esrosedotblog

SAUCED

I made real cranberry sauce tonight.

Ocean Spray Cranberries.

I looked on the bag and these were packed in Massachusetts. I got a bit of a hit from that. You can't have spent 35 years of your life around cranberry bogs and not get a hit.

Another thing; in another life, when I did real work, I spent five years at the cranberry company.

I was the Production Planning Manager; a job to which I was not all that well suited. I did OK though. Chutzpah. The job description pretty much licensed me to mind other people's business. I am pretty good at that.

I loved working around the production operations. Noise. Work. People.

Before that I did similar work at another company; only more in the engineering line.

This period of time was my apprenticeship. I got into management training because I saw first hand how 'amateur' managers could be clueless about working with their staffs and subordinates. Ten years in the trenches made me a great trainer. I could beat the academics and the consultants hands down. Practical.

It was a great time with Ocean Spray.

And I learned a lot about cranberries! When I was there we had plants operating in Vancouver and Quebec in Canada. In the United States we were in Washington, Oregon, Wisconsin, New Jersey and Massachusetts which was the headquarters. It is still that way although they have added Florida citrus in recent years.

Ocean Spray is a cooperative. It was interesting working for that kind of organization. The growers were our bosses. Go to the link above and read the 'about us' part.

Anyway, I can still make a mean batch of cranberry sauce. I use a little less sugar in mine. You need some to get the gel; pectin plus sugar. Then, I cheat the sweetness out with some Nutrasweet. very good.