PINE ISLAND, Fla. — Selling mangoes is fine, but Jean Sapp always wanted to do something more with the fruits from Promised Land Mangoes, owned by her and her husband, Chris. When the Florida legislature created the Cottage Industry Law in 2012, she began making mango jam, mango chutney and more.

 

“The Florida Cottage Food Law was passed in 2012 for the entire state of Florida,” said Roy Beckford, Lee County extension agent. “A cottage food is traditionally food that people can produce in their home kitchens and are allowed to sell for consumption, but it can only be sold retail – it cannot be sold commercially– so, things like cookies, jams and jellies.”

 

“The Cottage Industry Law allows me to make all of my products in my kitchen – my very clean kitchen,” Sapp emphasized. “I was excited because I wanted todo something with our mangoes, I wanted to make products with them.”

 

The couple have never applied pesticides, synthetic or organic, she said. Chris, who is a retired judge and semi-retired lawyer as well as a farmer, fertilizes, hoes and waters them, often with help from family members. The trees are well-spaced, only 25 to the acre.

 

“With the mango trees it is a wider planting so that the sunshine does get inside the tree and nourish the tree,” Sapp said. “We don’t fertilize our trees. We also have sea breezes coming in that carry micronutrients. Our trees are happy

trees.”

 

Like most farmers, Chris gets creative when he needs a piece of equipment. He designed a mango picker with a 24-foot pole used by swimming pool cleaners. He crafted a basket on the end and a razor blade – he puts the pole up in the tree and places the razor blade behind the stem. It cuts the stem, and the mango drops into the basket.

 

 It is difficult to lift and lower that pole, and 2-3 mangoes are about all that someone can pick at a time. A friend, John Bohanek, helps with the picking. In the beginning, Jean made all of the products at mango harvest. But it bothered her to be selling jams or chutney she had made eight months before. Now she freezes the mangoes and makes product year-round.

 

“I spend all day Wednesday in my kitchen, and I make the products that I need. I have a few weeks’ supply of everything that I have here but as I get down to just a few dozen jars, that Wednesday, that is one of the things that I’ll be focusing on,” she explained.

 

At their stand near the mango grove, Sapp offers half-pint and pint sizes of mango jam, several kinds of mango jelly jam, mango butter, mango chutney and mango preserves. Chris has about 30 beehives, and honey is also on the product list.

 

“The mango trees are self-pollinating, but the bees help – they are in the flowers, and they’re getting nectar,” Sapp said. “Because of their activity in the flowers and moving pollen around, it increases our yield. They make mango blossom honey.”

 

The Florida Cottage Food Law was passed in part because bee colonies had declined in the state. To encourage beekeepers, Florida dropped the previous commercial restrictions and allowed beekeepers to sell honey under the cottage food law.

 

Most states, including Indiana, Kentucky and Ohio, have cottage food laws, but regulations vary from state to state. For information on Promised Land Mangoes, visit www.promisedlandmangoes.com