Pasta Therapy, 3 other Sacramento-area companies named Good Food Award finalists
The sustainability-focused Good Food Foundation announced its last groups of finalists for this year’s Good Food Awards, and multiple capital region producers received new and repeat honors.
After announcing finalists in most categories in January, the Good Food Awards shared its list of 26 nominees in the grains and oils categories on Friday. Four producers from the Sacramento region, spanning from Capay Valley to Lodi, were named finalists in this year’s awards.
Oil mills Calivirgin and La Tourangelle, Capay-based Grumpy Goats Farm were honored once again, while pasta company Big River Provisions — best known in Sacramento as Pasta Therapy — is up for its first award.
Here’s what to know about these Sacramento-area Good Food Award nominees.
What are the Good Food Awards?
The annual Good Food Awards, held by the Good Food Foundation, honors the country’s sustainable food producers.
“The Good Food Awards recognizes that truly good food — the kind that brings people together and builds strong, healthy communities — contains all of these ingredients,” the foundation said on its website.
Producers are held to a strict standard regarding food sourcing transparency and ethics and thoughtful, responsible labor practices. Companies may nominate their own products among 18 food-specific categories — ensuring creamed honey won’t face-off with a rolled oats granola bar — each with their own standards.
This year’s competition is the Good Food Awards’ 16th installment, returning to its usual blind tasting format after holding a special previous-winners-only edition for its 15th anniversary in 2025.
Winners for all 18 categories will be announced on June 28, according to the Good Food Foundation.
Artisan oils up for awards yet again
Three companies specializing in high-quality oils could earn more Good Food Awards this year after becoming mainstays on the foundation’s list of nominees and winners in previous years.
Woodland-based La Tourangelle may receive another accolade for its signature slow-roasted California Walnut Oil. As one of the company’s flagship products, it last won a Good Food Award in 2015.
However, the business has a total of five Good Food Awards, with previous honors going to the walnut oil, a hazelnut oil and a pistachio oil.
La Tourangelle CEO Matthieu Kohlmeyer said in a statement that he and his team were “proud to see our California Walnut Oil be (a) finalist for a Good Food Award this year!”
“Walnut Oil is a wonderful oil that we make in Woodland,” Kohlmeyer said in his statement. “Unlike seed oils, the entire process is chemical free and all natural.”
Just a short hop away from La Tourangelle’s Woodland oil mill, Grumpy Goats Farm in Capay is pressing various award-winning olive oils, three of which are competing for a Good Food Award this year.
The business’s Spanish Picual and Hojiblanca olive oils, as well as its Italian Nocellara del Belice olive oil, are in the running among the oil contenders. Grumpy Goats’s Picual and Hojiblanca oils already have Good Food Awards from 2017 and 2021, respectively, while its Coratina and Italian Blend oils won Good Food Awards in 2019 and 2020.
According to the Olive Oil Times, an industry publication, Grumpy Goats is ranked the ninth-best olive oil producer in the world and the fourth-best in the United States.
Further south in Lodi, Calivirgin is seeking its 11th Good Food Award for its Calabrian chili olive oil.
In previous years, Calivirgin was honored by the Good Food Foundation for its Serrano pepper olive oil, jalapeño and garlic jalapeño olive oils, basil olive oil and lime olive oil.
Pasta Therapy seeks first Good Food accolade
The Sacramento-based Pasta Therapy, a Midtown Farmers Market favorite run by chef Jason Azevedo, has three of its “emotional support pasta” products in the running this year.
Pasta Therapy’s fusilli, campanelle and radiatori pasta shapes could earn the business its first-ever Good Food Awards in June.
On social media, Azevedo shared his process of going through the Good Food Awards application process. He shared updates as he prepared his submission, waited patiently as judges went through nationwide applications and finally received the exciting news that his pastas were named finalists.
In an Instagram post on Friday, Azevedo said he was “truly honored and grateful for this recognition.”
“Pasta Therapy is something special to me,” Azevedo wrote on Instagram. “It is more than a business, more than pasta. Every day I am allowing my self to heal and grow.”
What other California oils and grains producers were nominated for the Good Food Awards?
Out of 11 grains producers and 15 oil producers who could win Good Food Awards this year, 15 are from California — with the vast majority in the oils category.
California-based grains finalists:
- Big River Provisions/Pasta Therapy – Sacramento
- Mill Valley Pasta Co. – Mill Valley
- Pasta Santina – Santa Barbara
California-based oils finalists:
- Central Coast Family Farm – Grass Valley
- ENZO Olive Oil Company – Madera
- Grumpy Goats Farm – Capay
- Luretík Estate Olive Oil – Santa Ynez Valley
- Olivaia’s OLA – Lindsay
- Sunshine Olive Oil Co. – Templeton
- Calivirgin – Lodi
- Gold Ridge Organic Farms – Sebastopol
- La Tourangelle – Woodland
- Olive Truck – Emeryville
- Like Family – Carmel Valley
- McEvoy Ranch – Petaluma
