As you prepare for the holiday, add a Ron Hinkle’s glass pumpkin to brighten your table. The orange color will be enhanced by MountainMade’s natural taper candlelight. These natural candles also come in votive and tall pillars and are carefully created by MountainMade’s Heidi Haldeen.

Add a new food product to your dining table. Ordinary Evelyn’s Cranberry Walnut Jam or Thistle Dew Farm’s Cream Cranberry Honey will be a tasty complement to the turkey and dressing.

Visit the Food

Only a few of MountainMade products to enhance your holiday.

Bon Appétit!!

Wings are always popular and, served with Gourmet Central’s Garlic Wing Sauce, will quickly disappear.

Dips and spreads satisfy the choosy snacker when served with chips, veggies or crackers.  Ordinary Evelyn offers several dip mixes including a South Western Dip mix.  Or try West Virginia Fruit & Berry’s Cherry Jalapeno Pepper jam served over cream cheese.

There are many more savory food products to choose from on our website.  If you have any special uses for one of our products, post it to our Facebook page.

MountainMade food products for your tailgate.

The staff at Café Cimino Country Inn waits to delight visitors to Sutton, West Virginia.

Café Cimino Country Inn is pleased to announce that MountainMade will place a selection of West Virginia fine arts for sale in their restaurant and Inn located in Sutton, West Virginia.

This partnership is a natural fit for both Café Cimino and MountainMade.  Café Cimino is a place of casual elegance in the heart of West Virginia.  Owners Tim and Melody Urbanic have been supporters of the arts especially the dramatic art and culinary arts for many years.

“We are thrilled to offer MountainMade arts and crafts here at our Inn,” says Melody.  ”We feel that it gives our guests just one more reason to come to our little town of Sutton.  Over the years, our guests have shown their impeccable taste; they appreciate the fine food, accommodations and atmosphere we offer and we know they will also appreciate the fine arts and crafts that the MountainMade brand represents.

MountainMade, headquartered in Thomas, promotes West Virginia fine arts and crafts.  “Seeking new retail locations is one of the tools we are pursuing to develop a strong artisan base in West Virginia,” according to Becky Henderson, General Manager.  “Featuring our West Virginia artisans at Café Cimino will give their guests the opportunity to see how the art might look in their home or office.”

Melody agrees, “Café Cimino Country Inn has always been committed to promoting West Virginia artists and we’re excited about this new partnership which allows our guests to purchase original MountainMade works of art on display throughout the Main House, Cimino’s Little Dishes, and the Guest Rooms. We invite our guests to come take a little bit of West Virginia home with you.”

Melody and Tim are working with MountainMade’s staff to select the artisan work for display.  The artisan works will continually change with all photographs and two-dimension work changing with the seasons.

Café Cimino is located in a lovely historic mansion at the end of a quiet main street-gracefully situated on the banks of the scenic Elk River in Sutton.  It offers world Class gourmet dining, luxurious lodging and comfortable southern hospitality.

This event is the only in-state wholesale/retail trade show exclusively promoting handmade work from West Virginia artisans and gourmet food producers.  Arts organizations, such as MountainMade, have also been invited to attend but may not sell.

Friday, September 20, will be limited to wholesale only from 1:00 p.m to 6:00 p.m.  The Trade Show will be open to the public on Saturday, September 11 from 11:00 am to 6:00 pm.  If you can make it to the Trade Show, please stop by MountainMade’s table.  We’ll be on the lookout for new artisans and artisans we haven’t seen recently to attract to MountainMade and our exciting new website.

The goal beyond the initial trade show is to create a trade association to operation the West Virginia Made Trade Show as an annual event.  Association services proposed included a website with member listings and a like to their business website.

Connie McColley, a MountainMade jewelry artist, is leading this effort and can be reached at conniemccolley@pawv.org

The MountainMade staff spent the week boxing, wrapping, loading and unloading hundreds of West Virginia made arts and crafts. We are pleased to report that nothing was broken.

The Gallery is now ready for summer and overflowing with great gifts for all occasions – we’re sure you’ll be able to find the perfect gift for someone special or even for yourself.

The MountainMade Artisan Gallery is located on Douglas Road. After you pass the U.S. Post Office, take a right onto Douglas Road at the MountainMade sign. The Artisan Gallery is three-quarters of a mile farther along the road.

Let’s start with our yummy rubs. Our first rub is Copper Creek Classic Wet Rub. Copper Creek rubs are a combination of the finest herbs and spices from around the world. Your limit is your imagination. With this wet rub you mix the rub with Worcestershire sauce and Tabasco sauce to create a mouth-watering paste to put on your meat of choice.

Our second and third spots also go to Copper Creek Specialty Food LCC.

The Copper Creek Ginger Rub is made with a combination of fine herbs, spices and a hint of brown sugar. This rub is great on chicken but can be used for pork, beef and venison too.

The Copper Creek Tuscan Rub is also made of fine herbs and spices with the wonderful taste of rosemary. This rub is wonderful on any meat but it also gives roasted red potatoes a great flavor.

Our fourth and fifth top selling rubs are made by Uncle Bunks, a family-owned company providing family recipes perfected over many generations. They use the highest quality fresh ingredients in there products. Their Janese’s Steak Rub was formulated from a 50-plus year old family recipe. Delicious on steaks, beef or pork roasts, or chicken, the rub also makes wonderful beef stew or stroganoff.

Their Janese’s Southwestern sizzle adds an exciting spark of southwestern flavor to dips, soups and meat dishes. Makes great fajitas and western omelettes too. Yummy!!!

Now it’s time for our top five barbecue sauces. Our first and second barbecue sauces are by Gourmet Central, in Romney, W.Va., home to many specialty foods. All products are open-kettle cooked in small batches to provide you with “just like Grandma made” taste. Their sweet and sassy barbecue sauce (available in the MountainMade Country Store) gets our Top Spot. This barbecue sauce is a treat on chicken, pork or any beef you like. My kids like to dip their homemade chicken nuggets in this sweet-with-just-a-kick sauce.

Our number two spot goes to Gourmet Central’s Garlic Wing Sauce. If you like garlic and hot wings this sauce is a dream come true to your taste buds.

Our number three spot goes to Uncle Bunk’s Rustic Pepper Sauce. Their Award-winning sauce can be used as a dip for chips, crackers and cheese; a marinade for any meat; a spread on sandwiches — on anything where you want more kick than ketchup can deliver.

Our fourth and fifth spots go to two sauces from ThistleDew Farm Inc., located in Proctor, W.Va. In 1974, Ellie and Steve Conlon left suburban Philadelphia with one son, two dogs, a cat and two beehives, ready to begin a new life in West Virginia. Guided by their deep-rooted faith, the Conlons launched several agricultural enterprises and served as foster parents. The Quaker principle “… that of God in everyone and everything …,” has guided them in their lives and their business.

From this beginning, the Conlon Family and ThistleDew Farm have grown to include four sons, three dogs, four cats, 700 beehives, beeswax candles, beeswax skin and lip cream, honey mustard, bee beards, pollination and a honey of a gift shop!

The number four spot goes to Secret Sauce. Secret Sauce makes a terrific steak sauce and is a great complement to beef, and for basting burgers, simmering with shredded beef, or bake chicken in it or just try it in one of your owe recipes.

Our number five spot goes to West Best Wild’n Wonderful Wings and Rib Sauce. This sauce is great for dipping, basting and baking. Make your wings and ribs something the whole neighborhood will envy.

Now that your mouth is watering and you can taste the barbecue, remember MountainMade has the best rubs and barbecues in West Virginia, so start grilling!

Shown here: Gourmet Central’s Fiery Horseradish Mustard, Thistle Dew Farm Inc.'s Hot Pepper Butter, Miss Molly's Appalachian Salsa, and Gourmet Central’s Ramp Mustard all make wonderful additions to your kitchen.

At our MountainMade Country Store, we have many West Virginia made food products. MountainMade customers are dedicated, and once they get hooked on a food product, you can bet they will come back for more. For our mail order customers that might not have the opportunity to stop in and sample food products, I thought you’d like to know our top sellers.

So, here are the five most popular food items from MountainMade.com:Regular Pasta Chips and Sweet Pasta Chips by the Biselli Pasta Company is based in Elkins WV. They produce a full line of gourmet pasta products with several varieties of fettuccine, linguine and spaghetti. Their specialty pasta chips are delicious. Pasta Chips ingredients include: flour, tomatoes, peppers, mushrooms, spinach, eggs, cheese, garlic, sea salt, and peanut oil. They hope to introduce in the near future gourmet pasta sauce. (Yum. I cannot wait to try that.)

Appalachian Salsa by Ms. Molly located in Morgantown, WV. Ms. Molly, the daughter of a West Virginia coal miner and youngest of six children, cherishes the precious memories of her mother’s kitchen. Family and friends would gather around the table enjoying the traditional food masterpieces, warm hospitality, and fellowship her parents had to offer. Today, Ms. Molly carries on the tradition with the same passion and enthusiasm. Her kitchen remains the hub of her home where samples of her culinary works of art for her extended family and friends are forever in abundance. The hallmark of Ms. Molly’s products has been the creation of foods that combine traditional Appalachian ingredients with gourmet flavor.

Gourmet Central’s Fiery Horseradish Mustard and Ramp Mustard are two wonderful food products made in Romney, WV. Gourmet Central makes their specialty foods in small batches to provide you with that “just like grandma made” taste. Gourmet Central works diligently to promote local farmers and sustainable agriculture. They work with regional farms to create value added specialty food products and make their products with locally grown produce. Thanks to Gourmet Centrals efforts, local farms have the opportunity to sell products year round and bring a larger monetary return to their farms. This ultimately promotes sustainable agriculture in a way that is a tremendous help to our state and our entire region.

Hot Pepper Butter made by Thistle Dew Farm Inc. Thistle Dew Farm’s West’s Best Gourmet Line was started in 1989 by Sherry and Doug West of Parkersburg, WV. Beginning with the family recipe for Hot Pepper Butter, they soon developed an enthusiastic following throughout the country. The distinctive flavors of locally grown peppers and Thistle Dew Farm’s honey combined, make this a truly “down-home treat.”

The Country Store doesn't just have delicious food for your kitchen, we also have beautiful kitchen accents like handmade knives and cuttingboards.

What are your favorite MountainMade food and kitchen products? You can see a large selection of our food products on the MountainMade.com website.

My first and second choice for winter-time snacks are Ordinary Evelyn's South Western Dip Mix and Pasta Chips by Biselli Pasta. What are yours?

Well, it’s that time again. Time for snuggling in for the long haul as winter weather rages outside. The way I see it, we may as well enjoy this time of year by snacking. As MountainMade’s General Manager, I take quality control very seriously.

It’s a hard job taste testing all of the food products we carry, making sure that they will indeed appeal to consumers like you, but here at MountainMade, we take our jobs very seriously. I’ve done my fair share of product quality control, so I think I can speak with authority on the matter of the best winter-time snacks from MountainMade’s selection of food items.

Here are my top 5 picks for winter-time snacks from MountainMade’s West Virginian professional chefs:

#1: Ordinary Evelyn’s South Western Dip Mix. This is a no-brainer. Are your in-laws dropping in for a surprise visit? Don’t stress. This is a quick and easy snack to mix up; it’s great on veggies, chips, and crackers; and it’s an instant conversation starter. It’s also a quick conversation ender because everyone starts stuffing their faces. It’s that good.

#2: Pasta Chips by Biselli Pasta. You’ll enjoy every single one of these delicious snacks right down to the bottom of the bag. They are made with tomatoes, peppers, mushrooms, spinach, cheese, garlic and some other savory spices, and potatoes, and boy do they taste delicious! Pasta Chips are great by themselves, or you can pair them with your favorite dip (see #1).

#3: Pauley’s Pepper Jellee by Ms. Molly’s. Ms. Molly is somewhat of a local celebrity (more to come later on Ms. Molly and how she wows Martha Stewart), and her Pauley’s Pepper Jelly will not disappoint. It’s got a sweet undercurrent flavor with a hot kick to keep you on your toes. My favorite way to eat it is in concert with cream cheese, spread on crackers or celery.

#4: Papa Honey Bear Pure West Virginia Honey. Okay, I won’t recommend that you just tip back and down the whole jar all by itself (though it’s tempting), but I will say man is this good honey, straight from the mountains and clover fields of West Virginia. Honey has long been touted for its health benefits. Me personally, I like to add it to tea, put it on toast, or substitute honey for sugar when cooking. And my friend Mariah swears by honey as an additive to conditioner for naturally curly hair (I can’t speak to that, but you are welcome to direct questions to her regarding the benefits of honey on your luscious locks).

And #5 (drum roll please): our Medium Hot Peppers in Sauce. I’d say these are kind of in the same family as pepper jelly: a little extra umph to get your taste buds dancing around in your head. These are the secret to spicing up hoagies, left-over sandwiches, or scrambled eggs.

Do you have your own favorite top five MountainMade food items? Let us know what’s on your list and how you use it in the kitchen.

#3-5 are Pauley's Pepper Jellee by Ms. Molly's; the Papa Honey Bear Pure West Virginia Honey, and Medium Hot Peppers in Sauce.