to this specific Whole Foods, noticed their selection of raw products and started talking to the right people. She made quite the move because here we are, approved and awaiting our first order from them. We have no idea what is going to happen next, but it is so exciting! Thank you, Marian for your courage and for sharing our dreams. While I am at it, I would like to acknowledge Ian for his all around wonderful-ness. I decided to take a trip to New York City to attend a Landmark Forum, a transformative seminar (to say the least!). Anyway, it was my first time leaving the kitchen for such a long period of time. Ian held it down and was so supportive of me going on this adventure. It was an amazing experience; I learned so much and I am back fully inspired and excited about our business! So thank you Ian for being you and for your greatness. Wow, I am just full of gratitude this evening! Who knew? Anyway, I am extra pumped to get to the market tomorrow because I really missed it last weekend. See you there!

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Ithaca Farmer's Market Menu (08/30/09)

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Pies: $6 per slice

Chocolate Goji Cheesecake

Coconut Lime Cheesecake

Blueberry Acai Cheesecake

Drinks: $6 per 16oz

Vanilla Milkshake

Berry Smoothie

Ice-Cream:

$5 cup

$3 kids cup

$4 cone

Chocolate

Vanilla

toppings: $1 each (goji berries, cacao nibs, coconut, sprinkles)

Macaroons: $0.75/ea. or $4/half dozen

Mint Chip

Lemon Ginger

Dark Cacao

Chocolate Orange

Chai Spice

Coconut Vanilla

Super Fudge: $1.25/ea. or $7/half dozen

Goji Berry

Peppermint

Mocha

Granola: $8/12oz bag or $5/bowl w/fresh almond milk

Cookies: $1 each

Almond Butter Cookie

Brownies

Almond Date Energy Balls ($ .75)

Chocolate Almond Date Energy Balls ($ .75)

Nut Butters: $10/jar

Cashew

Chocolate Sauce: $6/jar

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Cashew Butter

2009-08-08T21:11:00.001-07:00

(post by Samantha)

Well, there are so any things that I could talk about right now. This was a really cool week because we have been thinking a lot about employees. We really want employees to have a meaningful experience working for us and I know it will be meaningful to us in return. It has been fun to talk about and ask people about their favorite work experiences have been.

Another fun creation of this week is raw cashew butter. After some time, our commercial nut grinding machine will not just be used for the occasional snack! One of Ian's favorite things to eat right now is cashew butter. He was really pumped to jar it up, shrink wrap the top (another new element to our jarring!) and label it. The jars look so beautiful. We will have them at the Market tomorrow.

I made our brownies today and I really think they are my favorite thing...as a chocolate lover. We will also be serving our Key Lime Pie. We have some serious fans out there. See you at the market tomorrow!

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Ithaca Farmer's Market Menu (08/9/09)

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Pies: $6 per slice

Chocolate Banana Cheesecake

Key Lime Pie

Blueberry Cheesecake

Drinks: $6 per 16oz

Vanilla Milkshake

Berry Smoothie

Ice-Cream:

$5 cup

$3 kids cup

$4 cone

Chocolate

Vanilla

toppings: $1 each (goji berries, cacao nibs, coconut, sprinkles)

Macaroons: $0.75/ea. or $4/half dozen

Mint Chip

Lemon Ginger

Dark Cacao

Chocolate Orange

Chai Spice

Coconut Vanilla

Super Fudge: $1.25/ea. or $7/half dozen

Goji Berry

Peppermint

Mocha

Granola: $8/12oz bag or $5/bowl w/fresh almond milk

Cookies: $1 each

Almond Butter Cookie

Brownies

Almond Date Energy Balls ($ .75)

Nut Butters: $10/jar

Cashew

Chocolate Sauce: $6/jar

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Busy Bees!

2009-08-01T17:44:00.001-07:00

(post by Samantha)

Hi!

As the title of this blog post describes...we have been so busy! It's just amazing and wonderful. Out wholesale business is doing very well. We continuously receive re-orders from all of our vendors and we are continuously getting new ones. Our local distributing company, Regional Access recently took our products on. They have been sending out samples to a ton of stores and last week we started receiving orders. It feels very cool! ALSO, we have our very first salesperson! Our beloved friend Marian, who has been helping us out at the market recently took samples down to her hometown in New Jersey and got us a new account! We were so excited! This new store, called It's A Wrap, really loved our stuff and even invited Marian to come down and do a demo this past week! We are so proud of her and feel so blessed to have her on board. Check out this beautiful woman! Thank goodness she has an iphone.

Here is the menu for the Farmer's Market, hope to see you there!

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Ithaca Farmer's Market Menu (08/2/09)

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Pies: $6 per slice

Chocolate Cheesecake

Goji Lemon Cheesecake

Strawberry Chocolate Cheesecake

Drinks: $6 per 16oz

Vanilla Milkshake

Berry Smoothie

Ice-Cream:

$5 cup

$3 kids cup

$4 cone

Chocolate

Vanilla

toppings: $1 each (goji berries, cacao nibs, coconut, sprinkles)

Macaroons: $0.75/ea. or $4/half dozen

Mint Chip

Lemon Ginger

Dark Cacao

Chocolate Orange

Chai Spice

Coconut Vanilla

Super Fudge: $1.25/ea. or $7/half dozen

Goji Berry

Peppermint

Mocha

Granola: $8/12oz bag or $5/bowl w/fresh almond milk

Cookies: $1 each

Almond Butter Cookie
Cashew Butter Cookie

Almond Date Energy Balls ($ .75)

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Family Affair

2009-07-25T13:02:00.001-07:00

(post by Samantha)

Hey Everyone! I am so pleased because we have had an abundance of family in town over the past week. Ian's brother and his girlfriend, Diana have been in town as well as Ian's father, Bill. This weekend my brother and my mother are visiting. Everyone has been stopping by the kitchen, hanging and helping out. It has been so great, I just love family.
The market is going to be great tomorrow. We made MINT ICE CREAM!!! We have a small amount so come and get it! We need some feedback! Come and see us.
Much love!

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Ithaca Farmer's Market Menu (07/26/09)

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Pies: $6 per slice

Chocolate Cheesecake

Lemon Cheesecake

Strawberry Chocolate Cheesecake
Coconut Lime Cheesecake
Banana Cream Pie

Drinks: $6 per 16oz

Vanilla Milkshake

Berry Smoothie

Ice-Cream:

$5 cup

$3 kids cup

$4 cone

Chocolate

Vanilla

toppings: $1 each (goji berries, cacao nibs, coconut, sprinkles)

Macaroons: $0.75/ea. or $4/half dozen

Mint Chip

Lemon Ginger

Dark Cacao

Chocolate Orange

Chai Spice

Coconut Vanilla

Super Fudge: $1.25/ea. or $7/half dozen

Goji Berry

Peppermint

Mocha

Granola: $8/12oz bag or $5/bowl w/fresh almond milk

Cookies: $1 each

Almond Butter Cookie
Cashew Butter Cookie
Brownies

Almond Date Energy Balls ($ .75)

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Ithaca Bakes

2009-07-22T18:23:00.000-07:00

Post by Ian (finally!)

Emmy's Organics, Inc. will be vending at the Ithaca Bakery (400 N. Meadow st.) this thursday from 4pm-7pm as part of their local foods market! Come check us out & induldge in the super exclusive "cheese"cake combinations & best raw vegan desserts ever! That's all for now, see you at the market.

Long Time No See!

2009-07-17T15:11:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

Hello beautiful friends!

I we have been a little MIA for the past week. We have had so much going on. We are now vending at the Thursday evening Farmer's Market. It goes from 4pm - 8pm, so a lot people come for dinner and stroll around Dewitt park. Last week we made an ENTREE! Normally we are the go-to dessert people, but this time we were serving up some dinner. We made a stuffed mushroom platter, stuffed with a sun-seed pate that was just amazing. It was served over a field green salad that we get from our local CSA from Stick and Stone Farm. As I predicted, we sold out! It was soooo great. We did not go last night as it was the very first night of the Grassroots festival. As Ian and I are both huge music fans, we wanted to catch as much as we could last night. Ian performed with his brother's band The Makepeace Brothers. It was a great show! This weekend we are trying to do kitchen and festival, my we sure keep busy with the bestest activities! So we are still going to be at the market on Sunday...fully saturated with music. Come check us out; we'll tell you about the shows we went to! Hope to see you there!

The picture above is of Ian and I in a very important business meeting on how to spread good health and joy to our community and beyond!

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Ithaca Farmer's Market Menu (07/19/09)

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Pies: $6 per slice

Chocolate Cheesecake

Lemon Cheesecake

Strawberry Cheesecake

Drinks: $6 per 16oz

Vanilla Milkshake

Berry Smoothie

Ice-Cream:

$5 cup

$3 kids cup

$4 cone

Chocolate

Vanilla

toppings: $1 each (goji berries, cacao nibs, coconut, sprinkles)

Macaroons: $0.75/ea. or $4/half dozen

Mint Chip

Lemon Ginger

Dark Cacao

Chocolate Orange

Chai Spice

Coconut Vanilla

Super Fudge: $1.25/ea. or $7/half dozen

Goji Berry

Peppermint

Mocha

Granola: $8/12oz bag or $5/bowl w/fresh almond milk

Cookies: $1 each

Almond Butter Currant

Choc Almond Date Energy Balls ($ .75)

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Happy Birthday!

2009-07-04T20:47:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

So yesterday was my birthday! It was a really fun day. I had a project for myself to make a raw strawberry cheesecake recipe from a Cafe Gratitude dessert book. I have always had strawberry shortcake on my birthday. I mean, it's the perfect summer birthday cake in my mind. The process was really interesting and fun. I had never made anything that was supposed to have a "cake" texture and it was surprisingly easy. After mixing in all of the ingredients, it was amazing how spongy the batter became. It was also amazingly delicious. So anyway, I was really excited to take on a new recipe and share it with my friends at a small birthday gathering I had. By the time everyone was hanging out it was way past eating time AND we had some other desserts around. With some left over cake and icing, I made a mini strawberry shortcake that everyone could try and it was such a it. But because no one wanted to eat a whole piece, Ian and I decided to offer my birthday-strawberry shortcake at the Farmer's Market tomorrow. I cant wait for people to come up and I get to say "...and we also have my birthday cake, would you like a piece?" What an appropriate cake for the time of year, I can't imagine anyone saying no. Tomorrow should be beautiful, we are super excited...as always. See you there!

oh, and p.s. happy independence day!

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Ithaca Farmer's Market Menu (07/5/09)

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Pies: $6 per slice

Chocolate Cheesecake

Birthday Strawberry Shortcake ($8/slice)

Drinks: $6 per 16oz

Mint Chip Milkshake

Berry Smoothie

Ice-Cream:

$5 cup

$3 kids cup

$4 cone

Chocolate

Vanilla

toppings: $1 each (goji berries, cacao nibs, coconut, sprinkles)

Macaroons: $0.75/ea. or $4/half dozen

Mint Chip

Lemon Ginger

Dark Cacao

Chocolate Orange

Chai Spice

Coconut Vanilla

Super Fudge: $1.25/ea. or $7/half dozen

Goji Berry

Peppermint

Mocha

Granola: $8/12oz bag or $5/bowl w/fresh almond milk

Cookies: $1 each

Cashew Cookies

Almond Butter Currant

Choc Almond Date Energy Balls ($ .75)

GInger Snaps

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Mint!

2009-06-27T13:46:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

Hi! Just finished packing up for the market tomorrow. There is mint! It is starting to come in season so that means we are making Mint Chip smoothies tomorrow. Our dear friend Cooper said he has a ton of mint growing out at his house and offered for us to use some. I am very excited about that! Hope to see you there so we can celebrate mint together.

Check us out...

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Ithaca Farmer's Market Menu (06/28/09)

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Pies: $6 per slice

Chocolate Cheesecake

Strawberry Cheesecake

Drinks: $6 per 16oz

Mint Chip Milkshake

Mixed Berry Smoothie

Ice-Cream:

$5 cup

$3 kids cup

$4 cone

Chocolate

Vanilla

toppings: $1 each (goji berries, cacao nibs, coconut, sprinkles)

Macaroons: $0.75/ea. or $4/half dozen

Mint Chip

Lemon Ginger

Dark Cacao

Chocolate Orange

Chai Spice

Coconut Vanilla

Super Fudge: $1.25/ea. or $7/half dozen

Goji Berry

Peppermint

Mocha

Granola: $8/12oz bag or $5/bowl w/fresh almond milk

***Extra Special Cookies: $1 each

Cashew Cookies

Almond Butter Currant

Almond Date Energy Balls ($ .75)

Choc Almond Date Energy Balls ($ .75)

GInger Snaps

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Rainy Days

2009-06-20T17:55:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

Hey Everyone! Hope you are doing so so well. We have had a great week this week, our pace really switched up. We had a large order to fill that required us to make almost everything but macaroons. Some new innovations came along such as some ginger snap cookies and chocolate energy balls. We are just going nuts with these cookies (pun intended). Tomorrow at the market, our lovely tiered cookie tray is going to be packed. Also, our local co-op, Greenstar, is now carrying our cookies in packages of two. They are going to be a hit!

Though it has been rainy the past few days (the sound of it is really nice right now), we are still super pumped for the market tomorrow. Check out the menu below, I highly recommend the lemon cheesecake, its kind of amazing. Much love.

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Ithaca Farmer's Market Menu (06/21/09)

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Pies: $6 per slice

Lemon Cheesecake

Choc Strawberry Cheesecake

Drinks: $6 per 16oz

Chocolate Milkshake

Banana Smoothie

Ice-Cream:

$5 cup

$3 kids cup

$4 cone

Chocolate

Vanilla

toppings: $1 each (goji berries, cacao nibs, coconut, sprinkles)

Macaroons: $0.75/ea. or $4/half dozen

Mint Chip

Lemon Ginger

Dark Cacao

Chocolate Orange

Chai Spice

Coconut Vanilla

Super Fudge: $1.25/ea. or $7/half dozen

Goji Berry

Peppermint

Mocha

Granola: $8/12oz bag or $5/bowl w/fresh almond milk

***Extra Special Cookies: $1 each

Cashew Cookies

Almond Butter Currant

Almond Date Energy Balls ($ .75)

Choc Almond Date Energy Balls ($ .75)
Lemon Coconut Squares

GInger Snaps

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We Heart Friends

2009-06-13T13:31:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

Tomorrow is the Farmer's Market! Yay! We are really excited, as always. Saturdays we get ready and now have three amazing friends who come and help out: Parker, Matilda and Sarah. It's so fun when they come; already a highlight of the weekends. We are so grateful for their amazing work and enthusiasm for what we are doing.

The article came out in the ithaca times this week. It was so beautiful and we have been receiving some beautiful acknowledgements from it. Thank you to Taryn who wrote the article! Check out our fame: http://www.ithacatimes.com/main.asp?SectionID=16&SubSectionID=87&ArticleID=9295&TM=79227.72

Below are our offerings at the market tomorrow...I'm especially excited about the pies, they are just to die for and so pretty to look at.

Ps: listen to 92WICB tonight from 10pm-12am for "Beef and Broccoli," featuring the most talented DJ Cappel (Ian).

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Ithaca Farmer's Market Menu (06/7/09)

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Pies: $6 per slice

Strawberry Chocolate Cheesecake

Key Lime Pie

Drinks: $6 per 16oz

Vanilla Milkshake

Mixed Berry Almond Milk Smoothie

Ice-Cream:

$5 cup

$3 kids cup

$4 cone

Chocolate

Vanilla

toppings: $1 each (goji berries, cacao nibs, coconut, sprinkles)

Macaroons: $0.75/ea. or $4/half dozen

Mint Chip

Lemon Ginger

Dark Cacao

Chocolate Orange

Chai Spice

Coconut Vanilla

Super Fudge: $1.25/ea. or $7/half dozen

Goji Berry

Peppermint

Mocha

Granola: $8/12oz bag or $5/bowl w/fresh almond milk

***Extra Special Cookies: $1 each

Cashew Cookies

Almond Date Balls (50 cents)
Lemon Coconut Squares

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The Zero Waste Diet

2009-06-10T18:45:00.000-07:00

(post not by Ian)

Hi Everyone! So Ian and I have decided to take on a new diet that we developed called "The Zero Waste Diet." Here's what it entails: Everything that you consume...including what it was packaged in...must be compostable. It's so simple. For example, Ian went to the co-op to get some veggies and was about to get some cauliflower but then realized that it was wrapped in plastic and therefore not on the diet. So he said no and got some loose broccoli instead. We are allowing glass containers that we can re-use and compostable corn plastics (like our macaroon packages!) and that's it. So far, for me, it has brought my attention to how much waste our food produces. It's incredible. It has also brought my attention to how easy it is to avoid all of this waste. If everyone ate "The Zero Waste Diet," we could save the planet.

By following "The Zero Waste Diet" not only are you contributing to an extremely healthy body by eating mostly fresh food, but also to the sustainability of our planet. I challenge you all to take on this diet and let us know about your experience. Talk to you soon.

P.S. There was an article printed about us in the Ithaca Times today, we are feeling very famous.

Moves and Grooves

2009-06-06T19:03:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

I am listening to Ian's new radio show on 92 WICB "Beef and Broccoli." It will be playing every Saturday night from 10pm-12am. It's pretty amazing and one of Ian's dreams come true! Go boy! We have had such a great week (once again) at Emmy's. Not only did we get a ton done with our summer intern Peter Jenkins, but we got four new vendors...Gimme! Coffee, Cafe Gratitude, Bet The Farm and Sheldrake Point Winery. This is such a beautiful acknowledgement for us! Things are getting busy and the extra hands from our friends and family are so appreciated. What an amazing community we have.

The weather tomorrow is supposed to be lovely. I cant wait for the market. I really really love it there! We have our friend Bad Boy Billy coming to do some filming for us too. Pretty exciting. Here is our menu for tomorrow. Hope to see you around. Thanks for the love!

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Ithaca Farmer's Market Menu (06/7/09)

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Pies: $6 per slice

Chocolate Cheesecake

Chocolate Banana Cheesecake
Coconut Lime Cheesecake

Drinks: $6 per 16oz

Vanilla Milkshake

Strawberry Almond Milk Smoothie

Ice-Cream: $4 (gluten-free cone or cup)

Chocolate

Vanilla

toppings: $1 each (goji berries, cacao nibs, coconut, sprinkles)

Macaroons: $0.75/ea. or $4/half dozen

Mint Chip

Lemon Ginger

Dark Cacao

Chocolate Orange

Chai Spice

Coconut Vanilla

Super Fudge: $1.25/ea. or $7/half dozen

Goji Berry

Peppermint

Mocha

Granola: $8/12oz bag or $5/bowl w/fresh almond milk

***Extra Special Cookies: $1 each

Cashew Cookies

Almond Butter-No Oats-Oatmeal Cookies
Lemon Coconut Squares

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Happy June

2009-06-02T14:00:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

Happy June Everyone! I cant believe that it is already here and that summer is approaching. We have had some really cool projects going on down at the Headquarters. Yesterday we made over 300 raw cookies for our friend Alex who runs www.rawguru.com. He noticed that we started making cookies and placed an order! So great! We also were just officially asked to do some custom wedding favors for a couple getting married in Albany. I cant wait to put these together. We are thinking about doing a small box with two truffles inside, it's going to be so cute. Thank you to our beautiful friend Elizabeth for referring us for the favors. I can officially say that we "do" weddings now. Always expanding. On that note we are in the market for a larger fridge. We are growing out of our current space.

In the past few days I have had a few conversations about the progress of Emmy's Organics. We are working in such a great flow. I found the picture above the other night and could not believe that it was only six months ago that we were making everything in a home kitchen and keeping our dehydrators in Ian's bedroom! Now looking at our new space, new opportunities and happy vendors, I cant help but be so proud of Ian and myself. This is just amazing! (I know I say that a lot).

Thank you as always for coming along and supporting our ride. We love our people.

Talk to you soon!

p.s. I am really getting in to Twitter. Follow us! emmysorganics.

Another Beautiful Day!

2009-05-30T13:08:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

Well, it's all in the title...It is such a beautiful day today! We are prepping for the market tomorrow and we have some wonderful help today...Ian's amazing Momma, Meryl and our favorite gluten-free vegan babe, Matilda. The market is going to be beautiful as well, we are very excited.

Tons of great things happened this week! We had our talented photographers come in and take some new photos for us. Ian is in the midst of designing a new website for us, it is so incredible beautiful. Get excited. Anyway, our photographers, Jake Forney and Ashley Connor (hire them, they're amazing) came by and took some amazing photos, including the one above. Oh, and we made more cookies! Cashew cookies and these brownie cashew bites. Amazing!

Anyway, our kitchen has truly become such a vibrant place where people stop by and hang. We feel continuously blessed for such an amazing and talented group of friends, family and community. Thank you for being apart of our journey.

Check out our Farmer's Market menu for tomorrow.

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Ithaca Farmer's Market Menu (05/31/09)

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Pies: $6 per slice

Chocolate Cheesecake

Chocolate Banana Cheesecake
Coconut Lime Cheesecake

Drinks: $6 per 16oz

Vanilla Milkshake

Strawberry Almond Milk Smoothie

Ice-Cream: $4 (gluten-free cone or cup)

Chocolate

Vanilla

toppings: $1 each (goji berries, cacao nibs, coconut, sprinkles)

Macaroons: $0.75/ea. or $4/half dozen

Mint Chip

Lemon Ginger

Dark Cacao

Chocolate Orange

Chai Spice

Coconut Vanilla

Super Fudge: $1.25/ea. or $7/half dozen

Goji Berry

Peppermint

Mocha

Granola: $8/12oz bag or $5/bowl w/fresh almond milk

***Extra Special Cookies: $1 each

Cashew Cookies

Almond Butter-No Oats-Oatmeal Cookies
Brownie-Cashew Bites

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see you at the market!

The Pie Raffle

2009-05-23T11:49:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

I think a universal positive feeling is winning a prize. You feel super special and lucky in that moment. Sometimes you can win some really cool stuff. We have decided to extend this experience to our customers at the Farmer's Market. Every few weeks we will be raffling off a raw, vegan and gluten free pie of your choice. Raffle tickets will be three dollars each. So if you win you will be getting a whole pie (which is usually around $35 or $40) for three dollars! We will announce on the blog which days the raffle will occur. Tomorrow is our first day! So best of luck! We cant wait to give away such a beautiful dessert to one lucky winner. See you guys tomorrow at the market.

Milk n' Cookies

2009-05-22T08:37:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

Hi Everyone! I hope you are having an amazing week. We have been having the nicest weather here in Ithaca. Last weekend, the market was completely hot on Saturday (we got in, last minute!) and freezing on Sunday. Nonetheless we were still blessed to have some wonderful people stop by our both. Our ice cream is pretty hard to resist, even on a cold day. Now that I think of it, on Saturday, we sold out of all the ice cream that we brought to market! Can you believe it? What a wonderful problem to encounter!

We have been getting a lot done this week. Doing the market has really upped our production level because not only are we satisfying the stores we provide to, but we are preparing and stocking for the Farmer’s Market. It’s really getting us in a flow, which is great. One of the most exciting outcomes of this week was the ultimate use of the almond meal that I keep talking about. I read in a book about how you can make almond flour by dehydrating your almond meal and then breaking it up in the food processor. I decided to try making raw cookies. What evolved was an almond butter-currant cookie. It tastes like oatmeal raisin to me (picture above). Today, after being so inspired by my attempt at the cookies, Ian made a peanut butter cookie that was just amazing. I can’t wait for it to be done dehydrating! We’re going to try them out at the market this weekend and see what happens. I just got the idea to offer a glass of fresh almond milk if you by a couple cookies. I mean, gluten-free, vegan and raw milk and cookies? That is just the most exciting idea ever!

So you may ask, where is Ian? Well, currently he is right next to me designing a new homepage for our website. Our beloved friend and raw foodie, Camille, just so happens to be an expert at e-commerce. How amazing! I cannot tell you how abundant I feel in talent and support from our community. This is how a typical situation will go: “hey, wouldn’t it be great if we had our own theme song? Oh my god, my friend is the most talented theme-song-writer ever! He lives in Ithaca!” This always happens when we want to make things happen for our company, from wiring electricity to photography to equipment. Camille is an extraordinary example and I am pretty sure she blew Ian’s mind today with her amazing knowledge of web communication (as well as mine!). We are on our way to a new and improved website! Everything just keeps getting better and more efficient. Go Emmy’s go!

We will not be attending the market this Saturday, but will definitely be there on Sunday. Below is our menu. Hope to see you there!

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Ithaca Farmer's Market Menu (05/24/09)

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Pies: $6 per slice

Chocolate Cheesecake

Lemon Goji Berry Cheesecake

Drinks: $6 per 16oz

Vanilla Milkshake

Cinnamon Banana Nut Milkshake

Ice-Cream: $4 (gluten-free cone or cup)

Chocolate

Vanilla

toppings: $1 each (goji berries, cacao nibs, coconut, sprinkles, granola)

Macaroons: $0.75/ea. or $4/half dozen

Mint Chip

Lemon Ginger

Dark Cacao

Chocolate Orange

Chai Spice

Coconut Vanilla

Super Fudge: $1.25/ea. or $7/half dozen

Goji Berry

Peppermint

Mocha

Granola: $8/12oz bag or $5/bowl w/fresh almond milk

***Extra Special Cookies:

Peanut Butter

Almond Butter-No Oats-Oatmeal Cookies

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see you at the market!

LOVE and FAME

2009-05-15T18:01:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

We had such an amazing Friday today. There were a few things that stuck out. First, was the fact that SEVEN people stopped by the kitchen to see us today. I cant get over how popular we are! The first guests of the day were three women that we met at the Farmer's Market. They asked if they could come and take a tour of our facility and we were so excited to show them around. Especially because they brought four babies with them. We had a really good time and gave them a new product of ours: raw popsicles! We had some almond milk left over from the market last week so we made about twenty pies and a ton of popsicles. It was so fun to say "ok, what flavor should we make next?!" The popsicles were a hit with the kids. I also gave them the left over raw hummus, that I actually made! I think it was a success. We also had some friends stop by, which is always fun because Ian and I get to be social and productive at the same time. Oh, I just really love our kitchen. There is even more electricity available thanks to our French electrician and friend, Pierre.

Ian and I are also really popular because we did out very first radio interview yesterday for Blockhead radio. We ALSO heard that there is going to be an article about it in the Ithaca Times next month. I know it's pretty small scale, but I'm feeling totally famous these days. Oh, and ALSO (too much to say!) we got in on Saturday for the Farmer's Market!!!!! This rarely happens to new vendors, so we get to be there on Saturday and Sunday. It is going to be totally busy and crazy and I cant wait. We picked some great pies and shakes for this weekend too.Our friend Zia re-did our black boards for market, they needed a little re-vamp (pic above). Check out the menu below!

There are probably a million other things that I could talk about right now...feeling pretty amped from some raw lasagna earlier! But I will refrain until a later post. Stay happy everyone, thanks for reading, it means so much to us.

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Ithaca Farmer's Market Menu (05/15/09)

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Pies: $6 per slice

Chocolate Raspberry Cheesecake

Key Lime Pie

Chocolate Goji Berry Cheesecake

Drinks: $6 per 16oz

Strawberry Smoothie

Chocolate Chocolate-Chip Nut Milkshake

Ice-Cream: $4 (gluten-free cone or cup)

Chocolate

Vanilla

toppings: $1 each (goji berries, cacao nibs, coconut, sprinkles, granola)

Macaroons: $0.75/ea. or $4/half dozen

Mint Chip

Lemon Ginger

Dark Cacao

Chocolate Orange

Chai Spice

Coconut Vanilla

Super Fudge: $1.25/ea. or $7/half dozen

Goji Berry

Peppermint

Mocha

Granola: $8/12oz bag or $5/bowl w/fresh almond milk

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see you at the market!

At the Office

2009-05-09T08:35:00.000-07:00

(post by Samantha)

It's a lovely Saturday here at Emmy's Organics, inc. (yes, we are incorporated!). Ian is about to go and DJ a wedding, which I am sure is going to be super fun. Mostly because he is the most amazing DJ...ever. Anyway, this means that I get to prepare tons of fresh Almond milk for the market tomorrow! I am really excited. I love making Almond milk! My favorite part is straining it through the cheese cloth and collecting all of the Almond meal. Every time I make it, I always want to keep the almond meal and make something delicious with it...like raw hummus. Ian made raw hummus with Almonds once and I have since wanted to make something like it because it was so so good. Most of the time, I forget about it and the almond meal goes bad. But today, I am going make a pledge to all of you that I will make use of my almond meal. How amazing is this life? Making fresh almond milk for a ton of people and then being able to use the meal to make something new and share with whoever comes to visit me today. So great.

The pictures above are of my two favorite toys of the the past few weeks (Ian is not one of them). The first, is our very own commercial nut grinding machine! I mean, both Ian and I LOVE raw nut butters. They are so delicious and now we can make them ourselves. This is going to be our newest product and I cant wait to get it out there. So far we have made a ton of almond butter which we used in an almond butter coconut milkshake at market last weekend (yum). We have also made a good amount of roasted peanut butter for Timmy, who is a peanut butter fanatic, and also some cashew butter. It literally takes three minutes...this machine is amazing!

The second toy, is our custom stamp. There isn't much to say about this one...we can make our own custom stationary, bags, invoices, etc. It's probably our best investment so far, I'm really in love with it.

Marmer's Farket

2009-05-07T09:59:00.000-07:00

(Post by Samantha)

So when Ian and I started getting our business going, we would kind of joke around about how amazing it would be if we had our own booth at the Ithaca Farmer's Market. The dinner table would get quiet for a moment and usually the silence would be broken by something like "imagine us at the Farmer's Market!" "wouldn't we just be the cutest at the market!" That second comment always made by me. Well, I will continue on my path of "you get what you think," because just last Sunday we had our first day as new vendors at the Ithaca Farmer's Market! I cannot tell you what an incredible experience it was and will continue to be. Right now we package up our macaroons, super fudge and granola to send out to stores. At the Farmer's Market, we are able to expand our menu like crazy. Not only are we serving the products that we package, but we are serving ice-cream, milkshakes, smoothies and pies. All gluten-free, vegan and raw.

It went pretty smoothly on Sunday. There was so much going on, so much to figure out! For not such a busy day at the market, we had a line almost the entire day. The feedback was so supportive and positive too. Everyone loved us (how could they not!). The best part for me was being able to serve all of these kids with food allergies. I cannot tell you how wonderful it felt to serve a vanilla ice cream cone to a child who had never had that experience before. I am also really excited to share my knowledge of raw food with people who come up and ask questions. The picture of us is at the market with Ian's niece, Leyla, who helped us out for the day and who is just amazing.

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Ithaca Farmer's Market Mother's Day Menu (05/10/09)

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Pies: $6 per slice

Chocolate Goji Berry Cheesecake

Coconut Cream Pie

Drinks: $6 per 16oz

Strawberry Smoothie

Vanilla-Chip Nut Milkshake

Ice-Cream: $4 (gluten-free cone or cup)

Chocolate

Vanilla

toppings: $1 each (goji berries, cacao nibs, coconut, sprinkles, granola)

Macaroons: $0.75/ea. or $4/half dozen

Mint Chip

Lemon Ginger

Dark Cacao

Chocolate Orange

Chai Spice

Coconut Vanilla

Super Fudge: $1.25/ea. or $7/half dozen

Goji Berry

Peppermint

Mocha

Granola: $8/12oz bag or $5/bowl w/fresh almond milk

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see you at the market!

Welcome!

2009-05-06T20:49:00.000-07:00

This marks the beginning of history. Well, our history at least. Emmy's Organics is a small (literally two person) company that makes and is devoted to spreading the love of gluten-free, vegan and raw foods. It is owned and operated by us, Ian, 26 and Samantha, 22. We met last summer at a music festival and realized that we were both passionate about raw foods (amongst other things...). And, it just so happened that Ian was ready for a career change and Samantha had just graduated college. Kind of perfect. We live in Ithaca, NY where we get to eat great food, see a lot of music, spend time outside and be good to the environment.

Anyway, so we decided to start Emmy's Organics. We started making a macaroon recipe in Ian's mother's house (whom we named the company after...it's her nickname). We had two dehydrators that we kept in Ian's room. We started packaging the macaroons up and selling them to our local food co-op and other local stores. They caught on pretty quick and more and more stores were interested. So we kept on moving. We bought more dehydrators and more bulk ingredients. Meanwhile, we were sharing the kitchen with Ian's mom and her boyfriend, Timmy and things were getting pretty tight.

So fast forward a few months. We now have our very own commercial kitchen in downtown Ithaca. It is certified vegan and such an amazing space to work. We basically live there, that's how cool it is. We now sell our product to over a dozen stores in Ithaca, three further upstate and four in New York City. It has been amazing to see how well this has progressed in such a small amount of time (we started in January 2009). It has also been extremely rewarding, inspiring and a ton of fun. So here we are, inviting you all to take the ride with us. We promise fun photos and videos to come. Bye.