A few bites from the Natural Products Expo
Given market research showing that more people are replacing lunch with snacks, efforts to up our nutritional snacking game are a plus, which isn’t to say they’re a replacement for broccoli. Look for chips with pea flour, seaweed and other vegetables, not just potatoes or corn. Supereats chips all have kale as the first ingredient. Nud Fud’s green chips are made from bananas, coconut, sesame and spirulina. R.W. Garcia found a tasty combination with Tortatos, a corn and potato combination. Good Boy Organics from the Finger Lakes region of New York had Organicasaurus: baked organic corn snacks in dinosaur shapes. Beanitos brought out puffs in cheddar and hot chili to add to its line of bean chips. Popcorn appeared in many guises, including 100-calorie bags from Skinny Pop and Half Pops kernels. (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)
Here are some products that caught our eye at Natural Products Expo West before we got too bleary and too bloated from tasting to go on. [Return to Natural Products Expo story] — By Mary MacVean
Chia seeds made a splash a few years back because of their high levels of omega fatty acids, and now they, along with amaranth, kamut and more, are turning up in lots of foods. Kathleen’s quick hot cereal has flax, hemp and chia with its oats. Pure brand bars added an “Ancient Grains” variety with quinoa and amaranth. Yumbutter and other companies have added chia and hemp to peanut butter. And Blue Diamond Almond put chia seeds in its nut crackers. Luvo, with a line of meals and snacks made with an eye toward fewer calories and less salt with fresh flavors, makes a flaxseed flatbread and adds quinoa to its oatmeal. (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)
We tasted several delicious ones, most of them lower in sugar -- and higher in price -- than mainstream bubblies. “Soda isn’t going away,” said Steve Hersh of GUS (Grown-Up Soda). But it’s evolving. Seattle-based DRY Soda Co. has cucumber, juniper berry and rhubarb among its flavors, with short ingredient lists and 70 or fewer calories in 12 ounces. Philadelphia-based Sipp, new to the West Coast, began life as a cocktail mixer but outgrew that role and now comes in elegant glass bottles and flavors such as pear-green tea. (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)
Products range from cute little 80-calorie packets (Justin’s or NuttZo nut butters) to family-sized pouches. Lots of things that used to come in bags or boxes are being packaged in pouches that claim to be earth-friendly and cut waste. Happy Family and Stonyfield packed yogurt in pouches; other companies packed grains and beans. Farmhouse Culture in Santa Cruz uses them for sauerkraut and kimchi. (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)
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Water (still or sparkling, plain or fruit-flavored), oils (extra virgin, which in this case means cold-pressed) and just plain coconut were everywhere. What else? We spotted coconut granulated sugar, frozen desserts, butter-like spreads and shortening from Nutiva, gluten-free Coco-Roon cookies, packets of coconut concentrate from Coco Hydro and flour made from coconut meat, from Tropical Flours. (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)
Lots of it was dark -- very dark. Nib Mor and Righteously Raw showed chocolate that’s 80% or more cacao. Love Bean had a chocolate sauce made with coconut that forms a hard shell when poured on ice cream. And Cocomels offered chocolate-covered coconut milk caramels. (Gary Friedman / Los Angeles Times)
My personal favorite of the show might have been the brand-new New Orleans Iced Coffee, in individual milk cartons, with Blue Bottle coffee and Clover organic milk. James Freeman, Blue Bottle’s founder, said ready-to-drink coffees tasted “from terrible to horrible,” so he set out to make one that tasted the way it did in his shops. (Anne Cusack / Los Angeles Times)
