For its fifth annual Ultimate Cranberry Recipe Contest, Ocean Spray has raised the bar once again in search of executive chefs and foodservice professionals who highlight the versatility of the cranberry in the most unique and vibrant way.

This year, Shonna Ebert of Dietert Center in Kerrville, TX, and her mouthwatering masterpiece, kickin’ chicken tortilla soup with zesty cranberry crème fraîche, took home the coveted Ultimate Cranberry Recipe title and the $10,000 grand prize.

Reidsville, GA-based Shuman Produce Inc. is proud to be joined at its booth by Atlanta-based celebrity chef personalities Chef & the Fat Man and Miss America 2011 Teresa Scanlan at the Produce Marketing Association’s Fresh Summit 2011 in Atlanta.

One of the major promises of the Internet and advanced technology is that it allows for more efficient communication that does not rely on the spoken word. Transactions can be made and confirmed without time-consuming phone calls or face-to-face meetings.

But the produce industry was built on personal contact, and FoodLink, an Internet-based network that efficiently processes $10 billion worth of produce transactions annually, has not lost sight of that fact.

The healthy snack category is on the rise and Ready Pac Foods Inc. is aiming to take advantage of that trend with the introduction of an innovative fresh-fruit parfait.

Barbara Dan, vice president of marketing and research and development at Irwindale, CA-based Ready Pac, which specializes in the fresh-cut and value-added sectors of the produce industry, said that fresh-cut produce sales are relatively static while healthy-snacking products have experienced a 5 percent increase over the past year.

David Fishgold and several other produce veterans who had been handling Mexican-grown produce on the East Coast, moved from New York to Arizona in 2007 and formed a new company, Shipping Point Marketing Inc., based in Phoenix.

Concentrating on their existing customer lists and also adding new customers, “we really started strengthening our Mexican deal” in addition to continuing the importation of products “from all over the world,” most notably Spain, Ecuador, Italy and Holland, Mr. Fishgold told The Produce News.

Malena Produce Inc., which is located in the Rio Rico Industrial Park just north of Nogales, AZ, has recently added 15,000 square feet of cold storage space to the company’s warehouse, according to Gonzalo Avila, vice president and general manager. Racking has been installed in 10,000 square feet of the new addition.

“We have also moved into that new area the forced-air precooling unit that we use in case produce comes in from Mexico not at the right temperature,” he said. That enables the company to cool the product down to the proper temperature upon its arrival in Nogales.