Pepper's Foods http://www.peppers-foods.com We have a passion for food and are committed to offering locally and ethically sourced products. Inside Peppers July 13 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/inside-peppers-july-13/ Peppers Foods Tue, 13 Jul 2021 06:40:00 GMT <p>Hi everybody! You know, this is going to sound crazy but I just visited Parksville this weekend for the first time and I&#39;ve been living here for 14 years! And what&#39;s more, it&#39;s so beautiful that I can&#39;t believe I didn&#39;t do it before now! What a beautiful location. Not that I hadn&#39;t heard it was beautiful or seen photos prior but still...you really need to see that incredible beach with your own eyes.<br /><br />Speaking of which, you get to see a picture of yours truly with your own eyes tonight because it&#39;s my turn to be recognized by Pepper&#39;s for the incredibly hard work I&#39;ve contributed to the company, for my dedication, selflessness, passion, levity, integrity and so on and so forth. It was nothing, really. Just doing my job, as they say. Okay, I&#39;ll tell you a little about myself since you&#39;re asking. I&#39;ve been at Pepper&#39;s since November of 2012 and during that time I&#39;ve been a grocery clerk stocking the shelves, placing orders and doing all the stuff that a grocery clerk does. A little while later I learned the office stuff that deals with changing prices, making signage and links the computer to the front end. I&#39;ve been the Weekend Manager, the Dairy Manager and two years ago, I transferred into the Meat Department where I&#39;ve learned an entirely new skill set. And, of course, I write this newsletter and fill you in on everything new and exciting at the store! When I&#39;m not at work I spend a lot of my free time relic and treasure hunting which is my addictive, nerdy hobby (I&#39;ve found Spanish silver from 1791 as well as a U.S. $5 gold coin from 1857 just to name a couple of my best recoveries). And I&#39;m a father to the best son any parent could ask for (I may be slightly biased here). But what&#39;s also great about Pepper&#39;s is that they&#39;ve allowed me to take the ball and run with it in whatever I&#39;ve been tasked to do. I&#39;ve worked in food retail for the majority of my working life and I&#39;ve never worked at a store with the management, coworkers and customers like this store. So today I choose to turn the tables (and get serious brownie points) by deflecting attention away from myself as Employee of the Week&nbsp;to thank the powers that be for allowing me to work here!</p><p>Alrighty then, so before we dive into the newsletter any further, we would love it if you&#39;d consider helping our fellow citizens who&#39;ve lost everything recently. Thank you.</p><p>Let&#39;s kick things off with a brand new, local product that&#39;s incredibly unique and super delicious:&nbsp;Elly&#39;s Oat Butter! You heard me, I said Oat Butter. But what exactly is it? It&#39;s a spreadable granola that &quot;has the taste of a warm oatmeal cookie and the texture of a smooth nut butter.&quot; You can spread it on toast, a bagel or a cracker, dip your apple slices in it, drop some on your ice cream, in your plain yogurt or just eat it straight out of the jar! This stuff is not only delicious but it&#39;s incredibly wholesome, vegan, gluten-friendly, free of nuts and refined sugar and is made from ethically sourced ingredients! What a pleasure to sell this and to be the first retail account of another new and local business!</p><p>Plant-based eating is all the rage these days. But it&#39;s not like it&#39;s a fad; it ain&#39;t going anywhere. So we&#39;ve embraced the need to offer a diverse selection of plant-based goods. Our newest addition is&nbsp;Gardein Supr&ecirc;me Plant-Based Burger. Made with no soy, no dairy and no meat, this juicy burger contains 20 grams of protein and looks, cooks, smells and satisfies like a real meat burger. Fun fact: Gardein is Canada&#39;s No. 1 frozen meat alternative brand. Why? It&#39;s because their products are diverse and delicious. It&#39;s that simple. Toss some on the grill and see why this brand is the best!</p><p>Hey you know what essential condiment is required for the best burger? Why, it&#39;s mustard, of course. But not just any mustard. Nope, it has to be Vancouver Island&#39;s&nbsp;Two Crows Coarse Ground Mustard! Available in three amazing varieties (Coarse Ground&nbsp;Original,&nbsp;Dill&nbsp;and&nbsp;Lavender) they use a base of Alberta grown mustard seeds and blend it with exceptional ingredients.&nbsp;Original&nbsp;simply contains&nbsp;coarse ground Canadian mustard seeds, vinegar, a dash of salt, and a sprinkle of sugar.&nbsp;Dill&nbsp;is added to the original for a zing that pairs great with salmon, devilled eggs or potato salad and Damali Winery&#39;s&nbsp;French Lavender creates&nbsp;&quot;a&nbsp;mustard robust enough to enhance lamb, roast chicken, or a charcuterie board.&quot;</p><p>A little company opened in Switzerland in 1914 called the Wernli Brothers Biscuit Factory. It&#39;s still going strong today combining fine Swiss chocolate with various types of cookies and wafers. So if that sounds like something you&#39;d like to try, check out&nbsp;Wernli Choco Petite Beurre Noir. It&#39;s dark chocolate planted onto a rich butter cookie. Sound addictive? It is! Or choose&nbsp;Wernli Granor&nbsp;which is a light wafer with delicate cocoa creme, puffed rice and Swiss milk chocolate! Heavenly! You can find both of these on the top shelf in Aisle 1, right under the TV monitor.</p><p>The Belgians know a thing or two about chocolate and other sweets as well! This next item doesn&#39;t contain chocolate, but it does contain a delicious vanilla creme sandwiched between two crispy biscuits!&nbsp;Anna Faggio Speculoos Fourr&eacute; Vanilla&nbsp;is the perfect accompaniment to your next cup of coffee or tea. What more is there to say except that these are really, really good?!</p><p>One of the major components of whole grain wheat is the germ. When wheat is refined, the germ and the husk is removed because the wheat can be stored for longer this way. But the germ is packed with nutritional properties: plant proteins, healthy fats, fibre and loads of micronutrients. It can be used as a nutritional supplement or as a food additive. So if you&#39;ve been looking for a healthy way to boost your diet, we have&nbsp;Kretschmer Toasted Wheat Germ&nbsp;back in Aisle 3!</p><p>The Little Stand&nbsp;is getting bigger again! It&#39;s added&nbsp;Raspberry Chutney&nbsp;to their line of locally, hand-made products! Vinegar, sugar and spices merge wonderfully with luscious red raspberries to form a truly remarkable product that also makes a great gift!</p><p>Remember&nbsp;Lucky Elephant Pink Candy Popcorn??&nbsp;Oh man, that takes me waaaay back! Just like Cracker Jacks, every box contains a FREE prize inside! But this is a purely Canadian treat that&#39;s been around since the 1950s and was a corner store staple when I was a kid! And who doesn&#39;t remember getting cotton candy? We&#39;ve got&nbsp;Mini Puppie Cotton Candy&nbsp;as well. And remember, Westshore Motorsports Park has the&nbsp;Legacy Drive-In&nbsp;running all summer! These make great movie-night snacks for the kids! Check out the website here:&nbsp;legacydrivein.com<br /><br />Thanks for tuning in again this week. Please have a look at our ad attached below for some great sales which run from July 13th-19th. And remember, when you&#39;re out and about to continue to take good care!</p> Inside Peppers June 22 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/inside-peppers-june-22/ Peppers Foods Tue, 22 Jun 2021 08:42:00 GMT <p>We&#39;re having a heat wave. A tropical heat wave. The temperature&#39;s rising it isn&#39;t surprising...<br /><br />Of course it isn&#39;t surprising; it&#39;s summer! And boy did it ever arrive here on southern Vancouver Island yesterday! Temperatures are soaring and records are falling. Of course, the weather made for a wonderfully sunny Father&#39;s Day.&nbsp;Today, however, is&nbsp;National Indigenous Peoples Day, where we recognize the achievements (and there are many), heritage, diversity and cultures of our First Nations, Inuit and M&eacute;tis peoples. It&#39;s part of the Celebrate Canada program which also includes&nbsp;Saint-Jean-Baptiste&nbsp;Day (June&nbsp;24), Canadian Multiculturalism Day (June&nbsp;27) and Canada Day (July&nbsp;1).&nbsp;<br /><br />This week&#39;s Employee Recognition goes to our Deli Department&#39;s own Tara, the Assistant Manager! For over 11 years, Tara has been creating delicious sandwiches, platters and loads of other good stuff that you&#39;ll find in her department! But her creativity isn&#39;t just limited to the kitchen. No, Tara is a very talented artist. You can see for yourself her artistic flair with a paintbrush by checking out her work on Instagram at @tara_fisher_art. And when she&#39;s not in the studio, she can be found exploring this beautiful island of ours with her husband, Len, and their sweet doggos! Thank you, Tara, for all that you do for Pepper&#39;s!</p><p>Beat this heat with three new varieties of ice cream from Breyers! Choose from&nbsp;Creamsicle, Revello&nbsp;or&nbsp;Fudgsicle! Now you can enjoy your favourite ice cream novelties without the wooden stick! And in much larger quantiities! Life is short; eat ice cream!</p><p>Just a little further over in the frozen food section you&#39;ll find these new&nbsp;Belmont Meats Purely Crafted Grass Fed Burgers! With only a few simple ingredients and no fillers, allergens, artificial colours or flavours, you get a high protein tasty burger that grills up in no time and is sure to satisfy everyone at the dinner table!</p><p>Maybe it&#39;s just too hot to cook so you&#39;re thinking something more along the lines of a charcuterie board or antipasto plate. If so, our Deli Department has three new Italian cured meats just for you!&nbsp;Preferisco Bresaola&nbsp;is an air dried cured beef (top round) that is lean and tender. In Italy,&nbsp;it is most commonly served and eaten with drizzled olive oil and lemon juice or balsamic vinegar, and served with rocket (arugula) salad, cracked black pepper, and fresh parmesan cheese.&nbsp;<br /><br />Another salami variety is&nbsp;Preferisco Salame Al Finoccio, a pork salami containing fennel. It originated in Tuscany during the Renaissance when the key ingredient of standard salami, black pepper, was scarce.&nbsp;<br /><br />The taste of Tuscany continues with&nbsp;Preferisco Salami Toscano. Taste Atlas describes it best:&nbsp;Salami Toscano&nbsp;is a traditional Italian salami hailing from Tuscany. It&#39;s produced with pork&#39;s ham, shoulder, lean belly, lard, and spices. The meat is ground and the lard is mixed with salt. The two are combined with spices, then stuffed into natural or synthetic casings. The salami is dried and well seasoned for at least 4 months before it&#39;s sold or consumed. Salami Toscano has an intense flavour of spices and meat, and the cross-section reveals a nice distribution of lean meat and fat. It&#39;s recommended to serve it thinly sliced with cheese, wine, and bread.</p><p>We recently told you about some Spanish Sheep Cheeses from Spagnia and they proved so popular that Dora brought in another flavour!&nbsp;Spagnia Sheep Cheese with Truffle. The classic nutty flavour of this cheese combines with the slightly pungent, earthiness of black truffle to form an outstanding cheese you&#39;ll be proud to serve!</p><p>An excellent, high quality cheese for grating or shaving is&nbsp;Italissima Parmigiano Reggiano! Another great Italian import, it&#39;s made only with cow&#39;s milk, salt and rennet in the traditional manner and aged from between 12-36 months.&nbsp;</p><p>Sam, our Dairy Manager, has been busy bringing in several excellent items to his department.&nbsp;Earth Island Avocado Oil Vegenaise&nbsp;is a dressing and sandwich spread made from oil extracted from ripe avocados that&#39;s gluten, soy and egg-free as well as being vegan!</p><p>if we told you that you could purchase a product that tastes, cooks and bakes like butter and replaces butter 1:1 but is dairy-free, gluten-free, vegan, contains 25% less saturated fat than butter and freezes well, would you believe us? The better question is, would you try it? Because finally, a plant-based butter alternative that you&#39;ll actually want to eat is here!&nbsp;Becel Unsalted Plant-Based Spread&nbsp;has arrived! Swap out for regular butter for a healthier alternative without sacrificing anything else. It&#39;s better than butter!</p><p>Why not saunter up to&nbsp;Nature&#39;s Bakery&nbsp;and get yourself a satisfying&nbsp;Fig Bar&nbsp;in either&nbsp;Original Fig&nbsp;or&nbsp;Blueberry? Pick up a box of these awesome new snacks and you&#39;ll immediately notice how heavy it is! Real fruit and whole grains join forces to create a sweet (but not&nbsp;too&nbsp;sweet) wholesome snack (they don&#39;t contain any glucose-fructose) that will fuel you up and keep you going! Look for these in Aisle 1 with the cookies.</p><p>In Argentina, Paraguay, Uruguay and southern Brazil, Yerba Mate is consumed equally, if not more than coffee. It supposedly increases energy and mental clarity without the caffeine crash, jitters, heartburn or other negative effects associated with caffeine. So if you&#39;re looking for a natural way to boost energy and you want to stay cool,&nbsp;Mateina Yerba Mate Energy Infusion&nbsp;is a slightly sweetened, non-carbonated beverage that fits the bill. Our cold beverage cooler sees a lot of traffic this time of year but that&#39;s where you&#39;ll need to go to find these organic and fairly-traded thirst quenchers!</p><p>That&#39;s a wrap for another week, folks. Remember, in this heat, it&#39;s important to take some precautions to avoid heat exhaustion or heat stroke, two very serious conditions. Stay hydrated: drink plenty of water, even if you don&#39;t feel thirsty. Reduce your exercise intensity: don&#39;t push yourself too hard. Wear sunscreen, wear light coloured clothing and stay out of the&nbsp;sun&nbsp;during the hottest part of the day. So please, stay safe and continue to take good care!<br />&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p> Inside Pepper's June 08 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/inside-peppers-june-08/ Peppers Foods Tue, 08 Jun 2021 10:59:00 GMT <p>&nbsp;</p><p>Good evening, everyone! Welcome to another edition of the Pepper&#39;s Newsletter, the first one for the month of June. You know, there are a TON of celebrity birthdays&nbsp;today&nbsp;including Liam Neeson, Tom Jones, Dean Martin, Karl Urban and Michael Cera. But one whose talent was exceptional as a musician, singer-songwriter, producer, actor and director who would have turned 63&nbsp;today&nbsp;was Prince Rogers Nelson, or simply Prince. He could play practically any instrument but he preferred guitar. Though short in stature, he was huge in musical ability and is severely underrated as a guitar player.<br /><br />Someone else who appreciates music almost as much as we appreciate her is our Deli Manager, Dora. For the past 14 years she has worked to create a deli with the freshest and most diverse products around! Dora is constantly sourcing new items and paying attention to what our customers want most and takes great pride in what she offers. So this week, we honour you, Dora, with our Employee Appreciation Award! Thanks for all that you do!</p><p>Today&#39;s newsletter just so happens to be filled with new items from our Deli Department, specifically cheese, so if you&#39;re a turophile, read on! Let&#39;s go!<br /><br />Kicking things off is&nbsp;Okanagan Falls Soft Unripened Goat Milk Cheese. This BC-made, fresh goat cheese comes in four flavours:&nbsp;Sundried Tomato, Fig, Olive Oil &amp; Rosemary&nbsp;and&nbsp;Truffle. Remember, with fresh goats cheese, you want to eat it within a week of opening and never wrap it in plastic wrap! Always store it in a lidded container because this and any cheese, needs humidity and space to breathe.<br />&nbsp;</p><p>Why stop at cheese made from goats? How about adding some more cheese made from sheep&#39;s milk, Dora? Oh you already did? Great!&nbsp;Spagnia Tradicion Sheep Cheese&nbsp;is traditional Manchego which hails from Spain. Available with added&nbsp;Black Garlic&nbsp;as well as&nbsp;Rosemary, these delicious cheeses have a mildly, gamey flavour that pair perfectly with sherry and are a staple with any tapas menu.</p><p>Hey, if we can&#39;t travel to foreign countries right now, we can at least purchase some excellent foods from them, right? Heading over to France from Spain, we&#39;ll find some fromage from&nbsp;LeSaveur de St. Germain. Here are two classic French cheeses:&nbsp;Petit Camembert&nbsp;(produced by the local farmers in Normandy) has a unique flavour made from raw milk collected in the Bocage Ornais area. Or choose&nbsp;Mini Brie&nbsp;which has a subtle nutty flavour with a slight hint of salt. Both are oven ready and will be the easiest appetizer you&#39;ll ever offer!</p><p>Scooting on over to Scotland, we&#39;ll be able to try numerous yummy and colourful matured cheddars&nbsp; from&nbsp;The Queen&#39;s Castle! Boozy options include&nbsp;Gin &amp; Tonic&nbsp;as well as cheddar infused fittingly with&nbsp;Laphroaig Whiskey. Alternatively, you could gnosh on&nbsp;Applesmoke Cheddar&nbsp;or one containing&nbsp;Laird&#39;s Grainy Mustard!</p><p>Canada produces some darn good cheese, too, and one of the tastiest one&#39;s you&#39;ve yet to try is&nbsp;Italissima Smoked Aged White Cheddar! It&#39;s smoked over applewood and aged two years to produce a full, refined flavour. Ever tried the simple yet ultra delicious grilled chicken and cheddar slider? This is the cheese you&#39;ll want to use!</p><p>That selection of fine cheese should tide you over for a little while. And while cheese makes an excellent appy, here are another two that are both vegan and gluten-free!&nbsp;Pizza Oggi&nbsp;has teamed up with&nbsp;Beyond Meat&nbsp;to create&nbsp;Mini Calzone&nbsp;containing Beyond sausage Italian crumble as well as vegan mozza and veggies.&nbsp;Baci Bites&nbsp;also are made with Beyond Italian crumble and vegan mozzarella but without the veggies. The crusts of both are made with cauliflower and cook up golden brown in about 15 minutes in your oven!</p><p>Looking for a concentrated broth for your soups, sauces and roasts? Canada&#39;s&nbsp;Savory Choice&nbsp;offers two liquid concentrate broths that come in convenient squeeze packs! Just mix with hot water and customize to your desired concentration and taste! With&nbsp;Savory Choice Beef Broth Concentrate&nbsp;or&nbsp;Chicken Broth Concentrate, you get a product requiring no refrigeration with less waste that makes great, gluten-free broth to bring out the flavour in any dish!</p><p>The same company, Savory Choice, also brings you&nbsp;Pho Liquid Concentrated Broth&nbsp;in&nbsp;Veggie, Beef&nbsp;and&nbsp;Chicken&nbsp;for adding a dash of Asian flavour to your cooking! One box makes 64 ounces (two quarts) of broth and all are made with natural ingredients.</p><p>I&#39;ve said it before and I&#39;ll say it again: coffee is the nectar of the gods. But bad coffee is just about as disappointing as the tepid caesar salad that I talked about last week. So in order to avoid an early tragedy in your kitchen, pick up a bag of&nbsp;Rhino Coffee House Whole Bean Coffee! Hand roasted in terrific Tofino, these premium coffee beans are available at Pepper&#39;s in&nbsp;Organic Medium Roast, Organic Dark Roast, Surfer Blend&nbsp;(it&#39;s gnarly) and&nbsp;Espresso. Rhino started pouring coffee to Tofino-ans in 2013 so now you don&#39;t have to drive all the way up there to get a great tasting cup of coffee.</p><p>And finally, if any of you like to indulge in fine dining in Victoria, you&#39;ve likely visited Zambri&#39;s. Since 1999 they&#39;ve been serving up &quot;Italian soul food&quot; to the locals. As taken from their website:&nbsp;The incredibly well prepared Italian food and efficient service created favourable word of mouth. And over time, the obscure little eatery gained highly acclaimed industry recognition. GOLD Best Casual Italian Restaurant Vancouver Magazine, Victoria Chef Of the Year, EAT Magazine, to name a few. The Urban Peasant James Barber called it the &ldquo;Nicest little Italian restaurant in BC. Probably in Canada. Terrific food.&rdquo;&nbsp;So if you would like to try to recreate some of that magical Italian inspired cooking in your own kitchen, choose&nbsp;Zambri&#39;s Hpuse Made Tomato Sauce! You can get a jar of it in&nbsp;Original&nbsp;or&nbsp;Arrabbiata&nbsp;(spicy) in Aisle 2 with the other pastas and sauces.</p><p>Thanks for checking us out again this week. Scott&#39;s put together an exceptional ad which you&#39;ll find below. We look forward to the day where we can see an unlimited number of your smiling faces in the aisles. But for now, we&#39;ll have to hold out a little longer. Until then, stay healthy and take good care!</p> Pepper's Newsletter June 1, 2021 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/peppers-newsletter-june-1-2021/ Peppers Foods Tue, 01 Jun 2021 08:56:00 GMT <p>Pepper&#39;s Newsletter Monday, May 24, 2021</p><p>Hi everyone, Jon here again with another newsletter for you (the last one for May, I might add). As I write this, game 7 of the Stanley Cup Playoffs is happening between the Montreal Canadiens and the Toronto Maple Leafs. if you know me, you&#39;ll know that I&#39;m a lifelong Leafs fan so it&#39;s a good thing that I&#39;m writing this instead of watching because I don&#39;t think I can take the disappointment. The personal pain and anguish of this love/hate relationship is just too much to take. I&#39;ve been apoplectic about this series collapse for two entire days so I&#39;ll just wait until later on tonight to see if the annual letdown has occurred. But enough about me and my emotional breakdown. Chin up, yes? On to the newsletter!<br /><br />We continue with our Employee Appreciation campaign this week by honouring our Produce Manager, Cameron Dean, who has slid into his relatively new role, taken the reigns and run! Cam&#39;s been a solid and dependable worker for the past 14 years whose first role was as an employee of the deli. That led to Deli Manager and for about the past two years, he&#39;s led his team in the Produce Dept as manager there. Cam is constantly looking for fresh, local, quality produce and isn&#39;t afraid to order unique or obscure items to line his shelves. His department has never looked better! Cam&#39;s a very proud papa of three young boys, a dedicated family man and just a generally all a round swell guy! Thanks, Cam, for your dedication and hard work!</p><p>While we&#39;re on the topic of our Produce Dept. let&#39;s kick off our list of new items with one that can be found there in the tofu section.&nbsp;So Nutty French Onion Dip/Spread&nbsp;is a vegan, wheat-free, soy-free, well, spread or dip! Stepping away from highly processed and animal-based products, the Victoria, BC based creators wanted to create a french onion dip that was actually good. And they did it! The label says, &quot;This is a fresh, natural product. Put it on everything. Eat. Repeat.&quot; Sounds good to us!</p><p>Continuing with plant-based deliciousness,&nbsp;TMRW Foods Breakfast Patties&nbsp;are 100% vegan and made with &quot;familiar ingredients&quot; and contain 13g of protein per serving. They&#39;re prepared in Canada in Port Coquitlam, BC, using ingredients including quinoa, red kidney beans, sunflower seeds and yellow split peas.&nbsp;</p><p>Alternatively,&nbsp;TMRW Foods Sausage Links&nbsp;are also available for a sizzlin&#39; good breakfast! Choose from&nbsp;Hickory Maple&nbsp;or&nbsp;Roasted Garlic + Herb&nbsp;with each variety containing 11g of protein per serving and made with similar ingredients!</p><p>If you&#39;re going to cook up a mess of plant-based sausages or sausage patties, you&#39;re going to have to have something else to go along with it. That&#39;s where&nbsp;JUST Plant Egg Folded&nbsp;comes in! I&#39;m not in love with the product name but you&#39;ll fall in love with the taste! And because it&#39;s folded for convenient heating in the toaster, you&#39;ll also love the ease with which you can prepare it! Put it on toast, as the middle of a breakfast sandwich or eat in by itself. It was voted&nbsp;Best New Frozen Product at Expo West&rsquo;s NEXTY Awards 2020&nbsp;which is great, because when you head to the frozen food section for the TMRW stuff, you can grab a box of these, too!</p><p>Alright, that&#39;s it for plant-based items. Next up is something to be found in our Meat Department seafood section and we&#39;re very excited about it because it&#39;s locally produced in little ol&#39; Sidney By the Sea, BC.&nbsp;Jenny&#39;s Smoke Shack Candied Wild Sockeye Salmon&nbsp;is handmade in small batches using just fresh fish, sea salt and maple syrup. Simple, healthy and delicious! Keep refrigerated.</p><p>If, while you&#39;re cruising past the meat counter, you decide to purchase any number of our delectable lamb cuts, either raised locally in Metchosin or those from New Zealand, you&#39;re going to want to make sure you have a good mint sauce to go with it. And we have not one but two new ones for you!&nbsp;Mrs Bridges Mint Sauce&nbsp;is one of the finest from the UK and uses a traditional vinegar-based recipe. Another exceptional sauce is&nbsp;Colman&#39;s of Norwich Mint Sauce&nbsp;which is made with mint grown in the fields of Norfolk and has been since the 1960s.&nbsp;</p><p>Not long ago, we told you about Bart Lemongrass Paste in a newsletter and it sold out almost immediately! It&#39;s back in stock again but our Grocery Manager, Don, though that he may as well get a couple more lemongrass products while he was at it. In addition ton the Bart Lemongrass Paste, you can now get actual&nbsp;Bart Lemongrass Sticks. It&#39;s the perfect ingredient for soups or other long-simmered dishes because the flavour infuses as they sticks rehydrate. And if you only need a one-shot of lemongrass flavour, pick up some&nbsp;deSIAM Lemongrass Stir-fry Paste. Each package contains 30g of paste, just enough for a single stir-fry! Perfect!</p><p>Belberry Fine Foods has taken an everyday favourite and turned it into a genuine gourmet table condiment with&nbsp;Belberry Royal Selection San Marzano Tomato Ketchup! Man, your mac and cheese is gonna be so wicked awesome now! Give your burger, grilled cheese, fries or whatever you put ketchup on the royal treatment with this exquisite sauce!</p><p>Have you ever gone to a restaurant and ordered a caesar salad, only to be disappointed by receiving one with a weak and meh dressing? It&#39;s such a bummer. Caesar salads should be bold and garlic-y, right? So if you&#39;re like so many of us who demand a strong garlic flavour in your dressing, pick up&nbsp;The Garlic Box Caesar Dressing and Dip. There&#39;s a whole bulb of fresh (Ontario grown) garlic in every jar! It&#39;s everything you want in an authentic caesar dressing and dip that won&#39;t leave you feeling bummed out!</p><p>Our Deli Department already had an impressive selection of&nbsp;Italissima Gnocchi&nbsp;located in front of the tofu section (bottom shelf) but decided to go all out and get a few more for you!&nbsp;Italissima Squash Gnocchi&nbsp;as well as&nbsp;Italissima Cauliflower Gnocchi&nbsp;and&nbsp;Italissima Gluten-Free Cauliflower Gnocchi&nbsp;cook in about two minutes. Just pour directly into boiling salted water and when they float, they&#39;re done (just like perogies).</p><p>And finally, for all of your baking needs, we offer&nbsp;Sav&ouml;r Organic Blackstrap Molasses. As per the company website:&nbsp;Sav&ouml;r Organic Molasses is organic, kosher, unsulphured and contains no additives or preservatives. A high source of iron and an excellent replacement for refined molasses &ndash; this baking champion will have you sweetening the organic way in no time! Our molasses has a robust flavour described as bittersweet. Unlike refined sugar, blackstrap molasses contains essential vitamins and minerals&nbsp;and boasts several powerful health benefits. Use for marinades, dressings and baking to add a hint of sweetness and warm spicy flavour.&nbsp;</p><p>That&#39;ll do it for this week and that&#39;ll do it for this month! June is upon us already! Oh, sports update... Leafs lose. Shocking result there. Time for a stiff drink. I guess the Seattle Kraken are going to need some fans, right? Hmmm. Oh well, that&#39;s sports for you. Actually, that&#39;s just the Toronto Maple Leafs for you. Until next week, take a few deep breaths and take good care!</p> Peppers Newsletter May 11, 2021 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/peppers-newsletter-may-11-2021/ Peppers Foods Tue, 11 May 2021 00:04:00 GMT <p>Good morning! Here&#39;s hoping all the moms, grandmas, stepmoms and generally mother-like figures had a terrific day on Sunday! All of the special ladies in our lives deserve more than one day a year to let them know how much they mean to us. And speaking of special ladies, there&#39;s one that we need to recognize this week for our Staff Appeciation campaign! Kathy Perry has been working alongside our Meat Manager, John,&nbsp; for more than&nbsp;22 years (that in&nbsp;itself deserves special recognition because, you know, it&#39;s John). Kathy is as reliable as they come and her high standards ensure that our Meat Department stays in tip-top shape! When Kathy isn&#39;t keeping John in line, she can be found spending time with her daughter and four grandchildren or tending to the garden. Thank you, Kathy, for your years of hard work. We look forward to spending many more with you on our team!</p><p>Management has been super busy getting in all kinds of new items for you over the past week or so!&nbsp;In fact, there&#39;s way too many to list in just this one newsletter so we&#39;ll forego the usual trivia so that we can list as many as possible without making it too lengthy. So here we go!</p><p>We have some new items that c an also be found in our advertised specials this week! That&#39;s always a bonus because you get to try something new at a special price! We&#39;re not saving the best for last this week, though, because it&#39;s chocolate and chocolate is pretty great, especialy when the business originated in BC! <em><strong>Zazubean Slinky </strong></em>is fair-trade, organic, gluten-free and vegan chocolate that&nbsp;either has half the sugar or has zero sugar! The top right corner of the label will tell you. The <em><strong>zero sugar bars</strong></em> are sweetened naturally with stevia and come in <em><strong>Grass Fed Milk Chocolate, Creamy Hazelnut</strong></em> or <em><strong>Super Dark Panama</strong></em>! <em><strong>Half sugar</strong></em> dark chocolate bars come in <em><strong>Nuts &amp; Berries</strong></em> and <em><strong>Salted Almonds</strong></em> and are sweetened with either coconut sugar or a combo of coconut sugar and stevia! And best of all, you can try one (or all) for just <em><strong>$3.26 each this week</strong></em>!</p><p>Our Deli Department has offered <em><strong>Continental Sausage Co. Whiskey Thyme Maple Ham</strong></em> slices for quite awhile now and since they added this to their selection of fine meats, it&#39;s been a top seller. Now&nbsp;it&#39;s available as random weight hams<em><strong> in our Meat Department this week for the amazing price of just $1.06/100 grams</strong></em>! What makes this ham so special is the recipe of maple syrup and thyme combined with the award winning 100% single malt Shelter Point Whiskey from Shelter Point Distillery in Campbell River. This is premium ham with an unforgettable flavour! Come by our meat counter and we&#39;ll hook you up!</p><p>Hey, here&#39;s something you don&#39;t see everyday in our advertised specials: bird seed. But Scotty threw caution to the wind and put <em><strong>Armstrong All Season Bird Blend 3.18kg</strong></em> in it&nbsp;nonetheless because 1) it&#39;s a great deal at <em><strong>just $5.96 per bag</strong></em>. 2) there are a lot of birds around. 3) there are a lot of bird-lovers around. So it just made sense, really. This seed is best used with a large port tube feeder, platform feeder or hopper feeder.&nbsp;</p><p>Twinings of London has been providing the world with tea since 1706. Now, over 300 years later, the company figured it was timne to change things up a bit. With <em><strong>Twinings Cold Infuse Flavoured Cold Water Enhancers</strong></em> you simply drop a pouch into your water bottle, shake and go! As per the company website:<em>&nbsp;a delicious range of herbal water enhancers that offer an easy way to stay hydrated. Each silky infuser includes a blend of the finest fruits and herbs, specially blended to brew in cold water to give you a refreshing drink</em>. There&#39;s no sugar, artificial flavours,&nbsp;colours or caffeine! And with great flavours such as <em><strong>Lemon Ginger, Strawberry Lemon, Blueberry Apple </strong></em>and <em><strong>Mango Passionfrui</strong></em>t, you&#39;ll liven up your ordinary cold tap water instantly!&nbsp;</p><p>If you just want to crack open a cold one we have something that&#39;s Canadian craft-brewed from the North Okanagan Valley. it comes from Underground, too! Not literally, though. <em><strong>Underground Kombucha</strong></em> is authentic, raw kombucha with naturally zero sugar&nbsp;loaded with billions of probiotics in every can. It&#39;s sustainably brewed using only ingredients from BC and comes in some amazing flavours: <em><strong>Peach Pear Apricot, Blood Orange &amp; Brewer Hops, Black Cherry Vanilla</strong></em> and <em><strong>Blueberry Blackberry Ginger</strong></em>!</p><p>Some great foods come out of La Belle Province and one particular restaurant called Joe Beef in Montreal is t&ecirc;tes and &eacute;paules above most. Voted No. 1 in Quebec and No. 3 in the country by Canada&#39;s 100 Best Restaurants 2020, this tiny 30 seater (it has since doubled its capacity) is definitely one you must visit when in Rome. But for those of us who probably won&#39;t be making that journey anytime soon, we&#39;ll have to settle for some of their sauces and seasonings to transform our own BBQ creations! And wouldn&#39;t you know it, BBQ season is upon us! <em><strong>Joe Beef Steak Sauce</strong></em> and <em><strong>Joe Beef BBQ Sauce</strong></em> are going to be your new favourite condiments this summer. Combined with <em><strong>Joe Beef Butcher&#39;s Blend Seasoning</strong></em>&nbsp;<em><strong>Montreal Steak Spice&nbsp;</strong></em>and <em><strong>Joe Beef BBQ Rub</strong></em>, you&#39;ll have all the bases covered come dinner time! Look for them on the front display by the entrance.</p><p>As long as we&#39;re talking about meat, you should pick up some of the following from our Meat Department. <em><strong>Mary Manette Seafood Smoked Herring</strong></em> is naturally smoked Nova Scotia herring that is sustainably sourced. This descriptor is taken from the website: <em>this sparkling fresh herring has a delicate and flaky texture that melts in your mouth; the perfect addition to your everyday pantry essentials. Our lightly smoked herring is high in Omega-3 fatty acids, protein, and Vitamin D, low in carbohydrates, and loaded with rich antioxidants. </em>It&#39;s an easy appy on your seacuterie board or<em>&nbsp;</em>make a quick and delicious lunch with smoked herring and avocado toast!</p><p>Also found in our fresh seafood section are two local products by <em><strong>Humble &amp; Frank Foods</strong></em> of The Atrium on Blanshard Street in downtown Victoria! <em><strong>Humble &amp; Frank Original Tartar Sauce</strong></em> is a little sweet and a little tangy with a creamy texture. The tastes of pickled relish, dill and lemon vinegar (yum!) will make your fish and chips, calamari, egg salad or fried shrimp spectacular! Or try <em><strong>Humble &amp; Frank Original Cocktail Sauce</strong></em> made with San Marzano tomato paste, freshly grated horseradish root, lemon juice, white pepper and other herbs and spices. Just add shrimp!</p><p>Stay tuned for next week&#39;s newsletter that&#39;ll be jam packed with more new goodies. Until then, enjoy the sunshine, stay safe and take good care!</p><p>Pepper&#39;s Foods</p><p>&nbsp;</p> Peppers Newsletter May 4, 2021 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/peppers-newsletter-may-4-2021/ Peppers Foods Tue, 04 May 2021 00:05:00 GMT <p>A long time ago in a neighbourhood far, far away...(unless of course you live near us in which case it would actually be pretty close by) was SHOP EASY grocery. After awhile it was re-named Pepper&#39;s Foods where it garnered a small but loyal following. It won dozens of awards over the years providing outstanding service and an excellent product selection despite possessing only 4000 square feet of retail space (speaking of space, this is supposed to be a take on the opening text crawl of Star Wars because today is May 4th which is Star Wars Day afterall). And just the other day our store was awarded the 2020 Canadian Independent Grocer of the Year Award for British Columbia/Yukon Region for Small Surface Category. We compete with stores across the country that are 15000 square feet or less. So we would like to thank the Canadian Federation of Independent Grocers (CFIG) for this honour, the entire management team, as well as all of the incredible staff and, of course, our loyal customers for continuing to support and choose us! Thank you!</p><p>This is the third week of our Employee Appreciation campaign and today&#39;s recipient is Sarah Ross who was hired over 26 years ago as a cashier and has moved up through the ranks to Accounts Payable. But AP is just a small portion of what Sarah does for our store. She looks after our payroll. She logs our inventory. She ensures the computer systems, email accounts, front end POS machiners, tills and numerous other vital systems function properly. She orders and stocks store supplies. Sarah tirelessly worked to get our online store up and running. She has numerous responsibilities related to customer service. Did we mention that she is also the President of the Cadboro Bay Business Improvement Association? At any given time Sarah juggles with quite a few balls in the air but when she&#39;s not actually working (which is rare), Sarah will likely be found on a baseball diamond somewhere or voraciously devouring (not literally) a book. Thank you, Sarah, for the work that you do to keep this ship afloat! We couldn&#39;t do it without you!</p><p>Alright gang, let&#39;s talk about the new items that we have for you this week. We&#39;re going to kick things off with something that lots and lots of people love: cheddar cheese. but what we have for you is not just any cheddar cheese. This is the cadillac of cheddars. <em><strong>Balderson Reserve 2017 Limited Edition White Cheddar Cheese</strong></em> is quite possibly &quot;<em>the world&#39;s finest aged cheddar</em>.&quot; Afterall, Balderson has been creating fine aged cheddars since 1881. iI&#39;s what they do. It&#39;s <em>all</em> they do! But this cheese ain&#39;t for the grandchildren. Nope, this is adult gnoshing cheddar that pairs well with full-bodied&nbsp;red wines, dark beers, port or sherry. Best served at or near room temperature.</p><p>Fans of our <em><strong>Paqui Haunted Ghost Pepper Chips</strong></em>&nbsp;(freakin&#39; hot) know that the heat comes from real ghost peppers, not a bunch of chemicals. By the way, if you like it spicy then these chips are definitely for you! We&#39;ve had them for a long time, so we figured it was time to add a few more flavours to the mix. <em><strong>Paqui Zesty Salsa Verde</strong></em>&nbsp;<em><strong>Chips</strong></em> (kinda hot) pairs tangy tamatillo, lime and sour cream flavours into a corn chip that everyone in the whole family can enjoy! And there&#39;s also <em><strong>Paqui Mucho Nacho Cheese Chips </strong></em>(not hot), the chip loaded with real organic cheeses and spices. It&#39;s a cheese lovers dream snack! Tomorrow is Cinco de Mayo so why not go all in with these deliciously spicy (or not) snacks?</p><p>Another crispy snack that&#39;s new is <em><strong>Quaker Veggie Crispy Minis</strong></em>! Made from puffed brown rice as well as real vegetables like carrot, beet and spinach, these yummy in your tummy&nbsp;snacks come in <em><strong>Balsamic &amp; Bruschetta</strong></em> as well as <em><strong>Italian Herb &amp; Olive Oil</strong></em> flavours! At just 90 calories per serving (16 chips) you can eat &#39;em guilt free!</p><p>Let&#39;s keep it rolling with another crunchy semi-savoury snack cracker with a unique yet tasty flavour! <em><strong>Christie Wheat Thins Sweet Potato Crackers</strong></em> are made with whole grain wheat flour and dried sweet potato, as well as contain salt and cinnamon! They are perfectly suitable for eating on their own, straight out of the box, or they can be topped with mild or aged cheeses. They must be good because they&#39;ve already been selling well!</p><p>Fresh lemongrass is an essential ingredient in Thai cooking but the problem with it is that it&#39;s not a great seler. So when you go to purchase it, it&#39;s often not at it&#39;s peak of freshness. And the other problem is that quite often, once you&#39;ve purchased it, you can&#39;t go through it quick enough so it goes to waste. Is there a solution to this dilemma? there is now! With <em><strong>Bart Lemongrass Paste</strong></em> you get that ultra fresh lemony aroma with the&nbsp;citrus taste of fresh lemongrass in a convenient jar! One teaspoon of lemongras paste is equal to one teaspoon of chopped lemongrass. The math is simple! And so is the decision to put this in your basket. It&#39;s a no-brainer for sure.</p><p>Altight, it&#39;s time to get naked. Scratch that. It&#39;s time to get a <em><strong>Naked Smoothie</strong></em> off of the shelf in our Produce Department. Naked Smoothies are incredibly fresh and delicious blends of fruit juices with other ingredients that are vegan and contain no added sugars. For example, <em><strong>Green Machine</strong></em> is a combination of apples, mango, banana, kiwi and pineapple with spirulina, alfalfa, broccoli, kale, barley grass, wheat grass, parsley...you get the idea! They&#39;re jam packed with fresh and delicious ingredients full of nutrition and goodness. Also try <em><strong>Mighty Mango</strong></em> and <em><strong>Strawberry Banana</strong></em>!</p><p>And finally, if that sweet tooth of yours has been calling, you might just have to listen and satiate the urge with <em><strong>Bar&uacute; Dark Chocolate Covered Marshmallows</strong></em>. Chocolaty coated Jet Puffed these are not. The &quot;fluffy mallows&quot; contain only natural ingredients, from bourbon vanilla to honey and are dipped in a crispy coating of fine dark Belgian or milk chocolate. Available in <em><strong>Dark Chocolate,</strong></em> <em><strong>Dark Chocolate Sea Salt Caramel</strong></em> or&nbsp;<em><strong>Milk Chocolate Sea Salt Caramel</strong></em>, these are the ultimate treat for caving in to temptation.</p><p>Remember to have a look at our Cinco de Mayo themed ad this week. We have some great deals on items from every department. And also remember to be kind, not just to others but to yourself! It&#39;s amazing how we can handle life&#39;s big issues, sometimes surprisingly well, but yet we are incredibly good at sweating the small stuff and we find ourselves coming down hard on ourselves for just being human. We make mistakes. We drop dishes. We forget things. We spill milk. In the grand scheme of things, none of this matters. It&#39;s easy to lose sight of the big picture sometimes. So be good to yourself and for gosh sakes, take good care!</p><p>Pepper&#39;s Foods</p> Peppers Newsletter April 27, 2021 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/peppers-newsletter-april-27-2021/ Peppers Foods Tue, 27 Apr 2021 00:05:00 GMT <p>Good morning! Last week we introduced our Store Manager, Don Way, to you in the first of a series of weekly Staff Appreciation posts. This week, our Meat Manager, Mr. John Eldridge, is in the spotlight. With 57 years experience as a butcher, John is a master at his craft and one of the best there is. Period. He stocks a diverse and exceptional meat counter each and every single day and do you know why? It&#39;s because he works very hard and LOVES what he does for a living! And&nbsp;we LOVE having him as an employee which he has been for the past 31 years. John brings an amazing energy to work every day as well as a great sense of humour. His newest hobby involves smoking various cuts of meat in his awesome backyard smoker! Have fun with it, John, and thank you!</p><p>Hey, remember Expo 67? It was the International and Universal Exposition, a Category One World&#39;s Fair that was the first of its kind to be held in North America. It was the focal point for Canada&#39;s 100th birthday which ran in Montreal, QC from April 27-October 29, 1967. Category 1 meant that it must cover the full range of activities of contemporary man. The theme was Man and his World with sixty-two nations participating (the most to date) and it also set an attendance record on the third day with 569,500 visitors. In total,&nbsp;54,991,806 people experienced this incredible event which, by the way, almost didn&#39;t happen. Moscow was originally awarded the opportunity by the&nbsp;Bureau International des Expositions in Paris but the USSR cancelled and Canada was granted the green light.</p><p>What&#39;s new and exciting to the store this week you ask? Let&#39;s start off with stuff found in our Meat Department since the manager is the man of the hour! John has added some amazing new items from Langford&#39;s Glenwood Meats. And if you know anything about Glenwood, you know that they don&#39;t skimp on quality. And they&#39;ve been a family operated business since 1950 so they know a thing or two about meats. Just in time for BBQ season are <em><strong>Glenwood Smokies</strong></em> available in <em><strong>Beef, Turkey</strong></em> and <em><strong>Jalapeno Cheese</strong></em>&nbsp;(pork) flavours! You get six giant smokies per package that cook up juicy and delicious on the grill!</p><p>There&#39;s also <em><strong>Glenwood Weiners</strong></em> which come in <em><strong>Original </strong></em>(pork and beef)<em><strong>, Beef Cheddar</strong></em> and <em><strong>Chicken</strong></em> varieties! There are six large weiners per package that will put the weiners you currently buy to shame. They taste that good!&nbsp;</p><p>And if you&#39;re looking for something ready-to-eat, try <em><strong>Glenwood Pepperoni</strong></em>! With four flavours to chose from (<em><strong>Original, Jalapeno Cheddar, Honey Garlic and Hot &amp; Spicy</strong></em>) these are large portions of beef and pork pepperoni sticks with the perfect blend of seasonings and ingredients. We know that this will become your favourite pepperoni. And keep this in mind:&nbsp;you&#39;re purchasing product that&#39;s created and smoked on-site. Glenwood is involved entirely in the process so you&#39;re getting locally-made, high quality product that&#39;s flavourful and satisfying!&nbsp;&nbsp;Keep supporting your local businesses!</p><p>Another tasty addition to the store can be found in our Deli Department in the form of <em><strong>Bacon &amp; Cheddar Egg Bites</strong></em>!&nbsp;These scrumptious gluten-free snacks are high in protein and come in a pack of two for just $2.99. You can find them in the Deli&#39;s cold case across from the first till!</p><p>Sometimes we&#39;re out of stock on certain items be it due to supplier shortages or what have you. That was the case with certain items from <em><strong>The Fishery</strong></em>, local seafood products from Salt Spring Island. But now <em><strong>The Fishery Smoked Mussels</strong></em> and <em><strong>Smoked Scallops</strong></em> have returned to the shelves!&nbsp;So if you&#39;ve been disappointed at not being able to purchase these, you&#39;re in luck because they&#39;re in stock! And another seafood item that was unavailabe but has also returned is <em><strong>St. Jean&#39;s </strong></em>(Nanaimo) <em><strong>Smoked Mussels</strong></em>. There&#39;s no shortage anymore of delicious, loical smoked shellfish so make sure you remember to put these back on your shopping list.</p><p>Remember <em><strong>The Upside Organic Coffee Blend</strong></em> that we told you about last week? They&#39;ve already expanded their line to include <em><strong>The Upside Organic K-Cups</strong></em> (K-Cup compatible)! It&#39;s that same great coffee blend except it comes in convenient Keurig cartridges. Each package contains 18 cups that are 100% blue box recyclable! Currently they live on a displayer outside the front doors of the store but they&#39;ll eventually find their way to the shelf in Aisle 3 with the other coffees.</p><p>Keurig coffee is almost instant coffee but not quite. But if you&#39;re in the mood for a flavoured instant coffee beverage then the two new ones found just below the coffee grinder might just be for you! <em><strong>Maxwell House Cafe Instant Coffee</strong></em> is available at Pepper&#39;s in <em><strong>Suisse Mocha</strong></em> as well as <em><strong>French Vanilla</strong></em> flavours! Apparently this is highly coveted stuff that&#39;s hard to find so if you&#39;re one of the many who have to go elsewhere to purchase this, your just saved yourself a trip!</p><p>Our Produce Department has added <em><strong>Muscat Grapes</strong></em>! If you&#39;ve never tried these delicate, seedless beauties then you&#39;re in for a treat! These greenish grapes with a pink bloom and soft skin are one of the oldest grape varieties in existence. Imported from Chile, they are only available until before the end of May. So you might want to jump on the chance to try these, if you haven&#39;t yet already. They don&#39;t taste like regular table grapes. They taste more of lychee fruit than grapes, actually:&nbsp;sweet and deliciously fragrant!&nbsp;</p><p>If you want to attain a high level of streak-free cleanliness on glass and surfaces at home in a product that contains zero ammonia, try <em><strong>Method Glass Cleaner Waterfall.</strong></em> You&#39;ll get a streak-free shine with plant-based ingredients that smells like water lily and sandalwood! Smudges, fingerprints and detritus flung onto the bathroom mirror&nbsp;as a result of aggressive flossing don&#39;t stand a chance against this meaner, greener surface cleaner!&nbsp;</p><p>Want a healthy yet convenient meal that&#39;s ready in mere minutes? One that doesn&#39;t contain meat? One that&#39;s loaded with fibre and protein but that;s gluten-free and vegan? Presto bang-o you&#39;re in luck! Because you can have all of that with <em><strong>San Remo Organic Chili with Romano Beans</strong></em>! Here&#39;s the complete list of ingredients:&nbsp;Borlotti Beans, Water, tomato puree, cane sugar, starch, salt, red chilli peppers, onions, spices. That&#39;s it. Simpler is often better and in this instance, that&#39;s exactly the case. Simple yet delicious. Quick and easy.&nbsp;</p><p>There&#39;s another one for the books, gang. Wherever this finds you we hope that you are healthy and safe and continuing to persevere through this crazy period&nbsp;in our history. We hope you enjoyed the newsletter this week and until the next one arrives, please, take good care!</p><p>Pepper&#39;s Foods</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p> Peppers Newsletter April 20, 2021 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/peppers-newsletter-april-20-2021/ Peppers Foods Tue, 20 Apr 2021 00:05:00 GMT <p>Good morning! Today we have some good news to share (this is, afterall, a letter about news)! Firstly, the Family Business Association of Vancouver Island has honoured Pepper&#39;s Foods by presenting the 2020 Family Business Excellence Award to the Davits family, the owners of the store. Our current General Manager, Cory Davits, along with his father John, are so pleased to have been presented with this award and sincerely thank the staff, our customers and everyone at the FBA for this recognition!</p><p>Secondly, if you&#39;ve been a shopper at our store for any length of time, you&#39;re likely aware of who our Store Manager, Don Way, is. If not, Don has been steadfastly working at the store for 34 years and holds the distinction of being the longest serving staff member at Pepper&#39;s. Don&#39;s easygoing personality and great sense of humour makes him a pleasure to work alongside, especially during the trying times associated with this pandemic. He&#39;s the glue that holds Pepper&#39;s together which is why he is never allowed to retire. Ever. So as part of our Staff Appreciation Campaign (we single out and embarrass a staff member every Thursday) we are proud to recognize hard-working Don as our first recipient and he was presented with a store gift card for his efforts. Way to go, Don!</p><p>Okey dokey let&#39;s talk about new items on the shelves starting with some refreshing beverages available in our cold case up front. You may already be familiar with <em><strong>Zevia</strong></em>, the zero calorie sodas sweetened with stevia that we sell singly up front as well as by the pack in aisle 5. Now there are two new lines of sugar-free drinks available to you! <em><strong>Zevia Organic Tea</strong></em> is sweetened (the Canadian way to drink iced tea) black tea naturally flavoured with either<em><strong> Lemon</strong></em> or <em><strong>Raspberry&nbsp;</strong></em>and is the &quot;f<em>irst and only zero calorie and zero sugar tea platform. Naturally sweetened with a delicate balance of flavou, Zevia Organic Tea is USDA Organic and brewed with Fair Trade Certified Tea</em>.&quot; We also have <strong><em>Zevia Energy</em></strong> for when you need a little extra boost without the added sugar! With zero sugar, zero calories and 120mg of caffeine per can, you&#39;ll power through your day sipping on a <em><strong>Mango Ginger </strong></em>or <em><strong>Raspberry Lime</strong></em> energy drink!</p><p>Or you could always opt for the old standby that&#39;s been chasing away the yawns for eons: coffee. But not just any coffee. You may recall how CHEK News aired an episode of The Upside on-location from Pepper&#39;s Foods just a little while ago. Well, the hosts, Ed Bain and Jeff King neother of which had ever been to the store before, were&nbsp;so pumped up about the store and how we focus on local products as much as possible, that they asked if we&#39;d be interested in selling <em><strong>The Upside Blend Coffee</strong></em>! Yes, Ed and Jeff have a brand of whole bean coffee that&#39;s only available for retail at Pepper&#39;s Foods and Fresh Cup Roastery Cafe. The beans are small batch roasted for the best possible taste bringing out the full-bodied&nbsp;flavour and aroma as well as an enticing sweetness and wonderful depth. You&#39;ll find it in Aisle 3 with the rest of the hot beverages.</p><p>The perfect accompaniment to coffee is undoubtedly biscotti. Italians know a thing or two about coffee and what goes well with it. So if you&#39;re picking up some of that Upside Blend, you should add the latest flavour of the most excellent <em><strong>Melinda&#39;s Biscotti: Gingersnap</strong></em>. What started out of a garage 15 years ago in Sidney, BC as grown into a successful and thriving business and we&#39;re very happy to offer this biscotti in our store. It&#39;s not in the most obvious spot so look for it on the top shelf directly across from the bread (near the ATM).&nbsp;</p><p>Alternatively, you could just go for a chocolate chip cookie. However, our newest chocolate chip cookie puts the standard to shame because it&#39;s<em><strong> Christie Chips Ahoy Chewy Family Size with Cadbury Caramilk Chocolate Chips</strong></em>! You read that right. It&#39;s the classic chewy cookie with the classic chocolate taste of the iconic Cadbury Caramilk bar! What more is there to say, really except that you have got to get your hands on these immediately for your next compulsive snacking/binge watching marathon! Sweeeeet!</p><p>This pandemic has caused a lot of peeople a lot of stress so it&#39;s no wonder that alcohol consumption spiked! But if you&#39;re looking to scale back your boozin&#39; yet still enjoy the taste of wine, try <em><strong>St. Regis Brut De-alcoholized Sparkling Wine</strong></em>! As per the company website:</p><p><em>The&nbsp;St. Regis&nbsp;Brut is a dry, golden yellow sparkling wine featuring floral, fruity and citrus notes layered over delicate and persistent effervescence. Made with a fine selection of Chardonnay grapes using traditional methods, our master winemakers have created a remarkable product that doesn&rsquo;t compromise on taste to dazzle even the most discerning palates. Make every occasion a memorable one with this medium-bodied Brut that unveils a lively acidity, rounded balance and broad texture</em>. It&#39;s great on its own or in mocktails!</p><p>Whole sesame seeds ground up with organic sesame oil = <em><strong>New World Organics Organic Sesame Tahini</strong></em>.&nbsp;No stabilizers, hydrogenated oils, sugars, salt, artificial colours, flavours, dairy products or preservatives are added to this traditional Middle Eastern condiment. It&#39;s also vegan!&nbsp;Add it to your dressings, noodles, quinoa, dips, pitas, hummus, and roasted vegetables.</p><p>If you happen to get a glob of that tahini on your favourite t-shirt there&#39;s a good chance it might stain it. <em><strong>Resolve Oxi Action Fabric Stain Remover</strong></em> comes in a new powder form in two varieties. There&#39;s <em><strong>Crystal White Chlorine Free Fabric Stain Remover</strong></em> as well as <em><strong>Colour Safe Fabric Stain Remover</strong></em>. NOTE: this is a super boosted IN-WASH stain remover meaning that you add it to your washing machine when you do your laundry. You can also use it as a spot remover by making a paste, applying it to the stain, waiting 5 minutes and then washing as recommended.</p><p>Finally, there&#39;s another new oat beverage available with the shelf-stable non-dairy beverages right under the monitor in Aisle 1.&nbsp;<em><strong>Silk Unsweetened</strong></em> <em><strong>Oat</strong></em> is a great dairy-free, gluten-free, soy-free, carrageenan-free, lactose-free&nbsp;and vegan alternative to drinking milk with only 50 calories per serving, zero cholesterol and zero sugar!</p><p>One last thing before you finish reading and start looking at our advertised specials, we have been provided with another NHL jersey from Arla Foods! This year we have a <em><strong>Winnipeg Jets Jersey </strong></em>available to be won (the draw will commence after the Stanley Cup is awarded) and all you have to do is sign your name and number on the back of your receipt and place it in the ballot box at the store entrance! Good luck!</p><p>Until next week, stay safe and take good care!&nbsp;</p><p>Pepper&#39;s Foods</p> Peppers Newsletter April 13, 2021 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/peppers-newsletter-april-13-2021/ Peppers Foods Tue, 13 Apr 2021 00:05:00 GMT <p>Good morning! &quot;Houston, we have a problem.&quot; Those were not the words that Commander James A. Lovell Jr. spoke 51 years ago today when NASA&#39;s Apollo 13 spacecraft suffered a major malfunction en route to the moon. He also didn&#39;t say, &quot;Houston, well there&#39;s the problem!&quot; or &quot;Houston, what&#39;s your problem?&quot; No, in one of the most misquoted phrases of the 20th century, what he actually spoke was, &quot;<em>Houston, we&#39;ve had a problem here</em>.&quot; At least that&#39;s what the official NASA transcript states. And what a problem it was, indeed. For as many of us are already aware, the craft&#39;s oxygen was rapidly venting into space due to a short circuit which caused a significant explosion. Commander Lovell, as well as fellow crewmates&nbsp;Fred W. Haise Jr., (Lunar Module Pilot) and John L. Swigert Jr., (Command Module Pilot) were then forced to survive in space for an additonal four days (the accident happened on the third day in) while the spacecraft, instead of landing on the moon, orbited it on a return trajectory to earth. On April 15th, Apollo 13 was 254 km from the lunar surface on the far side of the moon and 400,171 km above the Earth. This is a Guinness World Record for the farthest distance from Earth reached by human beings&nbsp;and still holds to this day. They all survived the ordeal.</p><p>Okay so there&#39;s alot of ground to cover this morning so lets get right to it. And this week, our newsletter is packed with loads of local stuff which is very exciting! Salsa&nbsp;is the most consumed condiment on the planet. So it shouldn&#39;t surprise anyone that we have some new ones to tell you about! <em><strong>Everland Organic Salsa</strong></em> is made in Vancouver, BC and we have both <em><strong>Mild </strong></em>and <em><strong>Hot </strong></em>varieties available. Organic tomatoes, vegetables, herbs and spices combine to create a flavourful sauce perfect for chips and everything else that tastes great with salsa!&nbsp;</p><p>If I had to guess, I&#39;d say the second most consumed condiment would have to be ketchup. I&#39;m not going to look it up but that sounds about right. So when we ordered the Everland Organic Salsas, we figured that we may as well get a whole bunch of <em><strong>Everland Organic Ketchup</strong></em>, too! BBQ season is here so complete your next cookout of dogs and burgers with this super tasty tomato ketchup!</p><p>Say, if we&#39;re talking burgers, let&#39;s talk about the buns to go with them. Another exciting local product&nbsp; that&#39;s new to Pepper&#39;s is <em><strong>Portofino European Bakery Golden Potato Buns</strong></em>. With a sweet buttery taste and soft texture, your next burger or sandwich is going to be the best you&#39;ve had in awhile! You&#39;ll love these buns!</p><p>A very popular saying is the one that goes &quot;you reap what you sow.&quot; In&nbsp; other words, you&#39;re farming karma. Which leads us to our next excellent product by Kelowna&#39;s <em><strong>Farming Karma Fruit Co.</strong></em>! With the warm weather on the way, now is the perfect time to try <em><strong>Farming Karma Fruit Co. Sodas</strong></em>, made from apples frown in BC&#39;s Okanagan region! There&#39;s no added sugars and the juice (there&#39;s an entire apple&#39;s worth per can!) is not from concentrate. The original Apple flavour contains just 50 calories per can (10 grams of <em>naturally</em> occurring sugars) with&nbsp;almost no sodium (10mg) and has 14% of the RDI of vitamin C. That doesn&#39;t sound like a lot but how much nutrition is contained in the average can of pop? Exactly - zero. So get your hands on this line of BC-made sodas that come in <em><strong>Apple, Cherry, Peach, Berry</strong></em> and <em><strong>Pear</strong></em> flavours: the&nbsp;sodas that are ripe with good karma!</p><p>Salmon Arm, BC is home to the original <em><strong>Happy Days Goat Dairy</strong></em> which has added an excellent cheese to their already popular line of goat milk products! <em><strong>Happy Days Goat Cheddar Cheese</strong></em> is pure white cheddar goat cheese and is the perfect alternative to cow dairy cheddar. It has a light yet distinct flavour that every cheese lover will enjoy!</p><p>Our <em><strong>Deli Department</strong></em> has added some terrific pre-sliced meats from Victoria&#39;s own <em><strong>Berryman Brother&#39;s Butcheries</strong></em>! Now you can purchase half-pound&nbsp;packages of <em><strong>Pepperoni </strong></em>as well as <em><strong>Capicola&nbsp;Ham</strong></em>!&nbsp;Both are ideal as pizza toppings. Oh and in case you were wondering, capicola is, as per Wikipedia:&nbsp;<em>a traditional Italian and Corsican pork cold cut (salume) made from the dry-cured muscle running from the neck to the fourth or fifth rib of the pork shoulder or neck</em>. It&#39;s fatty but not too fatty, lightly spiced and slightly smoky. In other words, it&#39;s delicious! Plus, now back in stock is <em><strong>Berryman Brothers Garlic Ham Rings</strong></em> as well as their <em><strong>Charcuterie Pack</strong></em>!</p><p>And if you&#39;re putting together a charcuterie board with the aforementioned items, you can really kick it up a notch with <em><strong>Little Stand Red Pepper Jelly</strong></em>, another exclusve to Pepper&#39;s Foods! More local goodness with exquisite flavour =&nbsp;happy customers!</p><p>The <em><strong>Deli Department </strong></em>has also added ready-to-heat soups from<em><strong> Vancouver Soup Company!</strong></em>&nbsp; Every flavour is made from scratch in small batches using nothing but the freshest of fresh ingredients! They&nbsp;take pride in offering home-made food that is reliably consistent and has rich and complex flavour profiles. And with soups such as <em><strong>Chicken Coconut Curry, Smoked Salmon Chowder </strong></em>and <em><strong>Potato Leek </strong></em>(just to name a few), there is bound to be at least one that is destined to become your next favourite!</p><p>Let&#39;s close the newsletter out with an exciting giveaway that the store is holding on Instagram!&nbsp;</p><p>Five amazing local businesses have teamed up to offer a chance for one person to win a gift pack loaded with products they are sure to enjoy!<br /><br />WHAT CAN YOU WIN?<br /><br />&bull; $50 gift card to <strong>Dumpling Drop</strong><br />&bull; $50 gift card to <strong>Pepper&#39;s Foods</strong><br />&bull; pint of ice cream &amp; t-shirt from <strong>49 Below</strong><br />&bull; bag of coffee, tote bag &amp; toque from <strong>Discovery Coffee</strong><br />&bull; one dozen tortillas, one pack (8) medium tortillas, one bag Hominy, one pound Masa Dough &amp; gift card from <strong>Maiiz Nixtamal Tortilleria</strong><br /><br />HOW TO ENTER?<br />Follow these&nbsp;steps:</p><p>Head on over to our Instagram account:&nbsp;<strong>@peppersfoodsvictoria</strong></p><ul> <li>LIKE the Giveaway post ??</li> <li>FOLLOW these accounts ??</li></ul><p>&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;@discoverycoffee<br />&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;@dumplingdrop<br />&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;@maiiz.nixtamal<br />&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;@49below<br />&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp;@peppersfoodsvictoria</p><ul> <li>TAG a friend in the comments of this post who would also want to win (1 comment = 1 entry, so tag away!) ??</li></ul><p>* contest closes @ midnight on April 15th 2021. Winner to be announced April 16th and must be able to pick up their winnings from Pepper&#39;s Foods.</p><p>Well, there you have it. Loads of goodies await one lucky winner. Perhaps it could be you! We&#39;re pulling for ya! We want to wish you continued safety from this exhausting pandemic. Keep doing all the good things! Stay positive. Be kind. Help your friends and neighbours. And, as always, take good care!</p><p>Pepper&#39;s Foods</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p> Peppers Newsletter April 6, 2021 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/peppers-newsletter-april-6-2021/ Peppers Foods Tue, 06 Apr 2021 00:10:00 GMT <p>Good morning!&nbsp; We trust everyone had a safe, enjoyable and socially distanced Easter long weekend! Any my, what amazing weather we had, too! The pink plum and cherry blossoms are in full swing here in Victoria and the sun has been shining brightly! But let&#39;s not get too excited because the forecast is calling for sub-zero temperatures this weekend. So best not put those seedlings in the garden just yet.</p><p>It&#39;s great when the subject of our little history lessopn has to do with food, although this week, one could argue that the item we&#39;re about to discuss is actually food. Today in 1930, a Canadian-born baker named James Alexander Dewar invented the Twinkie in Schiller Park, Illinois. Dewar was an employee of the Continental Baking Company when he realized that the machines which were used for injecting cream into strawberry shortcakes went unused when the berries were not in season. So he decided to fill some cakes with banana cream instead. When WWII broke out, bananas were rationed and the company was forced to switch to another flavour: vanilla. The name &quot;twinkie&quot; was conceived when Dewar saw a billboard for &quot;Twinkle Toe Shoes&quot; on a St. Louis billboard.</p><p>We mentioned holding off for awhile on planting outside but if you have a hankering for some fresh vegetables pick up some fresh <em><strong>BC Grown Living Lettuce</strong></em>! We have living<em><strong> Romaine, Butter</strong></em> or <em><strong>Spring Lettuces </strong></em>available that you can either leave out on the kitchen counter and continue to water or keep in the bag in your fridge. Fresh, crunchy, sweet and delicious greens that taste just like they were picked from the garden can be in your dinner salad today!</p><p>Consumers are becoming much more conscious of the choices that they make and how they can affext the environment, or degradation of it. For instance, plastic straws are frowned upon now and loads of people keep a reusable one in their purse, bag or glove box. Plastic bags have been largely replaced with reusable fabric bags. And plastic cutlery is becoming as equally avoided because they go straight into the landfill. That being said, we have a super convenient dining accessory kit available right now made entirely of bamboo! <em><strong>The Future is Bamboo Utensil Kit</strong></em> comes in a convenient and cute velcro-closing pouch and contains a bamboo knife, fork, spoon and straw (as well as a tiny brush for cleaning the straw). This renewable resource is used to make durable cutlery which can be washed and reused over and over with zero generated waste. They&#39;re vegan and cruelty-free certified, friendly on your wallet but best of all, they&#39;re good for the planet. Make a switch to your daily routine and ditch plastic once and for all!</p><p>If we&#39;re talking about items that are good for the earth, we&#39;d better mention <em><strong>True Earth Eco Strips Disinfectant Multi-Surface Cleaner! </strong></em>This product is made from the same company that created those eco-friendly laundry detergent strips! It&#39;s way&nbsp;cool because the package contains 8 strips of which you drop one into your own spray bottle filled with hot water thus creating a disinfecting solution that kills 99% of bacteria, 99% of fungi and mold and 99% of viruses! You shake the bottle until the strip is disolved and you&#39;re good to go. All without creating any waste plastic. You only need one bottle which you can use over and over again. Oh and did we mention that it&#39;s Health Canada approved?</p><p>Keto-dieters listen up! Things just got real. Gone are the days of using a leaf of lettuce for your low-calorie, low-carb wrap.<em><strong> Folios Cheese Wraps</strong></em> are here in our Deli Department! What&#39;s that, now? What is a cheese wrap? Here&#39;s what the company website has to say:&nbsp;<em>Folios Cheese Wraps, the first ever and&nbsp;#1&nbsp;cheese wrap on the market!&nbsp;Folios are 100% all natural lightly baked sheets of cheese that are made from <strong>Parmesan </strong></em>or <em><strong>Cheddar </strong>cheese and&nbsp;are recipe-ready to crisp, wrap, roll or melt. Ideal as a keto-friendly, low-carb alternative for tortillas or bread, Folios is the better-for-you alternative you never knew you needed.&nbsp;We are committed to using the highest quality, nutritious ingredients that are free of additives, sugars and preservatives and with only 1g of carbs per serving! </em>They&#39;re naturally lactose and gluten-free as well!</p><p>How does a fillet of salmon sound on the BBQ tonight? Yes, it&#39;ll probably make a sizzling sound but that&#39;s not what we mean. What we mean is, how appealing is&nbsp;grilling&nbsp;a fillet of salmon on the BBQ? Not just any fillet of salmon mind you. How about <em><strong>Aquastar Smoky Peppercorn Salmon</strong></em>? It&#39;s a side of marinated wild caught Alaskan chum salmon with garlic and cracked pepper! And it&#39;s a snap in either the BBQ or oven&nbsp;taking anywhere from 23-29 minutes depending on how you choose to cook it. The bag also has a see-through window on the back so you can have a peek before you buy it. We&#39;re working on getting this in individual portion packages as well!</p><p>We&#39;ve talked about all things savoury thus far so let&#39;s switch over to the sweet stuff!<em><strong> Walkers </strong></em>has been making fine Scottish shortbread for eons and their popularity is evident by the amount&nbsp;that Pepper&#39;s sells. We go through A LOT of shortbread at this store. Not surprisingly, Walkers wants to get in on all that gluten-free action so they decided to make a cookie. <em><strong>Walkers Gluten-Free Biscuits </strong></em>come in <strong>Oat &amp; Cranberry</strong> as well as Chocolate Chunk &amp; Orange (this flavour will come up again soon...) They&#39;re certified gluten-free and vegetarian and yet still taste delicious because, hey, they&#39;re <em><strong>Walkers</strong></em>. Now you don&#39;t have to exclude anyone from your next tea party, although, with COVID numbers exploding, you probably shouldn&#39;t be having a tea party to begin with. But if you or your bubble peeps need gluten-free stuff, now you&#39;re all set!</p><p>Terry&#39;s Chocolate Oranges sell out every time we get them in stock. And why wouldn&#39;t they, since the taste of delicious milk chocolate and oranges makes an excellent flavour coupling. It only makes sense then that they finally started making <em><strong>Terry&#39;s Orange Chocolatey Confection</strong></em> in bar form. Well, they&#39;re more like several little round pieces of chocolate. Regardless, they&#39;re really, really good! You can get <em><strong>Terry&#39;s Orange Original</strong></em> or <em><strong>Terry&#39;s Orange Cookie Biscuit</strong></em> which is the same except that it has pieces of cookie mixed into the chocolate. We know it was just Easter and you&#39;ve totally filled up on chocolate and couldn&#39;t possibly even think about eating any more but c&#39;mon, it&#39;s only wafer thin.&nbsp;</p><p>We couldn&#39;t finish things up this week without mentioning something new to drink now, could we? <em><strong>Tonica Kombucha Tonic Blue Lemonade Supertonic</strong></em> has been in the store for awhile but we&#39;ve just recently added <em><strong>Tonica Kombucha Tonic Pineapple Lemonade!</strong></em>&nbsp;How good does that sound (not this again...) It&#39;s the fresh taste of pineapple combined with the zingy tang of lemonade in raw, organic, enzyme-rich kombucha form! Yummy!</p><p>That&#39;ll do it for another week, folks. Please continue to do keep doing everything that you can to minimize your exposure to this stubborn virus. We&#39;re almost to the finish line so keep staying the course! And as always, our wish is for you to continue to take good care.</p><p>Pepper&#39;s Foods</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p> Peppers Newsletter March 30, 2021 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/peppers-newsletter-march-30-2021/ Peppers Foods Tue, 30 Mar 2021 00:05:00 GMT <p>Good morning! Hey y&#39;know what? This year, March has five Tuesdays in it which means that this is a bonus newsletter for the month! Woo hoo! And today&#39;s history lesson is directly related to two things that I love a lot: Victoria and hockey! Yes, today in 1925 the Victoria Cougars of the WCHL beat the&nbsp;Montreal Canadiens of the NHL 6-1 to win the Stanley Cup (Victoria took the series 3-1 in the best of five)! This was the last time any team that wasn&#39;t a part of the NHL won the Cup. The game was played in the old Patrick Arena in Oak Bay at the corner of Cadboro Bay Road and Epworth Street (then called Empress Street). Alas, the arena burned to the ground in what appeared to have been an act of arson on November 11, 1929. On a side note, the WCHL ceased to exist after the 1925-26 season and the newly formed NHL team in Detroit purchased the Victoria Cougars becoming the Detroit Cougars until 1930 when they renamed to the Detroit Falcons and then in 1932 came to be known as the Red Wings.</p><p>Easter will be here in a blink and if you&#39;re looking for some sweet treats for those baskets we&#39;ve got loads of stuff to pick from. <em><strong>Cakes Etc.</strong></em> has <em><strong>Easter Egg Cookies</strong></em> in a bag of five or individual <em><strong>Bunny Cookies</strong></em>! <em><strong>Dutch Bakery</strong></em> has <em><strong>Solid Chocolate Bunnies</strong></em> available in milk or white chocolate! Or we have bags containing both<em><strong> Easter Bunny and Egg Cookies</strong></em>! Plus, there are loads of other Easter candies located on the aisle end at the first till! So make sure to get some really great goodies now before we&#39;re all sold out!</p><p>Does eating gourmet, whole-hearted soul food sound appealing to you? It did to us as well. And that&#39;s precisely why we started carrying <em><strong>SaltSpring Pie Company Pies</strong></em>! Homemade, delicious hand-crafted and hearty, these pies are made by three generations of Walde women with lots of love! They&#39;re easy to cook and healthy, too! With flavours like <em><strong>Roast Chicken, Vegetable and Sweet Corn</strong></em>; <em><strong>Braised Beef &amp; Mushroom</strong></em>; <em><strong>Turkey and Roast Yam</strong></em> and<em><strong> Pork Apple &amp; Sage</strong></em>, you&#39;re getting simply exceptional comfort food made on the farm from one family to another!</p><p>If low-carb and keto-friendly eating is the name of your game then get ready to be happy because we now offer <em><strong>Sprague Simply Soups</strong></em>! Not only do they only contain between 6 and 7 net carbs per serving, they&#39;re also gluten-free and full of plant-based proteins! Choose from <em><strong>Simply Green</strong></em> (broccoli, creamed coconut and curry), <em><strong>Simply Bisque</strong></em> (tomato bisque with roasted red peppers and cream) or <em><strong>Simply Cauli</strong></em> (cauliflower, hemp hearts and turmeric). Sprague Foods has been in business since 1925 and they&#39;re proud to produce 100% Canadian products!</p><p>Oh, and did we mention that there are also <em><strong>Sprague Organic Simply Soups</strong></em> as well? These are just regular organic soups, not the keto-friendly, low-carb kind. The company motto is <em>tasting is believing</em>. So don&#39;t take our word for it that these soups are unbelievable.&nbsp;You&#39;re just oing to have to try them for yourself. Choose from six gluten-free flavours: <em><strong>Lentil and Vegetable, Carribean Black Bean, Tomato Red Pepper, Qu&eacute;bec-Style Split Pea, Tuscany-Style Minestrone</strong></em> or <em><strong>Sweet Potato Coconut Curry</strong></em>!</p><p>Here&#39;s an excerpt from the website of<em><strong> RiceSelect</strong></em>, a company that produces, no, not rice, but exquisite couscous! <em>Traditional Moroccan Couscous is a small, natural pasta that&#39;s extremely light and fluffy when cooked, but absorbs large amounts of flavor. With origins from North Africa, this pasta resembles small balls that are made with 100% enriched durum semolina wheat. Couscous is prepared by steaming the pasta to create a light and fluffy consistency. This grain&#39;s versatile shape and short cook time of 5 minutes make couscous ideal as a stand-alone dish or paired with sauces, vegetables, and other protein-heavy recipes. With RiceSelect, you can cook with confidence, knowing our Couscous is the perfect addition to an unforgettable meal.</em> That meal could be your Easter dinner this weekend! Whether it&#39;s <em><strong>RiceSelect Conventional Pearl Couscous with Turmeric</strong></em>,&nbsp;<em><strong>RiceSelect Organic Pearl Couscous</strong></em> or <em><strong>RiceSelect Organic Tri-Coloured Pearl Couscous</strong></em>, you have a very quick yet delicious side dish that makes a great alternative to potatoes or rice!&nbsp;</p><p>How convenient would it be to have a dairy-free beverage that&#39;s the perfect size for an on-the-go drink? With <em><strong>Blue Diamond Almond Breeze Unsweetened Vanilla</strong></em> you get four 240ml bottles of almond beverage free from added sugars, artificial flavours or colours! Pack one in your lunchkit or gym bag, stash some in your staff fridge or grab one on your way out the door!</p><p>Here&#39;s a perfect snack to go with that tasty beverage: <em><strong>Lotus Biscoff Sandwich Cookies</strong></em>! It&#39;s the unique caramelized taste of Lotus Biscoff with either a <em><strong>Biscoff Creme, Smooth Vanilla Creme</strong></em> or <em><strong>Smooth Chocolate Creme</strong></em> filling! You&#39;ll reminisce about that perfect plane trip that you took ages ago because these are the cookies served as snacks on many commercial airlines!&nbsp;</p><p>If you want to give your laundry detergent a serious boost without adding harsh chemical detergents, try <em><strong>Nellie&#39;s Oxygen Brightener Powder</strong></em>. This all-natural formula is unscented and phosphate-free and can be used on colours as well as whites. It cleans clothes, fights stains&nbsp;and does an excellent job deodorizing, too! So if you have gym clothes that you just can&#39;t seem to de-stinkify, this is your new go-to product! And since it comes in a nice tin, you can re-purpose the packaging to hold whatever you like.</p><p>Before we go, let&#39;s update you on <em><strong>The Little Stand</strong></em> product naming that we talked about last week. We erroneously stated that the product was a honey mustard glaze. The sweetness comes from brown sugar, not honey. And it tastes like a sweet and tangy mustard that you can use as a glaze or serve cold as a dip. Our staff tried it and LOVED it which isn&#39;t surprising since all of The Little Stand products are simply wonderful. At any rate,&nbsp;&nbsp;the name is <em><strong>Nanny&#39;s Ham Sauce&nbsp;</strong></em>and you can get some right now for your Easter dinner in jars of two different sizes.</p><p>Have a great long Easter weekend and until next week, take good care!</p><p>Pepper&#39;s Foods</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p> Peppers Newsletter March 23, 2021 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/peppers-newsletter-march-23-2021/ Peppers Foods Mon, 22 Mar 2021 14:35:00 GMT <p>Good morning!&nbsp;&nbsp;Elevator puns are bad on so many levels. Elevator puns really push my buttons, you know?&nbsp;Seriously, these elevator jokes really drive me up the wall! In fact,&nbsp;I&rsquo;m terrified of elevators, I&rsquo;ve been taking steps to avoid them. Alright, alright, I&#39;ll zip it. What&#39;s the reason behind these elevator jokes today? An American inventor and industrialist named Elisha Otis installed the very first commercial elevator in a New York City department store today in 1857 and went on to found the Otis Elevator Company which is still going strong to this day! His story is quite interesting in that his life&nbsp;had its fair share of ups and downs. He contracted pneumonia which was severe enough to almost kill him. His first wife died leaving him with two young sons. His career repeatedly stalled and he tried his hand at numerous jobs including dollmaker, mechanic and sawmill operator (which he designed and built). However, at age 40 while working as a manager for a bedstead factory, he wondered how to move debris from the lower levels to the upper in order to clean up the building.&nbsp;As a skilled craftsman, he was able to design and build a safety platform which could be raised&nbsp;and lowered without risk of falling. If not for this invention, modern skyscrapers would not be possible. So the next time you&#39;re inside an elevator, remember to thank it&nbsp;for picking you up whenever you&#39;re down!</p><p>Alright, bad jokes aside, this week we have some good items to discuss so let&#39;s get down to brass tacks. Easter is fast approaching and you&#39;ll want to be prepared if you&#39;re hosting dinner for this holiday! It&#39;s fairly easy if nobody has any dietary restrictions. But it can get a little more challenging when you need to feed the non-meat&nbsp;eaters as well! Though not new, a wholesome and tasty meat alternative is <em><strong>The Very Good Butchers Stuffed Beast</strong></em>! It&#39;s a meatless herby roast filled with delightfully tasty stuffing and veggies that feeds 5-7 people easily. Plus, it&#39;ll last up to four weeks in the fridge and even longer in the freezer.</p><p>Another great meatless option is <em><strong>Gardein Meat-Free Stuffed Turk&#39;y</strong></em>. This is a holiday favourite and you get not one but two individual stuffed turk&#39;y as well as two packs of gravy! So if it&#39;s just dinner for one, no problem. Just cook one and save the other for another occasion! These beauties cook up moist and delicious in just 20 minutes. If you like Tofurky, you&#39;ll <em>love </em>these!</p><p>We might as well mention another meatless option while we&#39;re on the topic. These guys were just in our ad but didn&#39;t make it into last week&#39;s newsletter. Oh well, better late than never, right? If you&#39;re in the market for an exceptional cheese alternative, and one that&#39;s already shredded, pick up <em><strong>Violife 100% Vegan Cheddar Style</strong></em> or <em><strong>Mozzarella Style Cheese Alternative</strong></em>! You next pizza, omelette, or batch of nachos will shine with the excellent flavour and perfectly melted texture of these shreds!</p><p>Let&#39;s go full 180 degrees from vegan to the artery hardening breakfast favourite: bacon. It&#39;s universally accepted that bacon is the most satisfying food in existence. Just ask Homer Simpson. So in addition to the already &uuml;ber popular Harvest bacon flavours that our Meat Department already stocks (Applewood Smoked and Thick Sliced) now we have <em><strong>Harvest Hickory Flavour Bacon</strong></em>! It&#39;s naturally smoked using real hardwood chips (so you know it&#39;s good) and cured using special flavourings and seasonings. Breakfast just got a whole lot better with Harvest&#39;s &quot;good taste of the West!&quot;</p><p>But, if your go-to breakfast is simple cold cereal, that&#39;s cool. We&#39;ve got you covered. <em><strong>General Mills Cinnamon Cheerios Oat Crunch</strong></em> are Multigrain Cheerios topped with whole grain oats and real cinnamon. One bowl has more than half of your daily recommended whole grains and there are five types of whole grains to boot including oats, sorghum and millet. It&#39;s a quick and easy,&nbsp;hearty and nutritious breakfast with a good source of fibre.</p><p>Another whole grain food item, albeit one designed to satisfy your snacking, is <em><strong>Nature Valley Crispy Creamy Wafer Bars</strong></em>! Choose from <em><strong>Peanut Butter</strong></em> or the obviously better combination of <em><strong>Peanut Butter Chocolate</strong></em>. Light and crispy whole grain wafers are coated in peanut butter and topped with crunchy granola (as well as chocolate if you bought the chocolate covered one which you should have and if you didn&#39;t then make sure you get it next time).&nbsp;</p><p>Whole grains seems to be trending in this newsletter so let&#39;s keep it rolling along by mentioning that we have a new item that is also in our advertised specials this week! <em><strong>Lundberg Organic Mini Rice Cakes</strong></em> are a light, bite-sized treat made with the goodness or organic brown rice. They&#39;re crafted to be thin, lightly crunchy but heavy on flavour. And since they&#39;re made with rice, it goes without saying that they&#39;re gluten-free but we&#39;ll say it anyway. These crisps are certified gluten-free! Right now we have <em><strong>White Cheddar, Sea Salt </strong></em>and <em><strong>Apple Pie</strong></em> flavours to choose from and they&#39;re <em><strong>ad-priced this week at $3.76 each</strong></em>!</p><p>I don&#39;t know about you but all this talk of delicious food is making me thirsty. If you also could use a new drink in your fridge then pick up <em><strong>Perrier Blackberry Carbonated Natural Spring Water Slim Cans</strong></em>! This premium sparkling water sets itself apart from its competitors because its water is naturally carbonated. And with zero calories, zero sweeteners and all natural blackberry flavour, we have it just in time for spring!</p><p>One last thing...The Little Jam Stand has concocted a &quot;Ham Gravy&quot; that will be available in time for Easter. It&#39;s another of her incredible items exclusive to Pepper&#39;s. It&#39;s kind of like a honey mustard glaze but it looks like gravy and it&#39;s for serving with ham. Problem is, there&#39;s no real name for it yet. That&#39;s where you come in. Reply to this email with a suggestion for the product name and the one whose name is chosen will win themselves a free jar! The name and more details of this item will follow in a future newsletter. Good luck!</p><p>From all of us here at Pepper&#39;s Foods we wish you a Happy Springtime and hope that you continue to take good care! Cheers!</p> Peppers Newsletter March 16, 2021 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/peppers-newsletter-march-16-2021/ Peppers Foods Tue, 16 Mar 2021 00:10:00 GMT <p>Good morning! There&#39;s been a whole lot of news and social media coverage lately about space travel. With NASA&#39;s Mars 2020 Perseverance Rover successfully touching down on the red planet (launched July 30, 2020 and landing Feb. 18, 2021) and the numerous SpaceX flights that have occurred recently, these are very exciting times! But noine of it would be possible without a fellow named Robert H. Goddard. This American physicist, professor, engineer and inventor imagined, created and built the world&#39;s very first liquid-fuelled rocket. And he launched it on today&#39;s date in 1926. It only flew 56 meters into the sky but it was a remarkable accomplishment which led many to dub him&nbsp;&quot;the man who ushered in the Space Age.&quot; This brilliant man patented 214 inventions, wrote several exemplary monographs regarding rocket science and because of these and other achievements, NASA had the Goddard Space Flight Center built named after him in 1959, 14 years after his death.</p><p>We have loads of new items to reveal this week so let&#39;s get down to business, shall we? Let&#39;s start off with another great local business based out of little old Victoria, BC! <em><strong>Moon Organics</strong></em> creates delicious and nutritious <em><strong>Superfood Powder Beverages</strong></em> containing ingredients from all around the world that are also used in Traditional Chinese Medicine and Ayurveda diets! Choose from a variety of types and flavours in containers ranging from 18-30 servings! We have <em><strong>Happy Dreams Creamy Hot Chocolate</strong></em> (raw cacao, lucuma, bacopa, lion&#39;s mane &amp; ashwagandha), <em><strong>Matcha Ritual </strong></em>(ceremonial matcha, lion&#39;s mane, MCT oil), <em><strong>Wake Cup Chai Chai Cha! </strong></em>(carob, chai mix, eleuthero, cordyceps, MCT oil &amp; lion&#39;s mane), <em><strong>Sunny Delight Soothing Golden Beverage</strong></em> (turmeric, banana, lucuma, shatavari, MCT oil &amp; reishi), and <em><strong>Mighty Berries </strong></em>(guava, maqui, acai, raspberrym, amla &amp; chaga). Head on over to their website to read all about these innovative and nutritious mixes, as well as to learn more about the owners and their story! <strong>www.moonorganics.ca</strong></p><p>Our <em><strong>Deli Department </strong></em>has added a bunch of new stuff this week, one of them being geared towards those on a paleo or keto diet. New <em><strong>Crepini Egg Wraps</strong></em> are made with, you guessed it, eggs but one of them is made with <em><strong>Cauliflower </strong></em>(no grains) and the other one <em><strong>Gluten-Free Grains</strong></em>! Neither contains any sugar, dairy or carbs and only 10 calories per wrap so if you have dietary restrictions these are the way to go!</p><p>And if you want a sweet treat that&#39;s 100% plant-based, sugar-free and also paleo and keto friendly, choose<em><strong> Sweets From the Earth Sugar-Free Cookies</strong></em> in either <em><strong>Peanut Butter</strong></em> or <em><strong>Chocolate Chip</strong></em> flavours! Each kind has only 1 gram of net carbs per cookie and absolutely no sugar, plus, they&#39;re certified gluten-free by the Canadian Celiac Association.</p><p>Most of us think of some kind of jerky if we&#39;ve got a hankering for some meat snacks, right? But now you can get <em><strong>Freybe</strong></em> (fry-bee) <em><strong>Snack Salami Slices</strong></em> in <em><strong>Chorizo, Classic</strong></em> and <em><strong>Italian Wine</strong></em> when you want some meat to go! They&#39;re gluten-free, lactose-free and 100% pork! Toss one in your lunch kit or reach for one for your mid-afternoon snack to get you through until dinner. So good!</p><p>Could real, authentic bagels taste any better? The answer is...YES! By adding some <em><strong>Epicureal Everything Bagel Seasoning</strong></em> you&#39;re adding a blend of crunchy, nutty and salty flavours to your already delicious bagel! This product of Canada contains sesame seeds, sea salt, onion powder, poppy seeds and garlic and you can find it in aisle 3 with the other seasonings and spices!</p><p>In 1962 in the Okanagan, Mr. Ted Atkinson founded <em><strong>Summerland Sweets</strong></em>, a company which specializes in fruit flavoured syrups and jellies! Pepper&#39;s already carries several of the syrups and now we have another sweetly satisfying one for your breakfast table: <em><strong>Maplapple Syrup</strong></em>! It&#39;s an apple-flavoured syrup that goes perfectly on your pancakes, waffles, french toast, crepes, ice cream cheesecake or plain yogurt!</p><p>Let&#39;s move on to some dairy products. We&#39;ve been expanding our lactose-free choices steadily over the past few years as the demand steadily rises. So we&#39;re very happy to now offer <em><strong>Tre Stelle Lactose-Free&nbsp; Traditional Feta</strong></em>! it&#39;s the same taste and texture as their regular traditional feta but without the lactose! Woo-hoo! This is so new, it&#39;s not even on their website! But if it&#39;s anything like their other multi-award-winning feta cheeses, it&#39;s sure to make your salads, pizzas and Greek dishes extraordinary!</p><p><em><strong>Olympic Dairy Organic Vanilla Greek Yogurt </strong></em>contains real vanilla beans and milk from grass-fed cows. It&#39;s 100% all natural. There&#39;s not much more to say about it, really. We know that Olympic makes great tasting yogurt so if you&#39;re in the market for organic greek yogurt, here&#39;s our newest offering.</p><p>Cam, our Produce Manager, just loves adding new items to his inventory! Whether it&#39;s Mangosteen Fruit, Mini Bananas, Cotton Candy Grapes or something savoury like&nbsp;<em><strong>Save Da Sea Foods Vegan Smoked Salmon</strong></em> or&nbsp;<em><strong>Very Good Butcher Very Good Dogs</strong></em>, he likes to &quot;keep it real&quot; so to speak. Our customers appreciate a varied selection instead of him just offering the same old stuff. So keep an eye oput for things like <em><strong>Pluots</strong></em> (a tangy cross between a plum and an apricot. I&#39;m not sure if I prefer that or Apriplum.) or<em><strong> Starfruit </strong></em>(aka the Carambola which is a sweet and sour fruit from Southeast Asia).</p><p>Easter is coming up quickly and if you look around the front of the store, you&#39;ll see that we are starting to get in some goodies for this holiday. But you don&#39;t have to wait until Easter to indulge just a little bit right now. That&#39;s why you should pick up some<em><strong> Christie Chips Ahoy! with Cadbury Mini Eggs Cookies</strong></em>! This is a family-sized bag because they know all who partake will quickly deplete the contents! Seriously, Chips Ahoy! plus chocolate eggs = off-the-hook amazing taste! Get some now before they&#39;re gone!</p><p>As if March is halfway over already! It&#39;s kind of crazy just how quickly the time goes by. So make good use of yours by reading the attached weekly advertised specials and either place your order online or by a good old fashioned telephone call. Of course, you could always come down to the store and check things out for yourself. We love seeing our customers in person. So as Ron Burgundy and Veronica Corningstone would say, &quot;Stay classy.&quot; and &quot;Thanks for stopping by.&quot; (Oh, and take good care!)</p><p>Pepper&#39;s Foods</p> Peppers Newsletter March 9, 2021 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/peppers-newsletter-march-9-2021/ Peppers Foods Tue, 09 Mar 2021 00:10:00 GMT <p>Good morning! Did you ever play hide and seek outside as a kid and were the last one to be found? Sometimes you hid too well and just stayed put waiting and waiting to be discovered but whoever was &quot;it&quot; never came by. Well on today&#39;s date in 1974, something similar happened except that the person was a Japanese soldier who, for almost 30&nbsp;years after the war in the Pacific ended, refused to believe that the Second World War was over!&nbsp;Hiroo Onoda and three other soldiers waged their own guerilla war on Lubang Island, refusing to believe that the war was over because there was no way that Japan could ever have surrendered. They believed that the leaflets being dropped in the mountains stating that the war had indeed ended on August 15, 1945 were lies told by the enemy. Over time, due to various factors, Onoda&#39;s fellow soldiers were either killed or surrendered, and it wasn&#39;t until his former commanding officer, by then a bookseller, was brought into the mountains to talk to him that he finally surrendered.&nbsp;Onoda died of heart failure in 2014 at a hospital in Tokyo at the age of 91.</p><p>Let&#39;s start things off this week with three new flavours of a new type of Que Pasa chip! <em><strong>Que Pasa Organic Grain Free Tortilla Chips</strong></em> are made with cassava flour, a gluten-free, grain-free (obviously) and nut-free flour made from the cassava plant root. It&#39;s suitable for paleo diets and just like their regular tortilla chips, is crunchy and delicious but with a nutty flavour with a hint of sweetness. We have <em><strong>Sea Salt, Nacho</strong></em> and <em><strong>Squeeze of Lime</strong></em> flavours for you to try!</p><p>Authentic Mexican cuisine is what <em><strong>Adriana&#39;s The Whole Enchilada</strong></em> is all about. So she went ahead and made a <em><strong>Cookbook</strong></em> to share her incredible and most popular recipes from their deli with the people who love her products, many of which we already sell at the store. Head on over to our <em><strong>Deli Department</strong></em> and ask for a copy of this cookbook which will quickly become your go-to kitchen reference for Mexican!</p><p>Last week we posted an organic coconut whipping cream as well as a full fat coconut cream by Cha&#39;s Organics. This week, we have a few other new items from them! <em><strong>Cha&#39;s Organics</strong></em> brings the flavours of Thailand to your dinner table with <em><strong>Thai Red Curry</strong></em> (two out of three chilis on their heat scale) as well as a hotter <em><strong>Thai Green Curry</strong></em>. Both are curry pastes with dried herbs that makes 4-6 servings per package in about 20 minutes! here&#39;s what you do:</p><p>1. Heat 2 Tbsp of cooking oil on medium heat, stir in contents of curry paste and herb pouches and saut&eacute; 1 minute.</p><p>2. Add 2 to 3 cups of vegetables and protein of your choice then saut&eacute; 5 minutes</p><p>3. Add 1 can (400 mL) of&nbsp;Cha&#39;s Organics Premium Coconut Milk&nbsp;with &frac12; cup of water and simmer 10 minutes or until all ingredients are well cooked.&nbsp;</p><p>4. Season to taste with salt and your choice of sweetener then serve over rice and garnish with lime and fresh Thai basil.</p><p>Ta da! As well, you can get a pouch of <em><strong>Cha&#39;s Organics Tom Yum Soup</strong></em> (a type of hot and sour soup) which is also a paste with dried herbs. Usually the protein added to this fragrant soup is prawns, but it can be whatever you like!</p><p>For a super quick and easy side dish tonight, give <em><strong>The Little Potato Company Microwave Ready Creamer Potatoes</strong></em> a go! In five minutes you can have fresh creamer potatoes (mix of red and yellow) cooked and seasoned with either <em><strong>Savoury Herb</strong></em>, <em><strong>Lemon Garlic &amp; Herb</strong></em> or <em><strong>Garlic Parsley</strong></em> on the table!&nbsp;</p><p>For the first time ever, Canadians on a keto diet can now enjoy ice cream made with real cream and zero grams of sugar! That&#39;s right, you can purchase a creamy pint of delicious ice cream with a great selection of flavours that contains only natural sweeteners that won&#39;t spike your blood sugar (erythritol, monk fruit, and xylitol). Fun fact: dogs cannot tolerate xylitol so no sharing! <em><strong>Enlightened Keto Ice Cream</strong></em> is now in Aisle 5 and currently Pepper&#39;s has <em><strong>Mint Chocolate</strong></em>, <em><strong>Caramel Fudge</strong></em>, <em><strong>Coffee Chip</strong></em> as well as <em><strong>Vanilla Bean</strong></em>!</p><p>Shoppers love the taste of <em><strong>French&#39;s Fried Onion Crunchy Toppers</strong></em>! Casseroles, potatoes, burgers and salads are just a few of the dishes that can be enhanced with some BIG TIME flavour with these little beauties! And now you can mix things up with new French&#39;s Dill Pickle Crunchy Toppers! Made with real cucumbers, you can add flavour and extra crunch to salads, sandwiches, burgers, hotdogs or whatever you want! Look for them in Aisle 2.</p><p>If sensitive skin bothers you then this new and affordable detergent should help out on laundry day! <em><strong>Arm &amp; Hammer Sensitive Skin Laundry Detergent 2.03L</strong></em> is skin friendly with a hypoallergenic fresh scent that&#39;s suitable for all types of washing machines. It&#39;s gentle on skin but tough on stains. It&#39;s also gentle on your wallet because this week, you can find it in our <em><strong>Weekly Advertised Specials</strong></em> for the awesome price of <em><strong>$4.96 a bottle</strong></em>!</p><p>And finally, if you&#39;re not gluten-friendly but you love cookies, it&#39;s your lucky day. it&#39;s an extra lucky day, actually, because now you can indulge in the sweet decadence of<em><strong> Oreo Gluten-Free Cookies!</strong></em> Finally, the same Oreo cookie that you remember is now available sans gluten so you can glutton-out on these bad boys all day long!&nbsp;By the way, they&#39;ve already sold out once in the few days since they hit the shelf. But we&#39;ve ordered extra to ensure that we have some on hand when you order a bag (or three)!</p><p>Thanks for tuning again this week! We love bringing you this newsletter and many of you will often say how much you appreciate it or enjoy it. And that&#39;s very much appreciated by us because it&#39;s all done on one person&#39;s own time every week with the hopes that it not only informs you of new things to purchase, but that it brings some kind of small pleasure to our shoppers on Tuesday mornings. Thank you so much for your continued support during this nagging pandemic. We love our customers and we want you to know it! Have a great week and until next Tuesday, take good care!</p><p>Pepper&#39;s Foods</p><p>&nbsp;</p> Peppers Newsletter March 2, 2021 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/peppers-newsletter-march-2-2021/ Peppers Foods Tue, 02 Mar 2021 00:10:00 GMT <p>Good morning! Today, the hills are alive with the sound of music! Well, they were in 1965 when the musical film <u>The Sound of Music</u> premiered. It was based on the Austrian von Trapp family and was actually an adaptation of the 1959 stage musical of the same name. Rodgers and Hammerstein composed and wrote the lyrics and it won a plethora of awards including Best Picture&nbsp;Academy Award as well as Best Picture Golden Globe. it also won for Oscars for Best Director, Best Original Score and one of its stars, the fetching&nbsp;Julie Andrews who played Maria, won Best Actress. A dashing Arthur Christopher Orme Plummer played Captain von Trapp.&nbsp;Plummer, who recently died in February, was an acclaimed stage and screen actor for over 70 years. Born in Toronto, he became a member of the Stratford Acting Company (located in Stratford, ON, this writer&#39;s hometown) in 1956 playing Henry V and would spend 11 seasons there between 1956 and 2012. I had the great pleasure of meeting him on several occasions and feel so fortunate to have done so. His character in <u>The Sound of Music </u>remains one of his most iconic and memorable roles.</p><p>Alright we have lots to talk about today so here we go! new from Libert&eacute;/Yoplait is <em><strong>Libert&eacute; 0% Lactose Free Greek Yogurt 4x100g Multipack.</strong></em> High in protein, this delicious yogurt is available in <em><strong>Strawberry Rhubarb</strong></em> as well as <em><strong>Raspberry</strong></em> flavours! And sometimes there&#39;s good reason to keep things simple.Less can go wrong! With<em><strong> Yoplait Simply 3 Yogurt </strong></em>there&#39;s only yogurt, real fruit and cane sugar. That&#39;s it. And with 3X more fruit the<em><strong> Tropical </strong></em>and<em><strong> Raspberry</strong></em> flavours are extra intense and yummy!</p><p>We&#39;re really excited about this next item! <em><strong>Cha&#39;s Organics Organic Coconut Whipping Cream</strong></em> is going to be your new favourite item! It&#39;s sp easy to use: just refrigerate for 2-4 hours, plunk into a bowl and ,ix with an electric mixer! It will not droop, melt or separate and it makes an ideal frosting for cupcakes or cakes! You can add any sweetener or flavour of your choice, too! And while you&#39;re enjoying this whipping cream made from organic coconuts harvested from regenerative organic orchards in Sri Lanka and sourced on fair trade terms, you can rest easy knowing that 1% of the sale of your purchase goes directly towards help solving the human-elephant conflict in Sri Lanka (there are elephants on the label).</p><p>And if it&#39;s&nbsp;organic coconut cream you&#39;re after, try <em><strong>Cha&#39;s Organic</strong></em>s! Their <em><strong>Full Cream Organic Coconut Cream</strong></em> is the perfect dairy-free choice for your sauces, soups and stews!</p><p><em><strong>Moong Pani Mung Bean Soup-Tea</strong></em>. Ever heard of it? We hadn&#39;t either until last week but this Indian style food is made from plant protein rich mung beans. But is it a soup or a tea? It&#39;s both! As per the company website:&nbsp;<em>Moong Pani truly comforts like a tea and nourishes like a soup. We&#39;ve transformed mung beans&nbsp;into an instant mix with aromatic herbs and spices for a delicious sippable snack. Just add hot water. No fuss. No cooking (we&#39;ve done that for you!).</em></p><p><em>? Good source of fibre, and easy-to-digest protein that aids digestive health</em></p><p><em>? Turmeric, black pepper, ginger and spices for healthy deliciousness</em></p><p><em>? Contains leptin, a natural appetite suppressant that reduces food cravings</em></p><p><em>? All natural&nbsp;&ndash; no hydrogenated oils,&nbsp; artificial flavours, colours, preservatives, sulphites, maltodextrin or MSG</em></p><p><em>Moong Pani embodies the principles of Ayurveda to balance</em> the vital energies of body and mind, and to live in harmony with nature&#39;s seasons.</p><p>These are wonderful for those wet and chilly days when you don&#39;t feel like making anything difficult! Or anytime, really! Available from Pepper&#39;s in <em><strong>Ginger, Lemon and Cilantro;&nbsp;Roasted Garlic, Black Pepper and Turmeric; Resfreshing Mint and Lime</strong></em> as well as <em><strong>Spicy Chili Pepper</strong></em>!&nbsp;</p><p>If you&#39;re feeling like a little bit more of a traditional pick me up then check out what <em><strong>Discovery Coffee</strong></em> has in store for you! This Victoria business is excellent at sourcing, roasting and brewing uber satisfyingly tasty coffee. With over five locations in greater Victoria, chances are if you&#39;re a local, you&#39;ve visited one of their shops.Pepper&#39;s has a bunch of varieties for you to choose from to brew at home including <em><strong>Single Origin Ethiopian, Florestra, Kenyan&nbsp;</strong></em>and more!&nbsp;</p><p>For thousands of years, people have been shredding cabbage and fermenting it. You know why? Because it&#39;s awesome! Sauerkraut is truly a superfood chock full of vitamins, minerals and probiotics. except when it&#39;s in a can or jar not refrigerated. That means it&#39;s pasteurized and all those beneficial bacteria are kaput. So if you&#39;re looking for incredible, raw and best of all local (Duncan, BC) <em><strong>Thorst&euml;n&#39;s Authentic Foods Sauerkraut</strong></em> is here for you! We have it in three varieties: <strong><em>Classic, Kraut Kraut</em>&nbsp;</strong>(Honey Ginger) and <em><strong>Hearty Kraut </strong></em>(Smokey Bacon &amp; Herbs). It&#39;s raw, vegan and gluten-free and FULL of all the probiotics that lactic acid-fermented foods bring! Look for it in our Produce section!</p><p>If we told you there was&nbsp;a magical fruit from the tropics&nbsp;(Southeast Asia) tasting of lychee, peach, strawberry and pineapple, would you believe us? Well, there is one such fruit whose&nbsp;nickname is the &quot;queen of fruits.&quot; It&#39;s said that Queen Elizabeth, in the 1890&#39;s, would grant anyone knighthood who brought her one unspoiled. It&#39;s the <em><strong>Mangosteen</strong></em> fruit, whose royal purple exterior yields to a snowy white and soft flesh with a juicy and delicate texture. It&#39;s a sweet and tart-type of flavour that&#39;s slightly acidic. And now you, too, can enjoy this exquisite fresh fruit that explorers and royalty alike have enjoyed for centuries. All you have to do is go to our outdoor produce section and look by the avocados.&nbsp;</p><p><em><strong>Lesley Stowe </strong></em>hasn&#39;t expanded her line of <em><strong>Raincoast Crisps</strong></em> for quite some time but recently she added <em><strong>Wild Blueberry and Almond with Chia and Pumpkin Seeds</strong></em>! Eat them straight out of the box or pair them with burrata, fresh chevre or sharp cheddar cheeses and as for charcuterie, try genoa salami, prosciutto or smoked salmon.</p><p>Lastly, for convenient sanitation on the go, try <em><strong>Clorox Disinfecting Wipes</strong></em> available in either a 15 or 30 pack. Kill 99.99% of viruses and bacteria with these <em><strong>Fresh Meadow</strong></em> scented wipes that fit perfectly in a purse or bag!</p><p>Ok gang, that&#39;s all for this week. Spring is officially only three weeks away (woo hoo!). Please make sure to check out the attached weekly specials and until next week, as always, our wish for you is to take good care!</p><p>Pepper&#39;s Foods</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p> Peppers Newsletter February 23, 2021 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/peppers-newsletter-february-23-2021/ Peppers Foods Tue, 23 Feb 2021 00:10:00 GMT <p>Good morning! Most people are aware of Orville and Wilbur Wright, the brothers who invented, built and flew the world&#39;s first motorized airplane. They did it near Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, on December 17,&nbsp;1903. But did you know that on February 23, 1909, the first powered heavier-than-air (non-dirigible craft) flight occurred on the ice of Bras D&#39;or Lake at Baddeck Nova Scotia? The pilot was John Alexander Douglas McCurdy and the aircraft was the&nbsp;AEA (Aerial Experiment Association)&nbsp;Silver Dart. The flight was of a distance of less than one kilometer. McCurdy was one of the craft&#39;s designers and the AEA was founded under the guidance of Dr. Alexander Graham Bell through a joint US/Canadian venture. Dart-like this plane was not, as per the description taken from Wikipedia:&nbsp;<em>The frame and structure of the&nbsp;Silver Dart&nbsp;were made of steel tube,&nbsp;bamboo,&nbsp;friction tape, wire and wood. The wings were covered with rubberized, silvery balloon cloth provided by Capt. Thomas Scott Baldwin of Hammondsport; hence the name the &quot;Silver Dart&quot;. Its Kirkham engine, supplied by&nbsp;Glenn Curtiss, was a reliable&nbsp;V-8&nbsp;that developed 50 horsepower (37&nbsp;kW) at 1,000 rpm. The&nbsp;propeller&nbsp;was carved from a solid block of wood. The aircraft had what is now called a&nbsp;canard&nbsp;or an &quot;elevator in front&quot; design. Like most aircraft of its day the&nbsp;Silver Dart&nbsp;had poor control characteristics; likewise, it had no&nbsp;brakes</em>.</p><p>Ok, so let&#39;s get into the newsletter with everybody&#39;s favourite subject matter: new stuff to eat! First on the list is a wonderful <em><strong>Salmon Wellington</strong></em> now available from our Meat Department! Sockeye salmon is wrapped along with spinach, parmesan cheese and some other good stuff, in puff pastry which bakes up light and flaky. It&#39;s super easy to make and super delicious!</p><p><em><strong>Miss Vickie&#39;s Potato Chips </strong></em>are some of the best around, and have been since the&nbsp;company started in 1987. They use tasty Canadian potatoes cooked in oil for that kettle cooked taste and they come in a great variety of flavours. That&#39;s why we&#39;re excited to introduce their newest flavour: <em><strong>Spicy Dill Pickle</strong></em>! It&#39;s like a cross between Miss Vickie&#39;s Jalapeno Chips with a Lay&#39;s Dill Pickle Chip! Unbelievable! You&#39;re going to go nuts for these so drop everything and get down here so that you can immediately spice up your snacking!</p><p>Speaking of spicing things up, how about doing it to your BBQ meals as well? With <em><strong>Newman&#39;s Own Most Wanted Original BBQ Sauce</strong></em>, the not-for-profit made sauce that doesn&#39;t contain high fructose corn syrup, gluten, preservatives, artificial colours or flavours.&nbsp;However, it <em>does</em> contain a mighty whollop of great flavour. The Verdict&#39;s in: Frank Galvin would have approved and so will you!</p><p>Thgis next product comes to us from Pender Island which further expands our excellent lineup of locally made goods. <em><strong>El Faro Gluten Free Flour Artisan Blend</strong></em> is just that- a perfect blend of&nbsp;Brown Rice Flour, White Rice Flour, Tapioca Starch, Potato Starch,&nbsp;Sorghum Flour, Sweet Rice Flour, Arrowroot Starch and Xanthan Gum. Actually, that&#39;s the entire ingredients list! Use it for all of your gluten-free and vegan baking!</p><p><em><strong>Quaker Oatmeal Cookie Mix </strong></em>is the perfect way to make easy, home-made cookies in 9-14&nbsp;minutes! Your home will be filled with the aroma of freshly baking cookies and afterwards, your belly will be full of those freshly baked cookies! And since each package makes 60 cookies, if you have a large family, that&#39;s a lot of full bellies!</p><p>If you&#39;d prefer to purchase your baked goods already made, the choice should be to make it something from <em><strong>The Dutch Bakery &amp; Diner</strong></em>.&nbsp;Again, we&#39;ve had to add more of their stellar products to our inventory because what they make is some of the&nbsp;tastiest sweets in these parts! <em><strong>Dutch Bakery &amp; Diner Peanut Butter Cups</strong></em> and <em><strong>Kahlua Cups</strong></em> are full of rich and creamy peanut butter as well as delicious chocolate and kahlua! Waaaaay better than any&nbsp;mass produced peanut butter cups. We also carry their <em><strong>Flying Saucer Cookies</strong></em> as well as decadent<em><strong> Almond Bread</strong></em> (filled with almond paste). This stuff sells quickly but don&#39;t worry, we&#39;ll have more soon if we sell out!</p><p>Mayflower Foods is a mid-sized, family run bakery located in Central Saanich. They pride themselves on providing the locals with real, hand-made foods that taste incredible. And they&#39;re succeeding! Mayflower Foods Ukee Vegan Dessert Bars are located in our Deli Department&#39;s cold case near the front entrance. They&#39;re so new that we don&#39;t have any info on them except that they&#39;re a sweet, vegan dessert bar reminiscent of a Nanaimo bar with a chocolate and sliced almond&nbsp;topping. You&#39;re simply going to have to try it for yourself!</p><p>And if you need some kind of beverage to go along with your snacking, how about <em><strong>Silk Unsweetened Coconut</strong></em>? It&#39;s the non-dairy beverage that&#39;s high in calcium and is an excellent source of vitamins A, E and B12. Plus, it has only 45 calories per serving. Try this &quot;temptingly tropical&quot; treat today!</p><p>Next week we will be into March, can you believe that? Let&#39;s see if it comes in like a lamb or a lion. Until then, treat the people you come in contact with like lambs because there are already enough lions and take good care!</p><p>Pepper&#39;s Foods</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p> Peppers Newsletter February 16, 2021 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/peppers-newsletter-february-16-2021/ Peppers Foods Tue, 16 Feb 2021 00:10:00 GMT <p>Good morning!&nbsp; Say, you know who had a good morning on today&#39;s date in 1923?&nbsp;English archaeologist&nbsp;Howard Carter had a very good morning then because it&#39;s when he discovered the final resting place of the teenaged Egyptian King Tutankhamen. after five years of unsuccessful attempts to locate it. After 3000 years, the solid gold casket of King Tut, who lived around 1400 B.C. was discovered in the last of four chambers unearthed that day in Thebes, Egypt. Thousands of other artifacts and relics such as golden shrines, jewellery, a chariot, weapons and clothing were found, but it was ther perfectly preserved mummy of King Tut, the first that had ever been discovered, that was the most valuable find. Today, the permanent home of the&nbsp;&ldquo;Treasures of Tutankhamen&quot; exhibit is the Egyptian Museum in Cairo.</p><p>Here&#39;s hoping that everyone stayed safe and sound throughout this weekend&#39;s stormy days and that your Valentine&#39;s Day and Family Day long weekend was&nbsp;otherwise thoroughly enjoyable! We have some beaty items to tell you about this week so let&#39;s get started!</p><p>Fresh juices are chock-a-block full of vitamins, minerals and other nutrients, especially if they&#39;ve been created using cold pressing. That&#39;s when intense pressure is used to squeeze the living daylights out of the fruit, as opposed to using spinning metal blades to chop and extract&nbsp;which creates heat and introduces air (causing oxidation and thus, reduces vitamins and enzymes). So if you&#39;re looking for some excellent, locally made (Vancouver) cold pressed juices, look no further than our own Produce Department! <em><strong>Chaser&#39;s 100%&nbsp; Cold Pressed Juices </strong></em>(500 ml) has grown from a small stand in Yaletown to one of Vancouver&#39;s largest producers of fresh juices! And with varieties such as<em><strong> Alkaline Me, Supremely Kale, Cold K, Taking Car of Business, Beet Rejuvination, Turmeric Sunrise</strong></em> and<em><strong> Tropical Greens</strong></em> it&#39;s easy to see why! We also have an assortment of 1L bottles of their<em><strong> Apple Cider, Cranberry Cider,&nbsp;Lemonades</strong></em> and other kinds!</p><p>Ever since<em><strong> Bubly Sparkling Water</strong></em> made its way onto the scene it&#39;s helped to explode the popularity of flavoured sparkling waters containing no sugars or calories (it doesn&#39;t hurt that crooner Michael Bubl&eacute; endorses the product). As if the selection of flavours wasn&#39;t already extensive (blackberry, cherry, orange, strawberry, grapefruit, to name but a few) now they&#39;ve added new <em><strong>Pineapple</strong></em> as well as <em><strong>Peach</strong></em> flavours! Enjoy some flavours of summertime right now and fend off the February blahs!</p><p><em><strong>Stubborn Chef </strong></em>is the Victoria BC business responsible for bringing you their incredible Ginger Sauce as well as numerous other captivating culinary creations! Another new item in our Produce Department is <em><strong>Stubborn Chef Spicy Pickled Daikon</strong></em>, the mild, Japanese radish high in potassium and vitamin C.&nbsp;It&#39;s been said that steaming hot white rice with&nbsp;pickled daikon&nbsp;is like the bread and butter of Japanese&nbsp;food. Give it a shot and see for yourself!</p><p>If you need a little somethin&#39; somethin&#39; to spice up your Asian cooking a bit more then try <em><strong>A Taste of Thai Roasted Red Chili Paste</strong></em>, &quot;<em>a&nbsp;concentrated blend of red chilies and Thai spices, combined for a spicy flavour. Use as a stir-fry seasoning, a soup base, or as a condiment for noodles or chicken. Add a teaspoon to your favourite marinades for a bit of spiciness</em>.&quot;</p><p><em><strong>Avalon Dairy</strong></em> has been a local tradition since 1906. It says so right on the product. And with their new <em><strong>Triple Cream Honey Yogurt</strong></em>, they&#39;re helping to ensure&nbsp;that they stay in business for over another 100 years! This yogurt is 100% natural and probiotic. It&#39;s a&nbsp;balkan style yogurt and it&#39;s keto friendly while&nbsp;the 9% milk fat content makes for a rich and creamy treat!&nbsp;</p><p>If you want the absolute ultimate rich and creamy treat, though, you&#39;re going to have to head over to the other side of the store to the frozen food section.&nbsp;There you will discover two of the greatest frozen ice cream bars EVER created, especially if you&#39;re a fan of chocolate (and a lot of you are!). <em><strong>Magnum Infinity Chocolate </strong></em>is a combination of dark chocolate ice cream with a chocolate swirl dipped in dark chocolate and cocoa bean nibs. The Belgian unsweetened chocolate is out of this world so, as Buzz Lightyear would say, &quot;To infinity and beyond!&quot; You can also choose new <em><strong>Magnum Mini Dark</strong></em>, the vanilla ice cream bars dipped in dark, unsweetened Belgian chocolate. They&#39;re smaller (you get 4x55 ml bars so you&#39;ll feel better about eating one because they&#39;re smaller but you&#39;ll only end up eating them all because they&#39;re just like potato chips and impossible to stop with just one).</p><p>Breakfast just got a little bit better because <em><strong>Kellogg&#39;s</strong></em> has introduced <em><strong>Vector Maple Crunch</strong></em>, the high-protein breakfast cereal with 11 vitamins and minerals sweetened with natural maple syrup. Tastes great in a bowl with milk or eaten as a snack all on its own!</p><p>But if a high-protein snack for busy folks is required then&nbsp;<em><strong>Rock Coast Vegan Protein Bars</strong></em> in <em><strong>Mint Chocolate </strong></em>(16g protein) or <em><strong>Peanut Butter Chocolate</strong></em> (17g protein) are the perfect choice. They&#39;re made with seven high quality organic plant-based proteins, without any artificial sweeteners, colours or flavours. They contain no pea protein, no sugar alcohols and no isomalto-oligosaccharidea (common sweetener used in protein bars). Plus they&#39;re gluten-free!</p><p>Thanks for tuning in again this week! Stay warm and dry out there and always remember to take good care!</p><p>Pepper&#39;s Foods</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p> Peppers Newsletter February 9, 2021 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/peppers-newsletter-february-9-2021/ Peppers Foods Tue, 09 Feb 2021 00:10:00 GMT <p>Good morning!&nbsp; For all you youngsters out there, today, in 1964, the Fab Four, the Liverpudlian Lads, George, John, Paul and Ringo otherwise known as The Beatles, made their first live appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show. Needless to say, it made for a &quot;really big shew&quot; as more than 73 million people tuned in to see the shaggy haired yet snappy-looking group. This marked the beginning of the British invasion and was a record-setting event for US televisionsurpassing the viewership&nbsp;of&nbsp;Elvis Presley&#39;s appearance on the variety show three years earlier. The setlist that night included &quot;All My Loving&quot;, &quot;Till There Was You&quot;, &quot;She Loves You&quot;, &quot;I Saw Her Standing There&quot; and &quot;I Want&nbsp; to Hold Your Hand.&quot;</p><p>There are a couple of things to mention before we get into the meat of the newsletter. Until February 12th, you can have the shopping fee waived if you&#39;re a first time user of our online store! Whether you&#39;re looking to have your order delivered or you&#39;d rather pick it up at the store, you can save a little bit extra. So if you haven&#39;t shopped online with us yet, now&#39;s the time!</p><p>We have&nbsp;an exciting contest on now as well!</p><p><u><strong>Enter to Win a Virtual Perogie Making Class</strong></u></p><p>Buy some <em><strong>Perogie Pinchers</strong></em> perogies &ndash; put your name and phone number on the back of your receipt and drop it in the entry box. One winner will be contacted in early March!</p><p>Invite your friends, neighbours and even your in-laws and get ready to roll up your sleeves, do a little pinching and have your very own Private Perogie Party! This is a perfect and&nbsp;unique idea for birthdays, anniversaries, team-building and much more!</p><p>100% gluten-free is what Victoria bakery <em><strong>Origin Bakery </strong></em>is all about. Whether you&#39;re looking for sweet cookies, chews and bars or delicious, savoury breads, buns and rolls Origin Bakery has it all. Their loaves contain no dough conditioners or preservatives and freeze great!&nbsp;</p><p>get your cheese and crackers all-in-one with two new <em><strong>Cheez-It Baked Snack Crackers</strong></em>! <em><strong>Cheez-It Italian Four Cheese Snack Crackers</strong></em> contain four types of 100% real cheese baked right in! Or choose <em><strong>Cheez-It Crunch Original Cheddar Baked Snack Crackers</strong></em>, the cracker with that extra satisfying crunch!</p><p>As long as we&#39;re talking about cheese, we may as well talk about cheese-like prodcts new to Pepper&#39;s. <em><strong>Daiya Mexican 4 Cheeze Flavoured Blend</strong></em> is the deliciously dairy-free cheese alternative made with chick peas! It contains a blend of cheddar, monterey jack, asadero and queso quesadilla flavoured shreds without the soy, dairy or gluten. Or you could pick up a pack of <em><strong>Daiya Smoked Gouda Flavoured Slices</strong></em>. Their website describes it like this:&nbsp;&nbsp;<em>Sharp yet sweet with just the right amount of smoked flavor, they&rsquo;re made with our new, improved recipe for even better taste, texture and melt. Pure plant-based perfection</em>.</p><p>How about a plant-based, dairy-free product that&#39;s spreadable on your favourite crackers or artisan bread? Boursin, renowned for their incredibly delicious soft cheese spreads, now has something just as good for the dairy-free consumer! <em><strong>Boursin Dairy Free Cheese Spread Alternative</strong></em> is made of a base of high-quality coconut oil infused&nbsp;with <em><strong>Garlic &amp; Herbs</strong></em>. It&#39;s a super smooth and creamy cheese-free spread that subs perfectly for regular Boursin!</p><p>Looking for an apple that you can bake with, cook with, juice or eat fresh? How about an all around versatile apple that&#39;s crisp and&nbsp;sweet yet tangy? Or an apple that&#39;s cellared in the fall until the new year in order to enrich the unique taste and texture? If so, may we suggest the most excellent <em><strong>Red Prince Apple</strong></em>? This Canadian-grown fruit is a cross between a Golden Delicious and Red Jonathan apple and the name comes from the grower who first discovered this NATURAL cross apple in a small town along the Dutch-German border: Mr. Princen. He was inspired by its rich, perfect deep red colour. It was originally transplanted to Canada in Thornbury,&nbsp;Ontario, situated along the shores of Georgian Bay.</p><p>Here&#39;s another very different type of fruit that makes the perfect cocktail or cheese tray garnish or&nbsp;dessert topping for a decadent dessert. <em><strong>Sable &amp; Rosenfeld Bourbon Tipsy Dark Reserve Cherries</strong></em> are, as the company website states:&nbsp;<em>Large, firm, blush variety of Oregon-grown Stardust&trade; cherries have been packed in our exclusive syrup spiked with Bourbon to create the &ldquo;Dark Reserve&rdquo;. </em>I don&#39;t know about you but I could probably polish off that jar all by itself. What more of an excuse do you need to really go overboard than a global pandemic?</p><p>Another way to get loopy is with new <em><strong>Kashi Organic Cocoa Loops </strong></em>or <em><strong>Kashi Organic Cinna Loops Cereals</strong></em>! Whether you choose the equally delicious chocolate or cinnamon flavour, you get: 25 grams of whole grains, 4 grams of protein and 3 grams of fibre per 40 gram serving of this certified organic and vegan breakfast treat!</p><p>It&#39;s been awhile since a Health &amp; Beauty product found its way into the newsletter but for all you lovely ladies out there, here are two just for you! If you&#39;ve ever used EOS Lip Balm, you know just how well these work to keep your lips soft and moisturized. Now you can have that same feeling when you shave with <em><strong>EOS Shea Better Shave Cream Vanilla Blis</strong></em>s which provides 24 hour moisture. It contains shea oil as well as shea butter and can be used wither wet or dry! The non-foaming formula contains vitamins C and E for an antioxidant packed ultra-smooth shave! Or check out <em><strong>EOS Pomegranite Raspberry Shave Cream</strong></em> which contains soothing aloe as well as shea butter for the same type of great shave that can be used on either wet or dry skin!</p><p>Perhaps we jinxed things last week by bragging about our balmy weather here on the island. The temperatures are forecast to drop over the next few days here so make sure you&#39;re prepared! Pepper&#39;s has kiln-dried kindling and firewood as well as firelogs to keep you warm when it gets chilly. So bundle up and stay warm and while you&#39;re at it, take good care!</p><p>Pepper&#39;s Foods</p> Peppers Newsletter February 2, 2021 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/peppers-newsletter-february-2-2021/ Peppers Foods Tue, 02 Feb 2021 00:05:00 GMT <p>Good morning! It&#39;s prognosticating day aka Groundhog Day and we&#39;re all waiting with baited breath to find out if Wiarton Willie or his other North American brethren will see their shadows or not! And while we&#39;re at it, has anybody figured out yet how much wood these critters can chuck? Groundhog Day, officially, goes way back to February 2, 1887, in&nbsp;Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania. Specificaly, Gobbler&#39;s Knob is the exact location&nbsp;where a fellow named Clymer Freas, a local newspaper editor, decided that his idea of a weather predicting giant squirrel (lovingly named Punxsutawney Phil) should emerge from his den and determine if another 6 more weeks of winter should occur by whether or not his sees his shadow. The tradition of a small animal predicting the length of winter, however, goes waaaay back to a pagen festival called Inbolc which morphed into a Christian tradition called Candlemas. Germans spun their own version whereby badgers and other small critters seeing their shadows signified an extended winter. Some of those Germans settled in Pennsylvania in the late 18th and early 19th centuries and that&#39;s where the custom comes from. Of course, those of us who live here in Lotus Land couldn&#39;t actually give a care about this custom because it&#39;s already almost 10 degrees and the cherry and plum blossoms are just about ready to explode. Sorry rest of Canada.</p><p>Ok, it&#39;s business time so to speak so let&#39;s get going on what&#39;s new at Pepper&#39;s! Valentine&#39;s Day is just around the corner so why not spread some of the love around by offering some amazing <em><strong>Heart Shaped Valentine Cookies by Cake&#39;s Etc</strong></em>.? These tasty sugar cookies are decorated in coloured chocolate and come in a six-pack gift bagtied with a red ribbon!&nbsp;</p><p>&quot;More cheese, please!&quot; was the sentence asked by one of our customers and Dora, our Deli Manager, responded by putting not one, not two but <em>three</em> types of them in her cooler! <em><strong>Haltwhistle Cheese Co.</strong></em> of Duncan, BC, produces numerous varieties of cheese and the cows&#39;&nbsp;milk types brought in are definitely going to please all those cheese-lovers out there! As taken from the company website:</p><p><em><strong>Thombury</strong></em> -&nbsp;<em>is the cows&#39; milk counterpart of our signature Tomme de Vall&eacute;e.&nbsp; This traditional French Alpine cheese is full of rich and earthy flavour.</em></p><p><em><strong>Tadwick</strong></em> -<em>&nbsp;is our traditional English cheddar.&nbsp; This cheese is sweet and sharp with a melt in your mouth texture.</em></p><p><em><strong>Nailsea</strong></em> - <em>is a mild Gouda with a pleasantly smooth texture.&nbsp; This buttery and velvety cheese has a fresh and light flavour, making it adaptable to many uses.</em></p><p>You just can&#39;t beat the one-two combo of cheese and crackers. And bonus if both of them are local! So pick up a box of <em><strong>Jenny Marie&#39;s Cracker Company Turmeric &amp; Pepper Crackers </strong></em>when you pick out your new favourite cheese from <em><strong>Haltwhistle</strong></em> (they&#39;re within five feet of each other). The earthy flavour of turmeric combined with the subtle spiciness of black pepper creates a most excellent profile that pairs with just about anything. They&#39;re hand-made and baked fresh right here in Victoria, BC!</p><p>You know, it&#39;s imperative to have something to drink when you&#39;re eating cheese and crackers. Wine is often the go-to beverage of choice. But if you&#39;re a beer drinker just embarking on your Dry February journey, you can still enjoy a nice cold one! How&#39;s that? <em><strong>Partake Brewing Non-Alcoholic Beer</strong></em> is a Canadian brewed craft beer that not only contains no alcohol (well, almost no alcohol at 0.3%. That&#39;s about the same amount as a normal sized glass of orange juice) but has only 10-30 calories and as low as zero carbs per can! It&#39;s won World&#39;s Best in the non-alcoholic category at the World Beer Awards, too! Choose from <em><strong>Blonde, IPA </strong></em>or <em><strong>Pale</strong></em> brews and feel free to mosey over to their website for in-depth descriptions of each of these truly delicious suds:&nbsp;<strong>https://drinkpartake.ca</strong></p><p>There are just so many great foods that pair well with a cold beer and often it comes in the form of wings, burgers, chicken, pork and so on and so forth. But how great does this sound to go along with them? <em><strong>Frank&#39;s RedHot Thick Sauce</strong></em> comes in <em><strong>Original, Buffalo Ranch</strong></em> and <em><strong>Buffalo BBQ </strong></em>and makes the perfect coating for your wings, an excellent dip for veggies or a super sauce for pulled pork or shredded chicken on a bun!&nbsp;Seriously, if you&#39;re a fan of Franks RedHot Sauce you&#39;ll already know that you&nbsp;can literally &quot;put that $#!t on everything!&quot; and make it taste even better!</p><p>How about a fun and healthy side-kick to the awesome kick-butt meal you just created with Frank&#39;s RedHot? Easy! <em><strong>Cal-Organic Rainbow Carrot Chips</strong></em> are great for snacking or dipping and have been washed, peeled and cut so they&#39;re ready to eat straight outta the bag!</p><p>Meat pies are very popular this time of year so when we got wind of Duncan&#39;s <em><strong>Little Zimbabwe Farm</strong></em> (Vancouver Island&#39;s happiest place!)&nbsp;<em><strong>Pies</strong></em>, we didn&#39;t hesitate to get them in our Frozen Foods section! Available in <em><strong>Beef Baby</strong></em> (beef and vegetable medley) and <em><strong>Cha Cha Chicken</strong></em> (chicken and vegetable medley) there&#39;s also a&nbsp;<em><strong>Veggie-licious</strong></em> (garden vegetable medley) option for those of you who don&#39;t want the meat! Hand crafted and locally produced in the Cowichan Valley, they&#39;re fully baked and ready to eat. Cook on the middle rack of the oven at 350 degrees and you&#39;re good-to-go in 15 minutes!</p><p>If you&#39;re already heating the oven up you might consider tossing in some <em><strong>Gardein Meat-Free Seven Grain Crispy Tenders</strong></em>, too! These certified vegan tenders are also kosher and dairy-free and are quick and easy to prepare in 10 minutes! Your meatless Mondays will never be the same again!</p><p>Have yourselves a great day and until next week stay safe and take good care!</p><p>Pepper&#39;s Foods</p><p>&nbsp;</p> Pepper's Newsletter January 26, 2021 https://www.peppers-foods.com/inside-peppers/peppers-newsletter-january-26-2021/ Peppers Foods Mon, 25 Jan 2021 00:05:00 GMT <p>Good morning!&nbsp; On today&#39;s date in 1924, American Charles Jewtraw became the first person ever to win a Winter Olympics medal, taking the gold in&nbsp;500m speed skating, the first event of what the International Olympic Committee called &quot;Winter Sports Week&quot;. The games were held in Chamonix, France from January 25-February 5 and attracted over 10000 paying spectators. 258 athletes (only 11 were women) from 16 countries competed in 16 events. The Canadian men&#39;s hockey team dominated their sport by scoring 85 goals in the first three games before allowing another team to net one! On January 28, Canada beat Czechoslovakia 33-0. The next day Canada beat Sweden 22-0 and the day after that beat Switzerland 33-0. On February 1, it was a little closer for the opposite team with a 19-2 victory for the Canadians over Great Britain. Canada wouldn&#39;t play the United States until the gold medal game where they beat them 6-1 scoring a total of 122 goals over the course of the tournament and&nbsp;allowing just three against! Great Britain took home the bronze.</p><p>Some of you may know that we had a very special visit from CHEK TV the other day, specifically from Ed Bain and Jeff King, the hosts of <u>The Upside</u>, the segment which appears nightly during the newscasts. It&nbsp;highlights&nbsp;&quot;<em>positive stories in our community and around the world to bring some levity and smiles to our viewers</em>.&quot; And leave it to these guys to bring the smiles! They put on some silly costumes, gave away gift cards and baskets and showcased some of the many local products that Pepper&#39;s offers our customers. It was a great night! If you missed it, here&#39;s the link where you can see the segment:&nbsp;<strong>https://www.cheknews.ca/best-of-the-upside-january-24-2021-737246/</strong></p><p>And starting next Tuesday, you&#39;ll find our weekly ad in The Times Colonist newspaper! It can also be found on our website and&nbsp;at the store as well just in case you forget to check it before you come for a shop!</p><p>Our newsletter today is mostly themed around baking and baked goods so without further adieu, here we go! <em><strong>Little Northern Bakehouse</strong></em> makes excellent gluten-free breads in many varieties and we carry a lot of them. But now they&#39;ve gone organic! New <em><strong>LNB Organic Loaves</strong></em> are described as follows from the company website:&nbsp;<em>Now you truly can have it all&mdash;gluten-free, allergy-friendly bread with all the taste and texture of the real thing, made from organic whole grains and seeds. Take your toast to a whole new level with three delicious varieties of organic gluten-free bread: <strong>Organic Ancient Grain, Organic Oatmeal</strong>, and <strong>Organic Original</strong>.</em></p><p>All you hot dog lovers out there who can&#39;t have gluten will be thrilled to know that we now hoave a new variety of bun! <em><strong>Aidan&#39;s Gluten-Free Hot Dog Buns</strong></em> are light, airy, soft and golden and are made with 100% natural ingredients without any eggs, dairy, soy, sesame seeds, peanuts or nuts.</p><p>Local bakery <em><strong>Cakes Etc.</strong></em> has been around since 1989 providing quality baked goods that get high marks for style, artistry and flavour and use local ingredients whenever possible.&nbsp;We&#39;ve added<em><strong> Cakes Etc. Scones </strong></em>in a variety of flavours, both sweet and savoury, to their already stellar line-up and you can find them in our Bakery Dept. near the checkouts.</p><p>If you watched Saturday Night Live in 1989, you may recall a spoof commercial&nbsp;sketch with Phil Hartman called Colon Blow, showcasing the ultra high fibre cereal that is the equivalent of 30000 bowls of oat bran cereal. Well, if you need to add more fibre to your diet and want to make your own Colon Blow at home then pick up a bag of <em><strong>Pure-Le Psyllium Husks Powder</strong></em> in our breakfast cereal section in Aisle 3. According to Wikipedia, psyllium&nbsp;is <em>mainly used as a dietary fiber to relieve symptoms of both&nbsp;constipation&nbsp;and mild&nbsp;diarrhea, and occasionally as a&nbsp;food thickener.&nbsp;It is commonly used as a&nbsp;food ingredient&nbsp;in manufactured&nbsp;breakfast cereals. </em>But please, treat this plant-based fibre as a dietary supplement and follow the directions carefully.</p><p>Also down Aisle 3 is <em><strong>XO Baking Co. Oatmeal Gourmet Cookie Mix</strong></em>! it&#39;s not only gluten-free but it&#39;s also rice-free. Prepare the dough ahead of time and store in the fridge to bake crunchy and chewy certified gluten-free cookies when it&#39;s most convenient for you!&nbsp;</p><p>And while you&#39;re still in the aisle, you can pick up a jar of <em><strong>All Natural Grynd Endurance Butter, </strong></em>made by<em><strong> Island Nut Roastery</strong></em>&nbsp;We shone the spotlight on this delicious nut, chocolate and honey mixture last week so you&#39;ll be pleased to know that you can now purchase a <em><strong>500g jar </strong></em>for a much larger source of complete nut-based nutrition!</p><p>If we told you that you could purchase a cream sauce for pasta, dips or as a topping for baked potatoes or rice that contained NO dairy and is vegan would scoff and then say, &quot;That&#39;ll be the day!&quot;? You&#39;d be forgiven if you did. But that day is here my friends. Because now you can purchase not one, not two but three cashew-based. dairy-free and gluten-free cream sauces! <em><strong>Nona Vegan Sauces</strong></em> come in <em><strong>Alfredo Style, Cheesy Style </strong></em>and <em><strong>Carbonara Style </strong></em>and can be found in our Deli Dept. cold case near the first till. And these sauces are proudly made in Ontario. They freeze well in the package or you can portion them out in an ice cube tray! Plus, they&#39;re certified kosher and&nbsp;certified delicious!</p><p>That&#39;ll do it for this week, folks. Can you believe that we&#39;ll be into February next week? It&#39;s kind of ridiculous how fast the time is going. And that&#39;s a good thing, because for those of you who want it, that means the vaccine will be available sooner than later. Fingers crossed...</p><p>Until next Tuesday, stay safe and take good care.</p><p>Pepper&#39;s Foods</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p><p>&nbsp;</p>