About

Say hello to berries selected from wild antiquity!

The Midwest Elderberry Cooperative (MEC) was formed in 2012 under Minnesota Statute 308B to assist small organic/natural farmers in elderberry production and processing in the Midwest. Our growing membership presently includes farmers from coast-to-coast as we develop a horizontal organization based on regional hubs that are coordinated by an integrated marketing effort to meet national demand regionally whenever possible. MEC is governed by a board of grower directors elected by its members. Its primary funding comes from sales of elder berry and flower ingredients along with some grants. Some of our members and friends also grow aroniaberries and/or black currants.

Wild Elderberries
We only grow, and supply ingredients from, native North American elderberry, Sambucus nigra canadensis. Wild canadensis elderberry plants are woody shrubs often found along roadsides, forest edges and abandoned fields. Their native range spans most of North America east of the Rocky Mountains.

Because they Taste Better!
Elderberries have higher levels of antioxidants anti-inflammatory nutrients than blueberries, cranberries and tart cherries – very close in total ORACS to aronia / chokeberries. But they taste better being sweet-neutral with about half the natural sugar as grapes. Native North American Sambucus nigra canadensis berries also taste better than their European cousins, Sambucus nigra.

Anthocyanins are the plant pigments behind red, blue and purple food colors. In American elderberry, 60+% of those pigments occur naturally acylated with p-coumaric acid—a small structural difference that changes how the pigment behaves. Think of acylated as a naturally reinforced pigment structure. Research has shown greater stability under certain heat, light, processing and storage conditions. That added stability matters because these pigments must make it through processing and storage. No acylated pigments were detected in the two European cultivars included in that study; the distinction is the structure and distribution of its pigments.

European elderberry contains powerful antioxidants that have been studied much longer than American elderberry, and most American products with elderberry on the label are using European or Asian ingredients. American canadensis berries possess a greater variety of powerful antioxidant and anti-inflammatory compounds, including those found in its European cousin.

American Elderberries are Safe to Consume Raw
Most researchers now agree that the  consumption of ripe American elderberries raw is safe for most people.  Andrew Thomas of the University of Missouri recently completed a three year research project that failed to find any significant presence of potentially harmful glycosides in Native North American Elderberry, Sambucus (nigra) canadensis berries.

European Sambucus nigra berries do contain glycosides, which likely is the reason for their bitter taste. That would be natural protection to discourage pests. The human body metabolizes those unprocessed glycosides into toxic cyanides, so over the centuries Europe developed proper methods of harvest and processing to neutralize them. This reality is likely contributes to why elderflower products being more popular in Europe than elderberry products.  In the USA, elderflower production and processing remains in its early stages.

Elderberry as a Commercial Crop
Presently, about 95% of all elderberry ingredients are imported, which means that almost all American made elderberry products use imported ingredients. Wild collected berries are considered certified organic by the European Union, which presents an economic challenge to American growers who must invest much more in their organic crops. Many of the imported certified organic European elderberries are wild collected, which European research has shown them to usually have lower levels of nutrients than the farmed ones.

Because European commercial production typically freezes their elderberry harvest unwashed and on the stem, imported elderberry products are usually more highly processed to deal with the sanitation and unripe European nigra berry glycoside issues. They may be pasteurized, fermented, or heat processed up to three days in order to make concentrates or extracts. They may also contain added potassium sorbate as a preservative.

Until relatively modern times in America, elderberry flowers and berries were mostly collected from their wild, natural setting, but small scale elderberry growers have existed for centuries. They used elderberries in a wide variety of products following European traditions for local consumption. The Internet makes it easy to search out the ancient and modern uses of elderberry plant parts and fruits around the world.

Sustainable & Regenerative Agriculture
All of our members practice sustainable agriculture and many of them are unabashedly regenerative in how they farm. Each farm and region is different, requiring different approaches to uphold these operational principles. Learn more about sustainable agriculture from this short SARE/USDA produced video.