Conversation with “Broc-Star” Jenny Maloney

Have you ever thought about how plant breeding can help mitigate food waste, improve sustainability, and improve flavor? These are a few things plant breeders think about when creating new varieties of some of your favorite produce. Bayer's High Rise™ Broccoli series has been 20 years in the making.  Developed in collaboration with growers, the High Rise broccoli series offers supply chain-wide benefits from field to store to table.

Transcript

Phil: 0:07

Welcome to RDBA's The Morning Fix. My guest today is Jenny Maloney, the global America's strategic account lead for Bayer vegetable seeds. Jenny is responsible for leading strategic account of both north and south America. And working with those accounts to introduce the full platform of Bayer's, fruit and vegetable seeds, as well as the entire crop science portfolio. Jenny, welcome to The Morning Fix.

Jenny: 0:34

Thanks for having me Phil.

Phil: 0:36

So I know what all RD's wanna know. What's the latest and greatest as it relates to frankly, you know, one of our favorite food groups produce

Jenny: 0:48

Well. Um, I've got exciting news to talk about, and I think, uh, some people can relate if you have young kids, I'm a mom to a two, four and six year old. And, uh, the topic is about flavor and better flavor, uh, in your fruits and vegetables. And specifically today, I'd like to talk to you a little bit more about, um, how we make broccoli taste better and turn broccoli into broccoli stars.

Phil: 1:11

Well, first of all, I've gotta take issue cuz I love broccoli. I, I'm not one of those people that have a problem with broccoli, but, but I'm curious when you say, you know, a, may it into a star making it even better than it is now. Broccoli's gotta be one of our most nutritious and, and delicious vegetables that are out there. What are you doing?

Jenny: 1:34

Well, yeah, broccoli has, uh, a great nutritional profile, vitamin C uh, fiber vitamin K potassium. Uh, but some people don't like the flavor of broccoli and some of the population based upon your genes actually. Um, some people are way more sensitive to the bitterness in broccoli and uh, some people love it, but there are some people in our society that, that really don't like it. Uh, and there are some traditional ways too that maybe people will cook broccoli that, um, makes it less interesting, but we're doing something really interesting with our broccoli portfolio. We've got a high rise broccoli portfolio and it does a couple of things once it like the name implies, uh, we've got a variety called Eiffel and another variety called Hancock, which has implies it's higher than traditional broccoli. So it's got a lot of benefits. One of them is better flavor.

Phil: 2:32

So what makes broccoli have better flavor if it's higher off the ground?

Jenny: 2:37

So the way that our broccoli grows, it's, it's extruded higher. It's got a little bit more, uh, stem and it's less fibrous. So what happens is when the broccoli starts to age, the stem gets more fiber in it, it gets sort of old and the broccoli plant starts putting more of its, um, energy and nutrients into the stem. So it, it gets harder and tougher. I was, uh, talking to one of our broccoli breeders and making the comparison between, uh, lamb and button. You know, when lamb gets old, it, the flavor changes and, uh, it it's less tender, but you can think of the same thing with the long broccoli stem. These varieties come, um, the harvest, it's a shorter harvest window. And also, um, because they're earlier to harvest in this longer stem, you've got less fiber in it. And so the flavor of the stem comes out and it's a much sweeter flavor, almost like a sweet pea.

Phil: 3:32

So I would guess, um, that when you look at that sweeter flavor, that's a product that your 2, 4, 6 year olds would love,

Jenny: 3:42

Right? As many parents know, getting kids to eat more vegetables in particular, they tend to be harder to eat for me than fruits. Getting them to eat more vegetables is, is hard. And broccoli fits into that category. That kids don't always say it's their favorite. Last year when I was in one of our Highrise broccoli fields, we were out in the field actually cutting the broccoli compared to more traditional varieties. And so I had this beautiful Highrise broccoli that my colleagues couldn't believe I did it, but I put it in a grocery bag with ice and took it on the plane home with me and, uh, gave it to my kids and they loved it. They loved the stems. They uh, love the florets. Um, I even put out some ranch dressing for them to dip it in and they abstain from the ranch and ate the broccoli, uh, directly. So, uh, I think if you can impress a four and six year old, you've pretty much got it made.

Phil: 4:34

So I wanna ask one question that I wanna move to the supermarket. How do these broccoli breeders figure that out? You know, somebody had to have this idea that says, Hey, if I grow the broccoli higher, you know, all these things are gonna happen. That's gotta be a brilliant mind. That is well past my pay grade.

Jenny: 4:56

Well, this particular, these particular varieties in our high rise portfolio, they were being worked on 25 years ago, but the initial target was not flavor. The target was to have a higher extruded broccoli that allowed for easier hand harvest and eventually mechanical harvest because anywhere you go right now, um, this isn't just an agriculture issue, but there's a lack of labor. And so we were thinking early on, what can we do to help growers as they're trying to mechanize their harvest. And one thing you can do is raise the broccoli head up that allows for a machine to come through and either through, uh, a blade or sometimes for lettuce, they'll use a high pressure, um, uh, water source to cut the broccoli and lead to mechanized harvest. But even though we don't have ubiquitous mechanized harvest in the us, there are some machines that are being used. Uh, still, when you have, uh, hand labor coming through, it makes it much, much easier to go through and cut the broccoli versus the more traditional varieties that sit lower on the ground in flavor, um, while not an initial target, that was, uh, another benefit that came through this, uh, breeding process. So our high rises varieties are used, are developed through conventional breeding. Um, and so as they bred to have this more erect, uh, broccoli head, they noticed again, less fiber in the broccoli stem itself and a much sweeter tasting, uh, broccoli stem. So it ended up being a, a dual benefit, a benefit to growers, but then also, so consumers, whether the stem was going into alaw or if they were just finding it in their grocery store and using different, uh, techniques of cooking to use the stem, which some people just throw it away.

Phil: 6:51

So let's head into the grocery store. So you have a focus group, if you would, um, of three, you know, kids, um, they, they liked it. Um, what else did you do to prove that, you know, this product, uh, kids would love and to get, you know, our retail dietitians to taste it for themselves, demo it, put it in their recipes and make it a real kid friendly, you know, resource.

Jenny: 7:22

Well, we were out in the field, the, the grower of this product, uh, a couple of the, my Bayer colleagues and we tasted the broccoli in, in the field and said, this is great. What, what can we be doing to introduce this to kids? And immediately we thought of school districts who, you know, are one of the biggest restaurants in the United States. I think, uh, before COVID, uh, you know, schools were serving, uh, almost 300 million lunches a day. And so you talk about, uh, a demographics that that's there and getting feedback all the time. So we do a lot of, of work with United fresh foundation, which is now part of the international fresh produce association. They do a lot of work with school children. We used to before COVID, uh, do a salad bar donation to a handful of schools every year during COVID. We had to get a little bit more creative. Uh, salad bars are still not back in VO, uh, with, with, uh, concerns about touching things. But one of the things that we said is let's partner with some of the local school districts, uh, where this grower was growing broccoli and see if we can get some of the school food service directors to try out our broccoli stems. See if, you know, broccoli stems could be the new baby care. We were lucky enough to partner with a couple of school districts in the Monterey California area and harvested our broccoli. Our grower donated all the broccoli to the school that week, and one of the teachers volunteered his time and did a mini, uh, kitchen out during lunchtime out on the black top, saute our broccoli, cut the stems into what I call coins or stars. We call them Brock stars, saute the broccoli, uh, talked about our varieties, how they grow. And if you look at some of the pictures, um, they were served on paper plates, uh, and every single paper plate that was put into the trash can was virtually lit cleaned. So we had students that came back for second, third, fourth, and even fifths to eat more broccoli stem. So I would say, uh, it is hard to impress elementary school kids. And by the showing of the, the clear your paper plates, that, uh, that it was, uh, the rock stars where it hit.

Phil: 9:40

Absolutely. It, it sounds fabulous. And also again, bringing it into, uh, the supermarket, you know, where today retail, dietitians are doing more recipes, doing more cook alongs, uh, doing more kit programs than ever before. Um, this sounds like a, a perfect product for them to use and to do more with than just saute.

Jenny: 10:06

Right. And, you know, as a, as a parent, when you're moving through the grocery store, you know, especially with, you know, whether you're, you're working out of the house or inside the house everyone's lives are busy. And so they're always looking for tips and tricks to, you know, to cook or present fruits and vegetables differently. And as we all know, um, our entire population isn't eating enough fruits and vegetables and with vegetables, it's, it can be hard to make them interesting for kids. So I think that we rely a lot on in-store demos on retail dietitians to help, you know, give us some tricks to use when we get back home. And, you know, broccoli stems are one of those areas where, whether you slice'em up into stars, coins, or cut them into sticks, like, uh, celery sticks or carrot sticks, it's easy to do. Um, kids really like them. And, and again, especially when they have that sweeter flavor, um, they can, I, I think really win their way into kids' hearts. And it's another use too, for the, the entire broccoli that you buy, not just using the head of the broccoli, but using the stem as well.

Phil: 11:16

So Jenny, for, you know, our members, our retail, dietitians who want to taste it, who wanna try it, who want to demo it, tell us more, I mean, is this product available 12 months a year? How would they go about reaching out, getting samples, uh, to experiment with?

Jenny: 11:34

Sure. So this is a newer variety. Uh, it's primarily in the United States, primarily grown in California in the Salinas area. It's grown, usually available may through October, but south of there and more like the Santa Maria area, they, there are companies who grow it year round. Um, it is available in, in certain grocery stores. And we can at Bayer always direct you to a grower or a distributor who's, um, either growing the product or distributing the product from the grower. So we usually have a grower that is growing it mostly year round, but if something that a retail dietician, um, tries and likes, I would tell them, ask your distributor to, you know, purchase more of Highrise broccoli varieties. The more demand that we get from grocery retail, um, the more growers will plant. So, uh, while it's not branded yet in the grocery store to say Highrise, you can typically tell from the longer sort of skinnier stems, they'll sometimes bunch them in three. Um, sometimes they're put into florets too, but if you taste something you like, or you get feedback from your customers, ask your, ask the company that you're buying for to grow more of it, because our, our growers for them, this variety has several benefits in field. There's some sustainability benefits, some labor benefits, they just need the signal to grow more.

Phil: 13:02

So, Jenny, I want you to pull back and, and give me the holistic view, uh, look in your Bayervegetable seeds, crystal ball. What else besides the high rise broccoli, should we be watching out for?

Jenny: 13:17

Well, you can look for, uh, better tasting tomatoes, so new tomatoes on the vine new colored tomatoes, snacking tomatoes. While I do like to eat my fruits and vegetables, I was very pleasantly surprised to know that a lot of our beef steak tomatoes go into, uh, in and out cheeseburger, if you order them with tomatoes. So, um, if you're a west coaster, you know, about in and out, uh, we have, um, some really new, fantastic snacking, uh, pepper varieties. So the mini peppers that you'll see at certain grocery stores, um, that's in our portfolio, we've got, uh, in the summertime amazing sweet. Uh, some growers grow that year round as well, depending on what location we've got. Um, some great tasting melons out in the market and, uh, really, uh, cucumbers, uh, squash, uh, several different lettuce varieties. So really a robust portfolio in the vegetable space.

Phil: 14:16

Well, Jenny, thanks for all the good work, thanks for the tips and tricks and looking forward to, I love those mini peppers. I love those, um, as well as the snacking tomatoes. So I'm looking forward to having some of those mini peppers for dinner tonight.

Jenny: 14:33

Yeah. Yep. Those are, uh, those are crowd favorite at our house too. And, uh, I'm, uh, I'm one of those people now that goes into the produce department and searches around and see, what's see what's new and what's coming up. And so I think, uh, be on the lookout for more varieties coming out from the Bayer vegetable seed division that have a focus on flavor.