Meet Michael, Our In-House Product Maker

It's Whitt. If you've picked up one of the house-made jars or tubs around the shop, you've got Michael to thank — he makes most of them right here in the back. Figured it was time you met him.

He didn't exactly plan it. Michael started hanging around Whitt's Place, we got to talking, and one day he brought in a batch of something he'd put up at home. Folks liked it, so he made more. Then he made something else. Before long he was back here most days with a canner going, and now there's a whole shelf of it out front — all of it under his own label, Our Family Can, which he's had going since 2017.

What he makes

Most of it is the stuff he'd want in his own fridge. Pickles — spears and chips both — and pickled green beans that are good straight out of the jar or dropped in a Bloody Mary.

Sauerkraut that he lets go until it's got real tang. Salsa for chips or for spooning over just about anything. A strawberry jam with a little jalapeño in it that sneaks up on you. And rendered beef tallow — if you've never cooked in it, you're missing out.

Then there are the jalapeños. He makes them two ways — the sweet, candied "Cowboy Candy" and a hot-and-sweet version — and those have taken on a life of their own (more on that in a second).

Sallie, who you'll see up front, has a hand in a lot of these. Between the two of them they keep the shelf stocked, though some things sell out faster than they can make them.

You've probably already had some

If you cook from Chef Ali's recipes, you've run into Michael's stuff. His Cowboy Candy goes on her Fajita Rice Bowls and her Bison Stuffed Sweet Potato, and it even turns up on pimento cheese at the farmhouse table. The Hot & Sweet jalapeños and salsa land on her Seared Ground Beef Nachos. And his pickles stack up on her Next Level Fried Bologna Sandwich. Once you've got a jar in the fridge, you'll start putting it on everything too.

Come say hi

Michael's around the shop most days, usually somewhere near the back — you can't miss his display, just look for the Our Family Can sign hanging over it. If you want to know what's in a jar, what just came out of the canner, or what he'd put it on, come find him — he's always happy to talk about it. Grab whatever's on the shelf while you're in; when it's gone, it's gone until the next batch.