Yesterday being a beautiful day, we took a 53 mile drive toward the Smokies
to the town of Dandridge. Part of the drive was narrow, winding roads with water on both sides.
Our destination was the small community of Chestnut Hill, the home of Bush Beans.
On one side of the narrow road is the manufacturing plant.
Len admiring a Bush Beans Ford
Walking into the visitors center is the gift shop
All varieties of Bush beans are sold here plus lots of other good stuff. We like their beans, especially the grilling label. The cost of the beans in the gift shop was lower than I pay even at Walmart. If we had a house, I would have loaded up. But knowing I have two cans back in the RV, I decided I really didn't have a need.
Every half hour a 20 minute video is shown telling the history of Bush Beans. The Bush family purchased land in 1904 to start a different business but were approached to be a canning facility. This is the 4th generator of Bush family canners. For most of their history they had an assortment of products. Tomatoes, asparagus, kraut, green beans, etc. Having not read everything in the museum I don't know when the decided it was just beans.
After the video we strolled through their little museum.
Now they process over 1,000 cans of beans a minute. Their beans are grown in North Dakota and Michigan. And processed by the secret recipe. Duke isn't even telling.
Len getting his weight in beans. Me? no thanks. I don't like what the scale says in pounds and I prefer not to see it in beans.
I would say I will get weighed when pigs fly..... but.....
Everyone is invited to get a free picture taken with Duke.
They also have a cafe. I would have liked to have eaten there, but it was relatively early and we really were not hungry. Later on the drive back to the campground we stopped at Outback. That was okay, but I kind of wish we had gone into the cafe and had their pinto bean pie.
Until next time......
Interesting place. Yes always keeping the weight in mind not over buying is the key.
ReplyDeleteWe love Bush's beans. Who knew they had a Visitor center?
ReplyDeleteOur last home was about 5 miles down the road from there, toward Sevierville. We love that area. We will be heading back to the area in Jan 2017 after our TX Amazon job.
ReplyDeleteAs many times as we have been in that area, we have never visited Chestnut Hill. Looks like a very nice stop.
ReplyDeleteGoing by the Bush's Beans plant is one of our memories along with the giant Florida Natural orange juice plant. Why we remember these things about food, I just don't know.
ReplyDelete