by Carrie Havranek
From her former career in the pharmaceutical industry, Adria Lazur Kinnier ’97 knows her way around labs. These days, her laboratory is a commercial kitchen where she creates a line of foods for a very special clientele. Baby SLOP, the company she launched last year, stands for seasonal, local, organic puree.
Kinnier experienced her brainwave when she and husband Alex Kinnier lived in Palo Alto, Calif. When their children Claire, 6, and Carter, 5, were babies, she fed them pureed versions of local organic foods. Her son even became a Brussels sprouts lover.
“I started Baby SLOP because this was the company I wish existed when I returned to work after having my first child,” says Kinnier, who now lives in Maryland.
“When babies are experiencing foods for the first time, it’s a wonderful opportunity to introduce them to a wide variety of healthy locally grown vegetables,” she says. “By eating foods that are not over processed, they get all the nutrients and vitamins.”
Kinnier produces three different purees a week—sophisticated blends such as cauliflower-garlic or carrots-sweet potato-cinnamon—sold at Bethesda Central Farmers’ market or delivered in the Washington, D.C. metro area. Four-ounce jars sell for $5.
Kinnier purchases produce from the Bethesda market, all grown within 100 miles. She encourages customers to return the BPA-free containers for re-use. She also donates a jar of Baby SLOP for every jar sold to a local food bank for infants at risk for hunger.
At Lafayette, Kinnier was an orientation leader and biology teaching assistant. She also volunteered as an ESL tutor through Delta Gamma sorority. “I developed a sense of social responsibility that I have not lost over time,” she says.
A biology graduate, Kinnier says the interdisciplinary nature of Lafayette’s curriculum gave her a well-rounded perspective. “While I loved the in-depth study of biology, the electives I took in other departments provided me with a broad knowledge of the wider world.”