About Char's Kitchen

My name is Charlene (Char) Barrie, and I have lived in the Turton, SD area for over 30 years on a farm with my husband Rolland Barrie. I have enjoyed baking, gardening and canning all my life. In June of 1995, there was a flea market in town and so I took some baked goods and some of my homemade jelly in to sell. As I was getting the jars ready that night, my daughter Glenda was complaining of the way they looked so boring. The jelly was in baby food jars, and I had written on a piece of paper the name of the jelly and then taped it to the jar (at that time, I only had a few flavors). She was the one who came up with the idea of decorating the tops with material and a bow, and then later making computer labels. After the flea market was over, I had several calls from people wondering if I could make them more jelly and baked goods. So I started making more and now I have 16 regular flavors and 5 sugar free flavors of jelly along with 7 flavors of syrup, honey, 5 types of pickles and 2 types of salsa. Needless to say, I had to get something besides baby food jars! In June of 1998, just after 3 years, I had to expand into my own 14x28 "jelly house" which is located on our family farm. It's all temperature controlled, just like my own kitchen but bigger! Besides the making of the products, there is also material and ribbon that needs to be cut and applied to each jar top and then the labels too. Jelly is now made year around.Read their story