10/21/08 Froozers

Froozers. I'm Greg Martin with today's Line On Agriculture. I don't know about you but I have this weakness for ice cream. Well a Florida company with a new frozen treat product ready to unveil in the next few weeks has come all the way to Oregon for great tasting ingredients. Patented technology has created the Froozer, giving it the appearance, taste, and creaminess of soft ice cream. But this product, targeted to school children in single serving packages, is made entirely from frozen fruit and does not contain dairy products. Laura Barton of the Oregon Department of Agriculture says Froozers. BARTON: "Consist of a fruit serving at schools. Dieticians and nutritionists love it because it doesn't have any added sweetener. So it has all the good things that whole fruits have. Barton and ODA played matchmaker, bringing the Florida company together with Oregon's berry industry. The Froozer folks were so impressed with the taste and appearance of the local fruit, they want to tell the world about it. BARTON: "They made the commitment to actually label on their various blends that these froozers are made with Oregon berries. It says so right on the label in a couple of places. This is really exciting to us. The product is especially welcome to Oregon's strawberry industry, which is trying to maintain its level of production after years of decline. Froozer is planning to roll out 2.2 million individual servings in November, with most headed to schools across the country. Future production could require nearly 400-thousand pounds of processed Oregon berries each year. Barton says Froozer is committed to using only Oregon berries in its products: BARTON: Our berries have exactly what they want. We have the flavor, we have the color, we have the growing conditions here that really brings the sweetness out. Barton says the Froozer product is an example of what ODA's marketing efforts are all about- bringing together companies and Oregon ag producers. BARTON: We really do welcome relationships with both industry and individual companies who are willing to step up to the plate, take risk, be innovative, and want to use Oregon ingredients. So we are willing to work with them. That's today's Line On Agriculture. I'm Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.