56: What's in Your Sausage? The Importance of Certifying Food free-from Allergens

Tracy Stuckrath [00:00:06]:
Welcome to the Eating at a Meeting podcast. I'm your host, Tracy Stuckraff, dietary needs expert, certified meetings manager, certified food protection manager. I have searched the globe to find people and businesses who are creating safe, sustainable, and inclusive food and beverage experiences for their employees, guests, and communities. In each episode, you will find authentic conversations about how food and beverage impacts inclusion, sustainability, culture, community, health, and wellness. I know that sounds like a lot, but we're gonna cover it all. Are you ready to feed engagement, nourish inclusion, and bolster your bottom line? If so, let's go. I am so excited today to introduce you to founder, president, and CEO of Mule's Foods, Mule's sausage, Loree Mulay Weismann. And her sausage products are so good.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:01:06]:
They're my mom was raving about them when we were making them. But their their sausages are certified allergen free, certified paleo, certified keto, and certified gluten free. So welcome to the show, Lori. Thank you

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:01:22]:
very much, Tracy. It's great to be with you.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:01:25]:
Thank you. Okay. So let's just start off. How did you get into this? When when did you start?

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:01:32]:
We started, long, long ago. My husband, then boyfriend, and I were ski bums in, Crested Butte, Colorado. Okay. And we worked in restaurants, four jobs, trying to make a living, and we, went back. My husband's from New York, and we went to a, big Italian street festival, and everybody was selling sausage with peppers and onions. And he's like, you gotta try it? I said, absolutely not. And then finally, I ate one, and it was all just grisly and gross. And I just said, my Nana's sausage is so much better.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:02:10]:
So fast forward, he said, hey. Let's link up some of the your Nonna's sausage. We'll sell it at the fourth of July fair. And, so we went to the one of the restaurants that, we worked at, borrowed their KitchenAid, mixed up a hundred pounds of pork with all of our spices, and linked 400 sausages. And then the next day, we sold out in four hours. And everybody said, oh my gosh. These are so good. Where where can we buy them? And said, well, you can't.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:02:41]:
And if you're lucky, we'll do it again next year. We were exhausted, but when we counted the money, we're like, oh, maybe we will do this. So anyway, that was back in 1990, and so that's thirty one years ago, this July 4. And, we it was always just and of this hobby business that just and of was in the background. We got into the lodging business, so always been in hospitality. Okay. And then when we sold that business in 02/2011, we still had this, sausage company that had grown and actually started doing some, volume in retail. Mhmm.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:03:23]:
So so we continued with that, and now we're kind of swinging back and and trying to start into food service again.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:03:30]:
Okay. That's so cool. I'm just trying to see if we've got who's coming on and, asking questions. Three new comments. I don't know if that's for this now. So you've had the sausage company for thirty years now, basically. Right? Right. I mean that.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:03:45]:
But you like I said at the very beginning, you're now certified allergen free, top eight allergen free, I should say, paleo, keto, and gluten free. And can you talk to me why you went that route, and why why was that important for you to go that route?

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:04:05]:
Well, the whole meetings healthy and the whole, idea of just simple, natural, traditional has always been the way I was raised, the way that my family eats, and the way that our sausages have always been. Just really good pork and spices. So when we started doing some retail business, we realized that we were pretty much the only clean, really clean product that you could find on the market. And, we were using antibiotic free pork, you know, humanely raised, all that kind of stuff. And, so I got certified gluten free, I believe in 02/2006 maybe. Okay. Which was way early. It might have been actually a little before that, but, we went with the Celiac Spru Association, which was the our our longest running and, at that time, the only really certifying agency for gluten free and, really catering to celiac disease.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:05:13]:
Okay. So we got that certification early on. But then we realized, like, I've I've been looking for a long time for allergen free certifications. I couldn't find anything in The States. There was one company in California, I mean, in Canada. But, then I came across Betsy, Craig, and Menu Trimpo and that whole thing. And that her certification program was fantastic because it would certify us free from the eight major allergens. And, you know, people don't think of sausage or meatball well, meatballs, you definitely do, but sausage as having gluten in it.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:05:55]:
But the fact of the matter is is that a lot of sausages are pumped full of fillers to absorb the enormous amount of fat that they use because they're using a lesser quality of meat. Okay. So there's a solution that's injected and or it's like not injected, it's mixed in with the meat when they're grinding, and that solution has some gluten in it or a leaf or something that, absorbs the the fat and makes them and of really plump up. Okay. Well, people don't think that they're eating anything when they do that. There's a lot of soy in meat products, things like that that are hidden allergens that you really don't think about unless it will make you critically ill or you know somebody that it will. And the, sausage, the skin, they don't people usually put flour in that to help do something? No. Well, ours is a natural casing, which is just a hog catering.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:07:05]:
And the other casing is called collagen casing. Okay. So no. It's just not a natural casing. It's a synthetic casing that we use. Yeah. Okay.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:07:20]:
So and but you do you yourself or anybody in your family, do you have allergens and and or why you know, what instigated it?

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:07:30]:
Well, it's always been that way. We didn't, like, say, hey. Let's go make a gluten free sausage. It's just it never had gluten in it. So, I thought it was important to tell people what isn't in our sausage. It's got, you know, what's in your sausage? Do you know? I'm telling you that ours doesn't have nitrates. It doesn't have gluten. It doesn't have soy.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:07:53]:
And then when we started to develop more products and we developed our meatball, that was really exciting because, we have developed a meatball that is completely gluten free and egg free and dairy free and, soy, tree nut, peanut, fish, shell shellfish. The eight major allergens. Yep. And we are proud to say, yes. It's certified free from the eight major allergens and it's free. And, so we are super, super excited about that, and it tastes so good. I just throw some on the barbecue the other night. Yeah.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:08:35]:
They're so good. But, that's what we wanna do religious celiac, simple food that tastes so food, and it it can reach all audiences. So if you have a family of six I mean, I get these mothers that say, oh my gosh. My family is eating altogether again. Because, you know, you buy things and maybe you buy it because your kid has to can't have gluten, but the rest of the family can. But the stuff that you're buying for the kid doesn't necessarily taste as food, and you really wouldn't wanna serve that with your family. But our products are for everyone. Right.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:09:16]:
And the guy who's like, I don't want anything natural, you know, he will love the product and say, like, let's serve it at the the football game or whatever when we get back to that. You know?

Tracy Stuckrath [00:09:28]:
Yes. I well, and it's funny that you say that because my mom made chicken Parmesan last night, and we had she makes mine with gluten free breadcrumbs, and then she makes her own makes hers and my dad's with, you know, non with fully gluten breadcrumbs. I'm like, mom, just it's getting doused with really good tomato sauce that's all natural, and we're using gluten free pasta. So why not just use, you know, the gluten free that. And she's like, I did think about that after the fact. But and so instant as products are getting better and as your products have always been that way, it does make it easier on the kitchen, whether you're a home kitchen or you're a food service kitchen. And you mentioned at the very beginning that you are getting back into food service. And and I know when we chatted, what, like, a month ago, two months ago, you're like, yeah.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:10:23]:
I had this whole thing going, and then COVID nineteen hit. So can you talk a little bit about your food service program and with your all of your products? And talk about what kind of products you have. You mentioned meatballs.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:10:36]:
Yes. Well, we are getting into food service again, which is very exciting. We have distribution through Dott. Mhmm. And so if you're not familiar with Dott, your, distributor would be very familiar with Dott. Okay. Doesn't matter who you're ordering from. It could be a small local, regional distributor, or it could be a Shamrock or Sysco or US Foods.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:11:08]:
All of those companies buy, can buy through DOT. It's DOT. And they are, like a redistributor. And what it does is it allows your restaurant or your hotel or, your events if you're a caterer, you can buy one case at a time of a specialty item or something that's not so special, but your, your distributor doesn't stock it full time. Okay. And if it's an in stock item at DOT, which several of our products are, you can get that case in three days from anywhere in The US. So it and it's not you think of an upcharge, but it's really, for us, it's we pay a price to go in, and the distributor pays, but the distributor's paying like they're getting it from us. Anyway, that's it might be too much detail.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:12:11]:
I I I tend to do that. It's great because you're not paying more, and it makes it super convenient. So whatever the I can give you a distributed distributor landed price, and then whatever your markup is from that distributor or margin, whatever, you can add that to it and you'll know exactly what you're you're paying. So it's it's really been an amazing thing to let us reach all these people that before we couldn't even imagine, like, setting up small distributors in North Carolina, or we couldn't imagine catering setting up a distributor in, you know, Minnesota or Chicago, whatever. Now it's like anybody anywhere can get it, and it's fun to watch our stuff. Yeah? Oh, somebody's in Florida is using our breakfast sausage. Oh, Patagonia is using our, you know, breakfast sausage and broth. Like, that's fine.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:13:07]:
No. That's great. And I yeah. Because I know I'm in North Carolina, and I can't get it at a grocery store here. But, and I know a couple people were chatting about it on Instagram earlier. Where how do they find you, or how

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:13:20]:
do they get your product? You can ask

Tracy Stuckrath [00:13:23]:
If I'm just a regular consumer, I guess.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:13:25]:
If I'm a regular consumer, probably the easiest way to do it is go online and order it. And it depends on where you are. But if you're, in the Western US, Natural Grocers by Vitamin Cottage has it in all of their 65 stores. Wow. Okay. All of our, products. And then, you know, fine retailers. So in Texas, Central Markets has it.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:13:50]:
In, California, Berkeley Bowl or Bristol Farms or Molly Stones or, you know, like smaller specialty markets, natural food stores, natural co ops.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:14:02]:
Okay.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:14:02]:
All of those kind of stores have it.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:14:06]:
There's one restaurant in Denver, Just Be Kitchen. You need to make sure that you've got your sausage in there because they are a paleo restaurant. They're right on

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:14:14]:
Cool.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:14:14]:
Fifteenth and near Central. My niece used to work there. Delicious restaurant. And they that's they're I don't know what where they get their service from currently, but it would be great. Now what how did, I know you've got you're you've recently been diagnosed with and with the dairy intolerance. Is that right?

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:14:38]:
Yes. It is an intolerance. It's not an allergy. Mhmm. But, I think I've had it actually my whole life, and, it's, it was kind of a weird way I came about it, which I won't bore you with. But, the fact of the matter is is if I have any dairy at all, I will get the next day a a major headache that is I can't really get out of bed. I guess it's very similar to a migraine. I've never I've never thought I had those.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:15:13]:
But, and that's only after I have cleared it out of my system Uh-huh. And, it's been three years now. So, I was having a reaction to dairy on a regular basis, but I was taking Advil or Tylenol or And every day of my life since I was about 15. Wow. And, then several years ago, I ended up with a, well, here I am telling you the story. I'm so sorry. No. That's okay.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:15:45]:
No. So I ended up having a heart attack.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:15:48]:
Okay.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:15:49]:
And, it was not a blockage or anything. It was called a SCAD, a spontaneous coronary artery dissection. And the I went to Mayo Clinic, got the, yes, confirmed diagnosis, and then she said, well, you're really a rare candidate for like, it's a rare thing, but you're you're not typical. It's runners. It's people like this. And then I started putting it all together, and I'm like, those people take Advil every day. Those people, you know, their muscles are hurting. And and I think that that's really I was trying to mask this headache that was always catering.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:16:25]:
And, when I stopped, and now it's it's so great. But it's really interesting, and intolerance can be very debilitating. Yes. And people don't understand that. And I loved in your statement where you like, like, no eye rolls. It's like people don't get it and they don't understand and, there is no diagnosis. It's not gonna kill me, but it'll put me out for two days. You know? It's like Yeah.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:16:56]:
And that's a big deal to anybody in their life. And some restaurants will be so amazing. Like, you call for a reservation, And on the phone, are there any dietary restrictions we need to know about? Right. That is, like already, by just calling to make that reservation, I'm feeling a sense of confidence walking into that restaurant that I will be taken care of, that they will be able to accommodate my needs. And other places, you know, you'll tell them three times, and then out comes this sauce where I'm just looking at it going, there's no way that there's not dairy in this sauce. You know, and they're like, oh, it's just a little butter. Oh, okay. I just don't need to get off tomorrow.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:17:43]:
That's all. You know? That's great. Yeah. So anyway. It's it's interesting.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:17:50]:
And then that that's frustrating. And I there's a story from a long time ago. Somebody said they were allergic to tomatoes, and they're like, so please don't put tomato on the sandwich. And then they put the toothpick on it, and they put a cherry tomato on the toothpick on top of the sandwich. And they're like, hello? You know? Because they just assumed this tomato inside the sandwich was the thing that was not necessary, but now you've just contaminated it with this other tomato because that was probably premade, you know, on the toothpick and done that. But so same thing with your dairy allergy. And have you seen you know, when did you start marketing that it was certified allergen free and gluten free? And did you see an uptake uptick in purchasing once you made that certification?

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:18:39]:
I think that we have definitely seen growth in our business. And I think that as we as word gets out and we're marketing to the right, people and they know about it, the more, and and people try it because that's the other catering, you know, especially think about the first gluten free things that you ate and how awful they were, you know, and, like, but people that haven't had a meatball in ten years, they're pretty excited about it. You know? They were

Tracy Stuckrath [00:19:12]:
so good. Yeah.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:19:14]:
It's We yeah.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:19:15]:
They were

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:19:15]:
good. So, you know, as people try them and then they're and we're just about ready to launch a new, German Frank and British Banger. Oh, awesome. They are also, fully certified gluten free and, free from the eight major allergens. Those hot dogs, like, are meetings. The German Franks hot dogs. They are meetings, and I haven't really eaten a hot dog in, like, twenty years. But now, I mean, they are so food, and people are just like, that was really good.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:19:53]:
Like, that was the best hot dog I set. A guy who's the catering, he's not he's more than he's the guy that decides what comes in or out of a major distributor in the, Northern California. And he's, you know, 65 and has had every product known to man forever. And he is just he tasted it, and he leaned back, and he's like, I think that's the best hot dog I've ever eaten. Really? Yeah, I know. I was just like, Oh, wow. But, and the, you know, the president of the plant where we produce, he had it, and he's like, oh, we have a winner. I mean, just it's it's meetings.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:20:36]:
And I'm so excited because people can eat really good food that tastes really good and it doesn't have to have There's no sugar in any of our products. No sugar.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:20:50]:
And that's why it makes it certified paleo.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:20:53]:
Paleo, right. Yeah. And keto and all that. And I think that as I was progressing, as we were deciding to really take this on as a full time business, when I realized, hey, we're paleo, and like my kids said, oh, we're paleo before it was cool, mom, and keto and gluten free and all this stuff, we just went for the certifications to give that consumer confidence, and customer awareness, that it's not just us saying it. Somebody else is going in and looking at it and saying, that's right. And their processes, everything is, totally, you know, on the up and up, and what they're doing is really clean.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:21:37]:
Yeah. Because those, those CYA statements I've made in a facility that also produces, you know, meetings, those aren't FDA regulated. Those are organizations companies just putting that on there to let you know that there may be minute something because, you know, 200, five hundred yards away, they're making something else. But so your facilities are a % free of all of those food.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:22:03]:
No. That's not true.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:22:05]:
No? Okay.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:22:06]:
But it's a u I think it's it's a little different when you look at, like, FDA and USDA. So USDA is all meat inspection. Right. And, everything from the second it arrives at the loading dock, to be received to the, time that is left the loading dock on the other end of the plant going into a truck, there is a chain of, what's it called? A chain of not command, but, it tracks the product through everything. The the equipment has to be cleaned to the nth degree. Every single thing has to come apart and be cleaned before anything can be produced in that food. And that's why the third party certification and so important. So not only is our plant a BRC certified, which is like a third party inspection for meat plants that are just like the highest.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:23:07]:
The the inspection takes several weeks. Okay. They go through every single inch of the plant, the offices, the docks, the they look at everything. They look at all the paperwork, how it's all the protocols are met. It's HACCP on steroids. And then so they have that third party certification. So then we have another certification that the third party certified. And when we the inspector came through and did that last time, he said, there is no way that your stuff could ever be cross contaminated.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:23:46]:
The only thing that could happen is if somebody intentionally sabotaged your product. You know, like Right. Rocking a little thing of gluten. Right. Yeah. But, I mean, he's like, there's just no way that it could ever happen. And that's even with the antibiotic free pork part of it too. K.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:24:08]:
So we source from 60 small family farms. Knock on wood, we have been super fortunate through this whole, like, meat crisis, that we were able to retain and maintain our supplier supply of meat. Mhmm. We pay our farmers a living wage. They get the same price year round. It doesn't matter what the markets are doing and that they can send their kids to college, so they can buy the new piece of equipment, so that they can maintain their barns and all that stuff. So, anyway, that's part of the process. When the pork comes in, that there's no the pork would never be mixed with something that wasn't antibiotic free, you know, raised sustainably, all that stuff.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:24:56]:
It's the And

Tracy Stuckrath [00:24:57]:
are the is the product mixture of meat and pork or, cow and pork?

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:25:03]:
It's all pork. All of our products are pork except for the meatball, and that is beef and pork. Beef and pork.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:25:13]:
Okay. Alright. Perfect. And and your farmers, are they within are they all in Colorado or are they

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:25:20]:
They're throughout the Midwest Okay. Okay. And geographically geographically in the Midwest. But because of like PEDV vegan, which is a awful virus that happened to the hogs in 02/2014 and just various diseases and stuff. It's better if you're raising on small farms that are scattered throughout so that if, a disease comes into a region or a geographical area, If one farm's hit, your other farms aren't hit. So but they have to be within so many miles of slaughter and all that kind of stuff. And the plantbased Temple Grandin facility, you know, disease, so it's all that Main. Yeah.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:26:07]:
Stuff. Yeah. And I've gone to the plant and, it was quite the experience. Service the hogs raise and the the slaughter, and I can just tell you that, I was so impressed, and I saw the kill floor and everything. And at the end, when I walked away, I wanted to go eat barbecue. And that is not the reaction that I was thinking that was gonna but people were happy. You know, the plants people were spread apart then. They stopped.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:26:41]:
They looked up from cutting. They, like, smiled and talked to me. And they harvest everything up to the pituitary gland of the pig that they use in biological research. Wow. It's just amazing. So nothing is going to waste. The only thing that's not is the toenail. Okay.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:27:03]:
I know. That's okay. I'm like, can't you, like, use that for a mortar or something? I I don't know. But, they it's it's just an incredible process, though. I feel good from the very beginning to the end. I'm proud of what I can give you.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:27:20]:
Yeah. I, a couple of years ago, I went down to White Oak Pastures in South Georgia, and I actually saw a cow, go through the process and get slaughtered. And when they were skinning it, I was actually that was so beautiful to me, the how they did it, but also the colors of the once they took the skin out, and it was multitude of blues and reds. And you would have thought, likewise, that I would have been you know, she's like, you're not passing out. I'm like, no. I actually thought it was beautiful, but it was done in a very humane way. And I know some people don't think that's humane, but I think it was done, you know, as humanely as you possibly could have done and. His slaughter facilities are on his farm, and they actually, are, Temple Grand and designed as well.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:28:14]:
So I think yeah. So if you haven't seen that movie, go watch that movie. Claire Danes is in it, and it's a really good movie of this woman who is autistic and designs helps ranchers design these humane killing facilities for animals. So, okay. So we're coming up on thirty minutes, in our chat. What and I just have to tell everybody. I did get Lori sent me products, a couple of months ago, and we're gonna we can't get for some reason, we can't, get the pictures up that I took. But alright.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:28:51]:
And then I'm just gonna interrupt because Mandy just got on here. We instantly watched the Temple Grandin movie, and I have such respect for the humanity of slaughtering animals. I so agree. And then Allison commented, she's like, I don't have allergies myself, but still appreciate being asked about allergens. My husband uses a wheelchair, and I find the best restaurants are always the ones more flexible when it comes to any kind of specific needs. And whether wheelchair or food allergies or dietary needs, I think that's so true. But the so I was talking about the stuff that so I we had the meatballs. We had the chorizo and the breakfast sausage.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:29:34]:
I know you said those are the ones that I can think of off the top of my head. Do you remember what else that you sent me? Or tell us what what did

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:29:42]:
you have. Did, like, bratwurst. We have bratwurst. We also have, Kosher Hot, which I don't think I sent you anywhere.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:29:52]:
No. Thankfully not. Yeah. It's super hot. Sells a

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:29:56]:
lot of beer, which is great. And then we have our Italian. So our hot Italian, mild Italian, and halal of the stuff, pretty much all of it comes in link or ground. Okay. So, like, you can get the breakfast ground or breakfast link. And, you know, then the breakfast links are small two ounce links. They're not really skinny one ounce links, but they're two ounce links so they look really pretty on the plate. And they're they don't shrink.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:30:27]:
None of our stuff shrinks when you cook. And you guys Yeah. When you cook it up, you don't get a pan full of orange grease that you don't get.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:30:37]:
No. We did not.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:30:39]:
Yeah. Super vegan, and it's so delicious. And we just did a whole batch of cooked crumble on that. And we can do for food service, we do cooked crumble on the Italians, and we just did some on the chorizo, which is fantastic. Easy to use in a restaurant situation where you can just pull it out. It's already cooked. It reduces labor costs, and then you just put it in. And you know what? We we have seen restaurants use our product very successfully.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:31:11]:
And the the main thing when they use it is if you tell people what you're serving them Uh-huh. They won't order it. Yep. You know, like, if you if you just say you're serving sausage, I would never buy that. Well, of course I don't I wouldn't, but but if you say that I'm using a sausage that is antibiotic free and it's certified gluten free and all this stuff and it's super clean and it's not as recipe or whatever, People buy it, and not only do they buy it, but they'll pay more for it. And you might restaurants might have found that, like, on menus with grass fed beef or, organic chicken or Mary's Farm. Like, if you just you and Mary's Farm chicken, like, I'll order that chicken. Right.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:32:02]:
Or if I know that I'm buying, you know, beef from Creekstone, I'm gonna buy that beef. So I think that it's really letting your customers know that you care, that you've taken the time Right. To do all this sourcing, and then you look at this beautiful menu you created for them. They will so appreciate it, and they will pay for it. Yeah. You know, because I will never win on this on sausage bids with the other with my competitors. I will always be way more expensive. But I'm telling you, people will pay for it, and they will thank you for it if you do it.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:32:45]:
Well and so when you what if you buy in bulk? So say your Mandalay Bay or a big hotel like that. I mean, does the price point come down when you're buying it for that large of a quantity, or is it still gonna be be I mean, I know it's gonna be more expensive than buying the the what you can find in the grocery store, but is it does do you have price points?

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:33:08]:
Oh, yeah. Absolutely. And it events, like, if if we're going direct to Mandalay Bay, if they're buying, like, a pallet or two pallets or a truckload or whatever, you know, there will be price adjustments for that for sure.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:33:23]:
And I think and and I just pops to my head. You know, they're very good on they're very big on sustainability, and so your sausage meets that criteria as well of where you're who you're buying your meats from for the product for meetings your sausages and things. But I know that we had my mom and dad and I had the breakfast sausage with blueberry pancakes and gluten free blueberry pancakes, and I moved I think I put the chorizo in, some chili. Oh my god. You don't really have we didn't have to add any real spices to it because the chorizo because we had the crumble, it gave that extra flavor that you knew normally do with adding a bunch of different spices to that, and it was fantastic. Exactly.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:34:07]:
Yeah. And I just took the ground, the chorizo this weekend and just put a pound of the chorizo with a pound of ground beef Uh-huh. Together and made hamburger patties and stuck them on the grill. No spices, nothing. I mean, the best, most gourmet burgers that you can make and with just slices of avocado and some cocoa.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:34:30]:
It was so good. Fly out to Colorado to see you.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:34:34]:
It's so good. I took I took pictures this weekend with a lot of stuff.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:34:39]:
Yeah. And and we also did the meetings, and I actually and I loved it because you had the recipe inside the label of and I don't have any of my labels with me, but inside the halal. And it was a lemon sauce. Oh, yes. Yes. With the meatballs. And then we topped it with one of your, co coloridian coloridian? Is that right? Coloradan. Coloradan.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:35:03]:
Okay. I can't do

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:35:04]:
it. Coloradoan. Yeah. Coloradoan.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:35:08]:
Capello's fettuccine A bad. Which is an almond based pasta, and they do pizza crust and things like that. And, actually, we just got the pizza crust in the Harris Teeter here in North Carolina. Oh, yay. That's awesome. I did. But we topped I topped the meatballs on top of their fettuccine, and the whole family ate it, and it was delicious.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:35:30]:
That's a regular meal in our house food sure.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:35:33]:
Yeah. Exactly. Alright. So how can everybody find you? Food I know we talked about it a little bit about twenty minutes ago, but if you're food service, you can find you on DOT

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:35:43]:
in the DOT system. Right? Yep. And, if you wanna email me, I can send you, like, a food service cell sheet that has all the dot numbers on it and stuff like that. Okay. That's probably the easiest way to look it up through. Okay. And then also online, the just muleys.com. Okay.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:36:05]:
It's our website, and I am putting up a food service page. We don't have enough today. I'm so sorry. That's okay. I will Coming up very, very soon. But I can send you our Excel sheet, and it it'll have both all the information on it, all the certifications.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:36:22]:
Well, send it to me, and I will attach it to this this page as well.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:36:26]:
Okay. That would be great.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:36:28]:
Thank you, Laurie, so much for being here.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:36:31]:
Thank you, Tracy. I really appreciate it, and I really appreciate what you do Oh, thank you. To make all of us feel much more, welcome and included in meetings and events. It's really meaningful.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:36:44]:
You're welcome. I appreciate that. Yeah. We it's it takes us a lot. My friend Marie Marie just said enjoy the show. So that's it for the day, and Allison and I will get pictures posted up on Facebook and Instagram, to show you what I cooked with mule sausage and products, and we'll post that sheet too for Dot. Alright. Talk to you next time, Lori.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:37:11]:
Thank you, Tracy.

Loree Mulay Weisman [00:37:12]:
Thanks. Bye.

Tracy Stuckrath [00:37:15]:
Bye. Thanks for listening to the catering at a meeting podcast where every meal matters. I'm Tracy Stuckrat, your food and beverage inclusion expert. Call me and let's get started right now on creating safe and inclusive food and beverage experiences for your customers, your employees, and your communities. Share the podcast with your friends and colleagues at our Catering at a Meeting Facebook page and on all podcast platforms. To learn more about me and receive valuable information, go to tracystuckrath.com. And if you'd like more information on how to feed engagement, nourish inclusion, and bolster your bottom line, then visit meetings.