Susan Eminger isn’t sure how they found out about her sweet, stuffed berries, but the Food Network came calling this week and asked – without a taste – to feature her in an upcoming show.
And oh, they’ll probably be here to film next week.
“It just tickles me that they found me,” she said Thursday, preparing to send a dozen Eminger Berries off to Food Network headquarters in Manhattan.
Eminger, in business for just over a year, has patented a way to stuff cheesecake, Georgia shortbread, truffles and other sweet concoctions into giant long-stemmed strawberries. She tops the desserts off with chocolate.
She sells them locally at the Black Watch for $6 each. She also works in the deli there.
Eminger said she’ll appear on Paula Deen’s show, “Paula’s Home Cooking.” Deen’s sons, Bobby and Jamie, will be in town for a stop on their tour of regional cuisine.
They’ll tape from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Black Watch, someday during the weeks of July 3 or July 10. (It won’t interrupt business.) She’s got the filming schedule already. The first hour is just “beauty shots” of the berries.
Eminger has run her business as a one-woman show. She said she got overwhelmed with orders on Valentine’s Day – “I didn’t even grasp the scope of L-A. I way over-committed.” – but delivered make-up berries the next day, and everything turned out OK.
She believes she’ll be featured on an episode with one or two other Maine dishes. She heard from another gourmet who has been featured on the Food Network that business “gets crazy” as soon as the episode airs. And it spikes, too, when it airs again in reruns.
“I definitely have to get organized and be ready to hire employees and have volume” in advance of when it airs, Eminger said.
No word yet on how soon that will be.
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