When you talk to Sean Superkoski, he peppers his discussions with a sense of the by-gone hippie lifestyle, a granola back-to-the-earth feel.
Superkoski is a first time St. Albert Outdoor Farmers’ Market vendor and he seems perfectly at ease promoting his organic oils that go hand-in-hand with a healthy lifestyle.
Along with his life partner Emily McNairnay and his parents, the young Redwater entrepreneur is manufacturing cold-pressed flax, canola and hemp seed oil under the label Mighty Trio Organics.
“I believe this is some of the healthiest and most nutritious food around, and I want to get it to as many people as possible in the least amount of steps.”
He holds up a slender bottle of amber liquid towards the sun. As he speaks, two young women approach his booth. With a flourish, Superkoski pours the golden liquid into tiny cups and passes around a plate of bread chunks.
One young woman picks up a sample cup of canola and dipping bread. After a tentative bite, she says, “It tastes good,” before asking for a second sample.
One of Superkoski’s first memories as a kid was his mother feeding him flax oil. “It was rancid, disgusting oil,” he says screwing up his face at the memory.
But it planted a seed. In later years when the Redwater High graduate was knocking around Alberta’s oil and construction industry and travelling through Asia, his fascination with hemp developed into a passion.
“I wanted to get into hemp clothing — making, selling, importing. But when I travelled through Asia I saw what a popular plant source it was. You could make fibre and food from it. And I saw the food aspect as a bit of a gateway into fully doing something with the fibre,” he explains.
Pumped about the possibilities, Superkoski went to work for Thompson Valley Farms, an experience he dubs as “food oil boot camp” before attempting his own fledgling operation.
With the help of his father, a skilled carpenter by profession, Superkoski renovated a building on his parents’ acreage to food grade standards and brought in a seed press.
While the flax and canola are grown just outside Morinville, about 22 tons of hemp seed was trucked in from Manitoba.
A cold press is critical to maintain the high omega 3-6 nutritional content with oil dripping into a 30-gallon drum. “Heat breaks it down. You have to go nice and slow to keep the nutrition and flavour intact. It takes about 30 hours to fill a drum.”
The oil sits for several days waiting for the sediment to settle before it is bottled and placed in a freezer for a longer shelf life. “We really look forward to working with local farmers, customers and bringing diversity to the market.”
