From Saucier to Green Juice Artist: The Chef Behind Evolution Fresh Cold-Pressed Juice

For nearly ten years, Chef Mark Satterfield has been working with Evolution Fresh founder, Jimmy Rosenberg, to craft new cold-pressed juices that are delicious and provide options for every step of the health and wellness journey. Most recently, with the explosion in popularity of green juice, Chef Mark has created three new cold-pressed High Pressure Processed (HPP) green juice varieties – Coconut Water and Greens, Smooth Greens, and Organic Sweet Greens with Ginger.

Chef Mark visits farms in search of the best leafy greens and complementary fruits to develop a spectrum of Evolution Fresh green juices that provide approachable green juice options for the new customer and more varieties for the seasoned drinker.

Here Chef Mark reveals a behind-the-scenes look at how he created this spectrum of green juices and provides insight gleaned from over a decade of experience in juice.

Where do you get inspiration for new Evolution Fresh cold-pressed juices?

I’m constantly thinking about our next cold-pressed juice variety. In addition to exploring the local farms in communities near and far for the highest quality produce, I take every opportunity I can to taste the different juices available to stay ahead of our customers’ needs and inspire my next juice. Over the last year I’ve been paying particular attention to green juice, and taste after taste I realized that most of the options out there are focused on citrus and apple blends. For the new Evolution Fresh green juices, I wanted to provide our customers with something truly unique and approachable, so I looked to tropical fruits to add a touch of exotic flavors.

The two newest green juices, Coconut Water with Greens and Smooth Greens, both feature a tropical flare from coconut, cucumber and mango that allow us to put spinach and kale in the spotlight.

As you mentioned, Coconut Water with Greens and Smooth Greens feature new vegetable and fruit juice combinations. What is the resulting taste difference?

Our first two popular green juices, Sweet Greens with Lemon and Essential Greens, include celery as a primary ingredient which provides a more salty taste with a bit of a wood note. To develop a different refreshing, neutral green juice with melon undertones that allow the flavor of the leafy greens to come to the forefront, we swapped the celery with cucumber in our new Smooth Greens. We also added a dash of mint to amplify the cool, refreshing attributes of the cucumber.

With Coconut Water with Greens you get a great tropical-oriented juice that hydrates and highlights the leafy greens notes. Coconut water can naturally lower the sugar content of the juice when compared to other fruit juices, while also being hydrating and refreshing. When developing both Coconut Water with Greens, and Smooth Greens we focused on kale and spinach to get the dark green flavor notes to come through.

Can you walk us through your process for developing the new green juices?

With each new juice we are trying to achieve certain goals, and for Coconut Water with Greens and Smooth Greens we wanted to create two more approachable green juices with an eye on sugar content and nutrition. We then look at customer needs and produce seasonality before coming up with a new juice concept. Once we’re there, the fun part of finding the right mix of ingredients begins. Typically I make three different options during the creation phase, and from start to finish it takes on average a month of small tweaks and taste tests with my team to create the exact right blend of juice.

When blending the greens and fruits together, our creativity comes into play when addressing flavor gaps. For example, in Smooth Greens we needed to bridge the gap between the greens and pineapple, and to bring those flavors together we added just a touch of mango and mint.

Additionally, we visit and work with our produce suppliers regularly to give feedback on the produce that goes into each bottle of juice. For example, the same type of lettuce can have stronger flavors or attributes than a previous crop based on a number of variables from weather to soil content. And so understanding the seasonality of produce, and being flexible, is very important.

How has the new juicery helped to enhance your abilities to create new varieties?

Now that our new state-of-the-art juicery is fully operational, I’ve been able to maximize innovation and production of cold-pressed juice. The new presses and blending equipment give better vegetable yields and better control, which helps me ensure our customers are getting the highest quality juice and the burst of flavor they expect from Evolution Fresh in every bottle.

While developing new juice blends, what do you see as the next big fruit and/or vegetable to be included in cold-pressed juice?

In my estimation, vegetables, and greens in particular, are going to continue to surge in popularity in cold-pressed juice with kale at the forefront because of its nutritional halo. I have some really interesting new green juice varieties in development, so stay tuned for what’s “cold” off the press!