Thank You To The Following Sponsors And Mentors:

Village Eatinghouse

Village Eatinghouse is one of our first and most important mentors. Clay and Melanie Phillips create, manufacture, and distribute their all-natural line of small-batch handcrafted sauces and seasonings for use in marinating and grilling meats, poultry and fish; and on salad greens, pasta salads, and fresh veggies. Developed for use in their full-service restaurant, catering, and cafe in the area, these sauces have a real following and are now available across the USA in more than 250 Mom and Pops as well as at local festivals all around Pennsylvania. They are consultants to many small business owners and are happy to partner with local non-profits with their fundraiser program as well. Check out their website for more info.

"Clay and I are so impressed by Mr. Biddle’s enthusiasm and the experience he and his students are engaging in with this project. We are thankful and honored to be a hands-on part of it. Working with these students has been an enjoyable and rewarding experience for us as well.”

April Line and Josh Leidhecker

Susquehanna Mills is a local manufacturer of quality canola and sunflower cooking oils whose top priority is sustainability. To that end, they practice Full Circle manufacturing, wherein waste oil is picked up from restaurant and university partners and is upcycled into biodiesel, which powers many farm partners' vehicles. Their delicious culinary oils are expeller pressed for health and come from Non-GMO seeds. Check out their website for tips on how to use them.

Josh Leidhecker, owner of Susquehanna Mills, and April Line a past employee have been valuable contributors to our business as oil suppliers and consultants. Their feedback and advice have allowed us to make significant improvements to our business and vinaigrette.

Josh Leidhecker started Susquehanna Mills in 2006 during a time of increased nationwide interest in biofuels and began crushing canola seeds to turn into biodiesel; when he learned he could cook with it, too, his wheels started turning on the Full Circle model they use to this day. His individual curiosity, creativity and drive have propelled the business's growth and evolution.

Susquehanna Mills is fully vertically integrated, which means they do everything from farming the seeds they crush to delivering our products to our customers. April Line came on board in 2018 with instincts, skills, and education that complement Josh's, and is now the Number Two Guy. They were delighted to be approached by Mr. Biddle for support with this salad dressing project, and have loved being involved.

Left to right: Todd Biddle, Renee Kredell

Todd Biddle and Renee Kredell

Todd Biddle is the FFA advisor of the Bald Eagle FFA chapter and an agriculture educator at Bald Eagle Area Middle/High School. The vinaigrette could not have been conceptualized or implemented without his expert leadership and vision.

Renee Kredell served as an art teacher at Bald Eagle Area Middle/High School. The students from her class helped to create the label design for our dressing. Furthermore, she was been invaluable as a reviewer of our pictures, designs, poster, and presentations throughout this process.

A big thank you to our student educators! Good Luck to Renee Kredell in all her future endeavors!

PA FFA Foundation

Like any business, securing start-up costs can be a challenge. The Pennsylvania FFA Foundation provided the Bald Eagle FFA with a $1,000 Learning By Doing Grant to support the first batch of our dressing. Our business has been sustainable ever since!

The Pennsylvania FFA Foundation cultivates partnerships and secures resources to enhance Agricultural Education and FFA. The Pennsylvania FFA Foundation is affiliated with The National FFA Organization. The Pennsylvania FFA Foundation was established as a 501(c)(3) non-profit foundation in 1984, to support the needs of agricultural education and the FFA. The Foundation has become important to the success of agricultural education and the FFA in Pennsylvania.

The Foundation is comprised of 17 Trustees for different aspect of industry. This trustees serve in a volunteer role for 3 to 6 terms.

Revenue Sources - Concession Sales at APD and Farm Show, Golf Outing and Other Events, Corporate Sponsorships, Individual Giving, Grants, etc.

We support Agriculture Education!

The Lewis Family

Lewis apiary is made up of four people; the Lewis family. The family includes mother Felicia Lewis, father Michael Lewis Sr, daughter Abigail Lewis, and son Michael Lewis Jr. The family resides in Centre County Pennsylvania. They began their beekeeping venture during the first Covid lockdown when Penn State University was offering free classes online. They took a class on beekeeping and then got their first hives. Then started making the delicious honey in the vinaigrette.

Weis Markets

Weis Market has been with us since the start of the enterprise. With an excellent selection of products and availability, they are the go-to market when we are short on an ingredient. Moreover, without their help in securing our ingredients and the willingness to sell our product, we would not be the same business we are today.

Centre Markets

Centre Markets is currently an online farmers market in the State College area - but we're planning on opening a physical retail store later this year. We currently work with more than 50 vendors, and supporting this innovative FFA project is in perfect alignment with our efforts to support our local farmers, especially new and beginning farmers. Our customer response to the FFA dressing has been great - especially combined with this bountiful lettuce season right now. I'm looking forward to the maple version as well! Link!!

Jeff Warner

The Bald Eagle FFA is fortunate to have made a connection with this great leader from the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture. He offers programing on product development for our students, tests our samples for quality, and helps us with complicated recipe formulations.

Over an 18 year career with Heinz North America, Jeff Warner supported Research & Development and new product innovation initiatives across both grocery and food service channels. He gained experience innovating frozen entrees, snacks, pizzas, pizza bagels, quesadillas, enrobed sandwiches, frozen soups, as well as bulk and portion control dressings, condiments, and sauces. He was responsible for innovating the first frozen potpie to bake crispy, brown, and flaky in a microwave oven which subsequently achieved substantiated superiority claims over the nationally best-selling competitive offering. He was recognized with a “Henry [Heinz] Award” for his work leading a team to reverse engineer, match, and start factory production of 15 restaurant soup formulas within 4 weeks as a competitor exited the business leaving customers without products to menu. His team later earned a 2012 Food & Beverage Innovation Award from the National Restaurant Association for their launch of “3-IN-1 Soup, Sauce, Dip” products that enabled restauranteurs to prepare a single base to serve across three sections of the menu. Jeff was recruited by Smithfield Foods to build a consumer products innovation capability.

The Fetteroffs

Many of our students know the Fetterolfs through 4-H and FFA. We knew that this family was the prefect partner for our Mountain Maple project. Their high quality standards and product grading, allow us to secure a constant supply of the grade we use in our product.

We love making Maple syrup and sharing it with others. We have been producing Maple Syrup for the last 20+ years, starting as a hobby with just a few taps to expanding over the years to now making it for others to enjoy!

Corby and I along with our seven children work together to produce maple syrup that is in several local stores like Burkholder's Market, Nature's Pantry, Meyer Dairy, Homan's General Store, & Mammy's Donuts. Soon we will be adding Belle Mercantile in Bellefonte. We also do a few events in the fall & Christmas which include: Wasson's Fall Fest, Pumpkin Chunkin' in Howard, Old Gregg School Christmas Bazaar, & Haven Valley Homestead Live Nativity. During Maple Season we enjoy hosting groups or families and teaching them about the history and process of producing Maple Syrup.

-- The Fetterolf Family

Page updated

Report abuse