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EMPOWERING PRODUCERS OF FOOD & FIBER
CapitalPress.com
Friday, February 5, 2021
Volume 94, Number 6
$2.00
RAISING RADICCHIO’S
PROFILE WORLDWIDE
By MATTHEW WEAVER
Capital Press
iri Erickson-Brown first fell
in love with radicchio while
she and her husband were
working on farms in
Europe in the early
2000s.
They ate a lot of the red
winter vegetable while in
Italy, where it is commonly
grown.
Erickson-Brown was
intrigued.
“What is this weird
vegetable that every-
body says is so hard
to grow?” she recalled
wondering.
Radicchio is a leafy
chicory, often used to
add color to salads.
And, by all
accounts, radicchio is
an acquired taste. It’s
bitter, which means
customers need some
education and recipe
examples from chefs,
said Laura Lewis, who
runs Washington State
University’s Food Sys-
tems Program.
“You may not necessar-
ily want to have a straight-up
radicchio salad,” Lewis said.
“But there are some beauti-
ful radicchio salads that you mix
with things like citrus.”
Erickson-Brown compares radic-
chio to a hoppy beer, dark chocolate
or coffee — the taste is hated by kids
but loved by adults.
“It starts out as something that seems
horrible, but then it’s your favorite thing,”
she said. “Radicchio is like that.”
S
Getting organized
Radicchio proved to be an important crop
in 2007 when Erickson-Brown and her hus-
band, Jason Salvo, started their 15-acre
farm, Local Roots Farm, in Duvall, Wash.
“For a farm that grows 40 different crops,
to have 1 acre dedicated to just one is a little
unusual,” Erickson-Brown said.
She and Salvo sell radicchio for $3 to $5
per head. They grow roughly 14,000 heads
in a good year.
RADICCHIO
AT A GLANCE
Radicchio (ruh-dee-kee-
oh) is part of the chicory
family.
Though it’s been around
since the 1500s, the
most popular red variety,
Chioggia, was bred in the
20th century.
A winter crop, it origi-
nated and is still widely
grown in Italy, which has
a climate and latitude
similar to the Pacific
Northwest. It overwinters
in the field and holds well
in storage.
See Radicchio, Page 11
— Wikipedia
Shawn Linehan
Culinary Breeding Network
Pacific Northwest radicchio
farmers saw all aspects of
growing, packing and mar-
keting the crop during a
January 2020 tour.
Local Roots Farm
Both photos by Shawn Linehan
Culinary Breeding Network
Farmers Jason Salvo and
Siri Erickson-Brown of Du-
vall, Wash., are helping lead
the formation of the Pacific
Northwest Radicchio Grow-
ers Association. They’ve been
raising the crop for 15 years,
ABOVE: A radicchio field
in January.
TOP PHOTO: Radicchio is
the focus of a new effort
to spark interest in the
vegetable from farmers,
chefs and consumers.
Lawsuit names Easterday Ranches in misappropriation scheme
Tyson Foods seeking more
than $225 million in damages
By GEORGE PLAVEN
Capital Press
Cody Easterday
PASCO, Wash. — Tyson Foods is
suing an Eastern Washington beef sup-
plier for allegedly defrauding the com-
pany out of more than $225 million by
falsifying records and submitting faked
invoices for more than 200,000 cattle
that, in fact, did not exist.
The lawsuit was filed Jan. 25 in
Franklin County Superior Court, and
accuses Easterday Ranches, based in
Pasco, Wash., of perpetrating the scheme
over a period of several years.
Easterday Ranches is part of the larger
Easterday farming operation, which also
grows 25,000 acres of potatoes, onions,
grain and forage in the Columbia Basin.
The lawsuit maintains that in meet-
ings with Tyson Cody Easterday, the
farm’s president, admitted to the fraud,
which it says he constructed in order to
offset more than $200 million in losses
incurred in the commodities trading
markets.
Easterday did not immediately
respond to messages for comment.
FOR A RELATED STORY
PLEASE SEE PAGE 11
“Over the last several years, Defen-
dant (Easterday) has submitted false
invoices to Plaintiff (Tyson) for reim-
bursement, identifying cattle that did not
exist; has requested and received reim-
bursement from Plaintiff for feed that
was not in fact purchased; has submitted
fictitious inventory records to Plaintiff;
and has otherwise schemed to defraud
Plaintiff in a way that has caused Plain-
tiff losses in excess of $225 million,” the
lawsuit states.
Tyson Foods is the world’s sec-
ond-largest processor and marketer
of chicken, beef and pork. The com-
pany does not own or operate feedlots,
but employs buyers in beef-producing
areas who visit independent feed yards
and public auctions to buy animals for
its processing plants — including one
near Pasco, which Easterday Ranches
supplied.
Tyson entered into a cattle feed-
ing agreement with Easterday Ranches
in 2017. In a filing with the U.S. Secu-
rities and Exchange Commission,
Tyson reported that Easterday provided
See Lawsuit, Page 11
Vilsack advanced by Senate Ag Committee
Committee hearing reveals what to expect from Vilsack’s second round at USDA
By SIERRA DAWN McCLAIN
Capital Press
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The
Senate Agriculture Committee
Tuesday unanimously advanced
to the full Senate Tom Vilsack’s
nomination to return as head of the
USDA.
Vilsack, 70, was also agriculture
secretary during President Barack
Obama’s two terms. The former
governor of Iowa has been a key
adviser to President Joe Biden, who
nominated him to lead USDA.
“It’s not lost on me, ironically,
that this is Groundhog’s Day, and
I realize that I’m back again,” Vil-
sack told senators Feb. 2.
Vilsack said that if he’s con-
Founded in 1945
by Farmers and Ranchers.
We still measure success by the acre.
firmed, many of his priorities will
remain the same as when he served
under Obama, but others will
change.
“This is a fundamentally differ-
ent time, and I am a different person
and it is a different department,” he
said.
Vilsack said his four priorities
will be climate change, food inse-
curity, competition
and inequity.
Senators in the
committee — some
in person, others
calling in virtually
— asked Vilsack
Tom Vilsack dozens of questions
over the 2 1/2-hour
meeting. Vilsack’s answers gave a
See Senate, Page 11
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