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Innovating the traditions of home canning.
In the Beginning At first, Rick Field did not set out to change the world of pickles. Quite the contrary. “When I came to New York City after college, my plan was to work towards becoming a film and TV director,” says Field. Within a few years, Field was directing promos for VH1, helped launch their “100 Greatest Artists” series and then segued over to PBS where he worked on NOW with Bill Moyers. He enjoyed the work immensely, but the weekends lead him elsewhere… A Family Tradition While growing up in New England, Field would make pickles every summer with his family, with produce pulled straight from their garden. “We made traditional dill pickles, and pickled string beans we called Dilly Beans,” recalls Field. The making and the eating of these pickles was a powerful memory that stuck with him as he plied his trade in the world of media. Feeling the tangy tug of his childhood, he started making the family recipes in the mid-90s in the kitchen of his one-bedroom apartment in Brooklyn. And then, creativity took over. Pickles for the 21st Century Field adapted the family dilly bean recipe that used cayenne pepper and dill as flavor notes and gave it a more Asian approach, with all natural wasabi powder, soy sauce and ginger. The result was something unexpectedly delicious. Similar experiments lead to nearly twenty varieties that Field would pickle in summer with produce from his local farmer’s market and share with family, friends and colleagues.
Making pickles in the early days.
The Hollywood Moment Then, a series of events right out of a Hollywood screenplay occurred. In the span of a few months, Field turned 40, lost his TV job, broke up with his girlfriend…and won a pickle contest “Clearly, the world was telling me something,” he grins. And so Rick’s Picks was launched in 2004 at the Union Square Farmer’s Market in New York City. This proved to be a great place to launch a business, as specialty store placements soon followed. In 2005, Rick’s Picks began working with Whole Foods Market, which lead to a national relationship between the two companies by the end of 2008.
Varieties for Everyone Field soon realized that he was not the only one for whom pickles had potent family memories. “In New York, the great cultural melting pot, you have folks from Poland, Japan, Louisiana, just to name three. Each of these places has a vibrant and unique tradition of pickle-making, specific to there and beloved by those who hail from there,” he notes. “It was cool to draw on those very different influences for my products”. And the product line developed in unusual and innovative ways, with spices such as smoked paprika infusing okra, beets with the mulled spices of the holidays, and many others. But at the same time, Field knew there was a vast audience for whom the word “pickle” always means something made with a cucumber, with spices and a flavor profile that are highly familiar. And so Rick’s Picks made pickles for those people, too. Flash Forward to 2014 Rick’s Picks are now sold nationally at specialty stores and major grocery chains. The company has also expanded into the food service channel with great success. One thing that is very important to Field is getting customers to understand his
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