Did you know that agricultural cross contamination is a common issue in North America? In fact, it is considered so commonplace that the US Food and Drug Administration doesn’t require agricultural products to list contamination with other crops, even if they are a top food allergen.

Case in point: we are bringing out raw, shelled, unsalted sunflower seeds tomorrow as part of our new Fab 5 Products. Sunflower seeds can be cross contaminated with soybeans, corn and wheat. While millers/producers of these agricultural products have cross contamination procedures in place to identify and eliminate unexpected seeds/grains, the reality is that crops are taken off the field with the same machinery and trucks and are often stored in bins that previously contained another crop.

This is the same reason why pure, uncontaminated oats are controlled from the field to machinery to storage to milling. Otherwise, cross contamination is a real potential along the way.

Our new sunflower seeds do have a “may contain: soy” warning on them but this is also because we package them on the same line as our chocolate chip/chocolate chunk pouches (soy lecithin) and Energy Explosion trail mix (soybeans). We test ALL ingredients that come into our facility for wheat and gluten before they’re released to the production floor so you know that our sunflower seeds have been checked for that allergen.

For corn, we do not test nor do we have an allergen warning as corn is not a top food allergen. However, we will be adding a note into our corn declaration on our allergen declaration page regarding the sunflower seeds.

We provide this information to you, not because our sunflower seeds are more cross-contaminated than others, simply that we let you know about this potential cross contamination in the interests of keeping you informed about your food choices. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact our team.

It’s getting to be quite a frenzy around here today with our Fabulous 5 New Products Launch happening tomorrow. We’ve got a great deal on the new products so you can give them a try with your family.

The five products are:

Blueberry Maple Granola
Cranberry Apple Granola
Berry Delight Trail Mix (with sunflower seeds)
Fruit Explosion Trail Mix (with sunflower seeds)
Raw, shelled, unsalted sunflower seeds

Now, I had not yet posted here about the raw, shelled, unsalted sunflower seeds although it was posted on our Facebook page last week. If you have a peanut/nut allergy family like we do at our house, you know how difficult it is to find sunflower seeds that don’t have the peanut/nut traces warning on them. We got so many requests from customers for sunflower seeds that we decided that if we were going to bring them in for new trail mixes, we’d also offer them on their own. We also decided to leave the seeds raw and unsalted because it’s really easy to give them a quick toast with salt in the oven at home but many people also like to have the seeds raw for throwing on salads or into baking. I’m sure you’ll enjoy them either way. Be sure to check back tomorrow for more details on the launch!

By the way, wheat contamination can also be an issue with all agricultural products and I’ve addressed that in a separate blog today.

Another new item being launched next week is Fruit Explosion Trail Mix. Not only does this trail mix use the raw sunflower seeds that so many have requested, we also listened to requests for a trail mix without salt or chocolate. We’ve delivered with Fruit Explosion.

Simple and clean, this goodie is just raw sunflower seeds, diced dried apples and apple juice sweetened blueberries and cranberries. Throw it in lunches, backpacks, muffins, chocolate bark or your favorite plain cereal without adding additional sodium or refined sugar. Simply yummy!

We’re putting the finishing touches on our new products that will be ready to launch in mid-February. So far, we’ve introduced 2 of those new products on our Facebook page. We will continue to give you sneak peaks at those products in the next couple of weeks but here is what we’ve shown so far:

Blueberry Maple Granola: With tender little blueberries and maple sugar, you’ll love the blend of 2 Canadian tastes!

Berry Delight Trail Mix: This is our new favorite and I have had to hide the samples. It has softy and yummy blueberries, cranberries, raw sunflower seeds and semi-sweet chocolate chips with just a touch of sea salt. Sunflower seeds are a new ingredient for us… but we had so many people asking for them that it was time to give them a try.

Watch our Facebook page as we update posts several times per week. Don’t forget to give us your feedback too.

It’s been a long time since I’ve written a blog post and there’s been a good reason; I’ve been locked in my closet with SunCups.  Not really, of course, but not too far off the truth. Read more »

In last January’s enewsletter, I had mentioned that we had received many requests for products with sunflower seeds.  At that time, I asked for feedback on both the pros and cons after which we received several emails for both sides.

After carefully reviewing the feedback and, in many cases, having further discussions with the people who sent in feedback on the con side, it was evident that sunflower seeds would be overwhelmingly well accepted as long as they were  were controlled on the pouch line only (trail mixes, baking ingredients, etc.) in the same manner that we currently control the soybeans. Read more »