Web Extra: Picklesmith, Inc. Factory Tours

Our March issue includes a feature on Texas factory tours. Here’s one more from TH Intern Kate Hull.

Beginning in April 2010, Picklesmith, Inc., in the South Texas town of Taft, will open its doors to visitors for tours of the cannery. Featuring handcrafted pickles, olives, relishes, jams, and preserves (and more), the cannery boasts “old-fashioned taste that never goes out of style.”

'Most of our recipes are based on a time when people took a little longer to enjoy their meals. The produce is cared for just like your great grandmother or grandma would have done.'

With the addition of new equipment to the production line, tours will be available by appointment year round for groups of 15 or more. A tour of the factory, housed in a building that was once the mercantile store of the historic Taft Ranch, includes a walk-through of the showroom area decorated with antiques, a visit to the mercantile shop (where different cannery products will be available for purchase and featured for sampling, depending on the season), and a look into the production room where the canning takes place.

See what goes into making the perfect pickle or the sweetest jams of Picklesmith. A glass window allows visitors to watch while the canning is taking place. 

If canning is not in progress, groups can still walk through and see the equipment.

Groups also have the option to tour the Blackland Museum across from the cannery free of charge. The museum is housed in the building that was once the headquarters of the Coleman-Fulton Pasture Co. Exhibits include antique farm and ranch equipment, personal and household items of early settlers, as well as valuable memorabilia from the Taft Ranch.

After the tour, attendees will receive free recipe cards featuring healthy recipes using Picklesmith products. David Smith, president of Picklesmith, Inc., says they hope to promote healthy eating with the products. “Most of our recipes are based on a time when people took a little longer to enjoy their meals. The produce is cared for just like your great grandmother or grandma would have done,” Smith says.

Among customer favorites are the garlic dill spears – pickles made from an old-fashioned recipe of dill and garlic using cucumbers from farms in nearby Texas towns. Smith says the most popular time to visit is in April or May, but production happens all year.

For reservations, call 361/528-4953 or 800/499-3401; www.picklesmith.com.

- Kate Hull

See the full article in the March 2010 issue.