Sweetharvest
Costco’s Kirkland Signature
frozen-fruit program
is “berry” good
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On Costco.com,
enter “Connection.”
At Online Edition,
search “buyingsmart.”
d
BuyingSmart
Consumer reporter Pat Volchok
gives a behind-the-scenes look at
Costco products and services. Send
your questions about this article to:
buying smart@costco.com.
COSTCO’S FROZEN berries are sweet little
bites of summer, delicious year-round.
Specifically, the morsels of goodness to which
I am referring are Kirkland Signature™ Rader
Farms Nature’s Three Berries and Kirkland
Signature Whole Strawberries.
If you haven’t tried these exclusive-to-Costco frozen berries, know this: They are a
world apart from the ice-encased, unidentifiable, overly sweet blobs of purple and red
Only top-quality
fruit is selected
for Costco’s frozen-berry program.
many of us have experienced elsewhere.
Costco frozen berries stand on their own.
USDA Grade A, they are whole, naturally
sweet, preservative and artificial-color free,
nutrient rich, picked at their peak, washed,
ready to eat and individually quick-frozen
with no added sugars or syrup cover-ups.
All berries are sourced from regions
along the West Coast known for growing
exceptional varieties.
The triple-berry blend relies on premium red raspberries, blueberries and blackberries. All are chosen for their large size and
the naturally sweeter, juicier eating experience they provide.
The full, red, sweet strawberries from
California are selected for their quality of not
breaking down and turning to mush when
thawed. High on the list are the Albion, San
Andreas, Ventana and Camino Real varieties.
RED BOX PIC TURES
Field trip
I spend a day with Costco assistant corporate food buyer Leanne Miller in Lynden,
Washington, visiting Rader Farms.
This is the kind of place you want your
berries coming from. Old barns dot the rich
landscape where 800 acres of raspberries and
blueberries surround us. We’ve stepped into a
Grandma Moses painting.
Third-generation berry farmer and
Rader Farms vice president Brad Rader is
our berry guru. “Costco fits us perfectly, as
we are both very particular about what we
sell,” he says. “Without quality, we don’t
have anything.”
Some Costco specifications, such as
requiring the majority of blueberries to have a
uniform diameter of a half inch or larger, are
significantly more demanding than USDA
Grade A guidelines. (Various criteria for
