Inspired by making marinara with his grandmother as a child, Michael Tesoro started his own pasta sauce business out of a small kitchen in his home in Windsor, Massachusetts. But what you'll find in that jar on the supermarket shelf is more than just marinara – it's a grandmother's love and a grandson's passion.

Michael Tesoro, who founded Ooma Tesoro’s, the gourmet tomato sauce company named for his beloved grandmother, is looking to grow his business. He currently rents a commercial kitchen and but wants to create his own point of production. While Tesoro makes his marinara sauce himself, he said he would be hiring additional people to help with the jarring and preparing ingredients with the growth of his company.

As a child, Michael Tesoro called his Italian grandmother “Ooma.” When Tesoro and his wife, Robin, decided to bottle and sell tomato sauce based on his grandmother’s recipe, they naturally named it for her.

Ready for a heart-warming-feel-good story in the middle of a deep recession? We sure were. When Robin emailed an introduction to her family business, Ooma Tesoro’s, we were awed by her and her husband’s resourcefulness and entrepreneurial spirit when the economy hit their family hard. Then we tasted her sauce in various incarnations over the course of three days, and we fell head-over-heels in love. We recently interviewed Robin and we’re pretty sure you’ll be as moved by her story as we are.

It’s hard to dismiss the current locavore boom in the Berkshires as mere fashion. In fact, the national enthusiasm for eating farm-to-table has roots in western Massachusetts. The nation’s first agricultural fair was held in Berkshire County in the early 19th century, and in 1986, when the country’s first two community-supported agriculture farms were established, one was in the southern Berkshires.