Try as I might, I couldn’t find any Top 9 allergen free snacks
at my normal grocery store on any aisle. I have a distinct memory of seeing
some somewhere… but I sure couldn’t find them. At least, not with a toddler
tagging along. Everything is impossible to find with a two year old. It’s like
you get transported through a vortex of “can we get that?” “what about that?”
and soon you have your cart full of Poptarts and sugar cereal and none of what
you came for.
I was forced to go to Whole Foods to explore their overpriced
yuppie aisles. This time, with my five year old. The only way to get him to
help with errands are if new snacks are promised at the end. None of the allergen
free crackers that were available were actually safe for my kid (Garlic! Why do you have to ruin EVERYTHING?) but they did have two more kinds of cookies. This
week-
We just got their minichocolate chip cookies, but they were
so good I immediately went to their website to see what other things the
company made. The first thing I noticed? They are running a sale all through
May to celebrate Allergy Awareness Month. 15% off! All of their products are
free of the top 9 allergens (awesome) and they have a wide variety (even
better). Granola bars, crispy squares (which appear to be square granola
bars?), crackers, crunchy and soft cookies. The most exciting? They have “cheddar”
crackers that don’t appear to have garlic OR milk in them. So, yeah, we will be
placing a large order from their website.
The cookies? My kid picked the mini version (cars, cookies, muffins… everything’s more fun tiny), and I was skeptical when I saw that there is a serving of vegetables in them. Hidden vegetables usually spell trouble. I was even more concerned when I read the vegetable extracts included (Broccoli? Shiitake mushrooms? Great for dinner, but cookies? COOKIES?) But, I reread the fine print and noticed it says “all the nutrients of 6 real fruit and vegetables” which to me just means they added some vitamins and minerals from mushrooms which I am totally fine with.
They have the most neutral flavor of all of the allergen
free cookies we have tried (mushrooms? Neutral? I know. It’s hard to
believe). They aren’t grainy at all, I'm assuming thanks to their gluten free flour blend of oats,
brown rice, potato starch, and chia. Don't get me wrong, the
texture is still different than a “normal” cookie; I don’t want to oversell
these guys and for everyone to be disappointed. You’ve got to bring a little bit
of optimism to any allergen friendly cookie. Really, if you did a blind taste test
these first any store bought cookie with wheat, milk, and eggs, you would need
no training to spot the difference, BUT their texture was better than other ones I have tasted.
Overall, I can’t wait to try more of their stuff!
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