Meet the ‘Bubba Gump of sweet potatoes.’ Farm kitchen opens in downtown Merced
In her own words, Angélica Estrada is “the Bubba Gump of sweet potatoes.” Her business, Sweet Roots Kitchen, sells sweet potato pie, candied sweet potato, sweet potato enchiladas, sweet potato chips, and parfaits and overnight oats with sweet potato as part of its mission to use local produce.
Estrada opened at the beginning of June as an extension of her family’s farm. The kitchen also uses produce from nearly 40 other family farms to make healthy breakfasts and salads to go, as well as weekly produce boxes. Estrada said she wants to provide healthy food and educate people about how to use local produce.
“I grew up in Merced County, and I remember being surrounded by agriculture and fields, but none of that product made it to my table,” Estrada said.
In addition to the restaurant, Sweet Roots also prepares produce boxes of misshapen or otherwise damaged produce for food banks or to be sold directly to consumers on Wednesdays and Thursdays.
Estrada’s family has been farming since the 1980s. Today, the family’s Sweet Valley Produce is a food hub which processes for family farmers as far north as Turlock and as far south as Reedley. Estrada returned in 2016 after graduating from UC Davis and after managing safety for several large food processing companies.
Though she didn’t expect to return, she fell in love with downtown Merced. Estrada signed her lease in February and began developing recipes in her spare time.
The front of her store has a refrigerator of pies, parfaits and oats, as well as a couple tables to eat the kitchen’s typically to-go lunches. Down the hall is a kitchen with stoves, fryers and a large walk-in refrigerator where salads and wraps are prepared fresh.
Damaged produce still tastes good
Estrada said Sweet Roots Kitchen uses produce that doesn’t meet aesthetic standards to be sold in stores, reducing food waste and helping farmers. She pointed to a sweet potato that had been damaged by a harvester and couldn’t be sold but was able to be used in sweet potato puree.
“Last week, we had a farmer who couldn’t go to Los Angeles to their regular farmers’ markets because of the protests and such. So they were going to get stuck with all this product,” Estrada said. “We were able to buy it from them and put it into our produce boxes. So that’s the other thing about Sweet Roots Kitchen is that we want to be a solution for farmers as well.”
Those produce boxes are distributed to food banks through the Farms Together program — over 400 boxes last week — as well as sold directly to consumers on Wednesdays and Thursdays. This week’s box included strawberries, lettuce, beets, squash, nectarines and onions
Estrada also provides kitchen time to other small farmers to produce their own packaged goods. She said many larger food processors have minimum quantities that are too large for family farms.
Tamika Dungy, the owner of neighboring Accelerate Performance Personal Training, said she recommends the food to her clients.
“I’m really excited now that it’s healthy compared to what we had before. So if I or my client wants healthy snacks, now I can refer them back [compared] to before where I’m like, “Yeah, go get a taco. I’m not having you come back here,’” Dungy said. “My whole family has tried pretty much everything that she has, so it’s good.”
Estrada hopes in the future to have retail space for farmers’ products and to add more processing ability. Sweet Roots Kitchen is open 9 a.m.-5 p.m at 828 W Main St.
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This story was originally published June 22, 2025 at 2:47 PM.