Food Shed Idaho

06/18/2026

05/19/2026

The Frescobaldi’s have been making wine and olive oil in Tuscany since the Renaissance. If you know anything about Food Shed Idaho, you know that we seek out only the highest integrity and most delicious products that touch our heart and feed our soul. And we like to visit them, like we did last month.

Today we are featuring their olive oil Laudemio Frescobaldi - the epitome of a true Tuscan extra virgin olive oil.

High in polyphenols with a unique emerald-green color and robust taste. It has an aroma of just mown grass, artichoke heart, and green olive notes. Its intense flavor is remarkably balanced between a very notable bitterness, with sparkling spiciness and long-lasting fruitiness.

To make an olive oil as precious as Laudemio Frescobaldi, it takes one tree per bottle. The bottle is unmistakable, too, with its dark green jewel-like embossed glass with the iconic Etruscan athlete emblem label, it makes a statement for what’s inside.

How did the creation of Laudemio come about? In 1985 a terrible frost devastated most of the olive trees in Tuscany; orchards were reduced by up to 70%. In 1986 the Frescobaldi family had a vision and proposed, to a few neighbors and friends, the creation of a consortium to collaborate in the repair and restoration of their respective olive groves, while at the same time elevating the future of traditional EVOO. They took the name from medieval times when the term Laudemio referred to the part of the harvest reserved for the feudal lord.

This was extraordinary. At the time, there were no IGPs or DOPs for olive oil. In fact, IGP Toscana olive oil was only established in 1998. Thru the Frescobaldi’s experience gained through centuries of grape growing, they helped develop a new level of EVOO production by emphasizing the concept of terroir, linking the olive’s typicity and quality to the uniqueness of its productive environment.

We celebrate the Frescobaldi’s with their commitment to cultivate the diversity of Tuscany thru their estate grown extra virgin olive oil, wines, and now pasta. Come celebrate with us.

05/15/2026

Our first Sips + Snacks event will be Friday, June 5th from 4-6pm.

As some of you already know, we usually do the last Friday of the month, May-September, but this year we had a conflict. So, June has two events this year!

What are we going to sample this time around? Sips from and inspired by my recent trip to Italy! We will be featuring tastes of 3 whites and 3 reds from Piedmonte and Northern Italy.

And, we are especially happy to have a special guest, Lacey McNeff, cheesemaker, cheese lover, and overall amazing human sampling and direct-selling a curated selection of hard-to-find cheeses.

Admission is $10 going to the featured guest non-profit, which will change monthly. No reservations are taken, and I would suggest you arrive closer to 4 than 5; event ends at 6pm.

New this year...help us save the planet by bring your own glass, or purchase a Riedel from us!

So, mark your calendars with the other dates: June 26, July 31, August 28, and September 25. Extra parking is available at the Victor Depot around the corner; and at designated spots on Highway 31 towards the light.

See you then! Cheers!

03/27/2026

What is this incredibly thin and delicate chocolate and how can you get some? It's called Palaegschokolade (without the Danish unique lettering), pronounced like pollack-scock-olade. Oh, and we carry them. 😍😍😍

03/25/2026

Come see us before we close for our annual spring break. These pictures are from last year. Today our first daffodil opened! That's almost 1 month early!!! We've planted now over 3500 bulbs, hope you enjoy the color while we are closed.

Store will be closed April 1-19th.

03/22/2026

Speaking of fish, there has been a lot of press lately on canned tuna, so I’d like to give you my 2 cents.

There are many brands out there that are NOT the cannery, they’re just private labels. What does that mean and why should you care? That means that they don’t have complete control over what’s in the can. Sure, their product meets the specifications agreed upon, but if you were the cannery and had your own line of fish, don’t you think you would keep the best quality for your own line? That’s my experience. These are common in the food industry, allowing the brand to pivot based on price, availability, and quality. Food Shed Idaho is not interested in ANY private labels on any products.

How can you tell if something is a private label? Sometimes it’s easy, sometimes it’s hard. It’s a deep rabbit hole that I go down all the time. Typically, they use the word “partners” and are vague in their descriptions. Go to their website and dig around; question the ingredients and how and where they are sourced. Surprisingly, you might be paying more for it because of all the marketing that goes into it. I won’t carry those brands; there’s no story, no product and very little traceability.

I carry exceptional canned tuna from Oregon and Spain.

Our Oregon tuna is from Sea Fare Pacific in Charleston and one of very few tuna canneries left in the USA. Their line-caught tuna is only from the Pacific Northwest, caught by mostly family run jig boats. This tuna is younger, so it has less unsafe levels of mercury. They are small, so you won’t see this brand in Costco and at major grocery stores.

My Spanish tuna is a little more of a treat. Fished in the clean waters of the Cantabrian Sea/Bay of Biscayne and packed in olive oil, these tunas are generally a little bigger, but still smaller with less mercury than what is caught in the Pacific Ocean. We carry two excellent producers, Ortiz and Bon Bocarte.

You won’t be disappointed.