I’m very careful when I buy nut products, always checking to find the country of origin. A lot of nuts (organic and conventional) like cashews are grown in Asia and I rather spend a little more and buy nuts labeled as grown in the USA.
Peanuts are no exception.
Recently, I have been learning that conventional peanuts are very bad for us. A lot of pesticides are used when growing conventional peanuts, and there is even talk of GMO peanuts being grown to help with allergies. Ugh.
So, we’ve been eating almond butter, which is yummy. I’ve been buying Trader Joe’s almond butter. It’s not organic, but it’s delicious with no added oils or salt.
This week Teddie brand organic peanut butter was on sale for $3.99.
I love Teddie peanut butter; it tastes fresh and delicious, and it’s offered in glass containers. A lot of peanut butter is sold in plastic.
Funny, I distinctly remember disliking Teddie peanut butter as a child, it didn’t taste like the normal salt/sugar-laden Skippy and Jif because it was “all natural” – probably the ONLY all natural peanut butter available at that time. I remember my mom buying it in a large tub.
Anyway, Teddie peanut butter is made by a local company here in Massachusetts and the label for their regular natural peanut butter states that the peanuts have been grown in the USA. All good, right?
Well the label on their organic peanut butter is missing any information on country of origin. I checked their web site, and they state:
We are proud to note that our products are market leaders in the areas we serve. Teddie Old Fashioned Peanut Butter, the Number 1 selling natural peanut butter in the Northeast, contains 100% fresh roasted and ground, USA grown peanuts providing the most wholesome peanut butter available.
It made me curious that they didn’t specifically state that “all their peanut butter…” so I phoned Leavitt Corp this morning and she was very adamant that ALL their products were made with peanuts grown in the USA.
After I hung up, I was happy, but then my paranoia set in again. Why didn’t their organic peanut butter label state USA grown? What if the person I spoke to didn’t really know, and was only stating what she thought was fact?
I viewed their web site again, and noticed the caption at the top left of their peanut butter page:
For over 100 years, we at Leavitt Corp, purveyors of Teddie peanut butter, have devoted ourselves to providing our customers with premium peanut butter made from only the highest grade USA grown peanuts that will consistently deliver great taste. Nothing less.
That makes me feel a lot better, but I still wonder about their organic label.
For now, I only purchased one jar of Teddie organic peanut butter.
We’ll continue to use peanut butter once in awhile, but I think we’ll also concentrate on other nut butters, like almond butter, hazelnut butter, sunflower butter.
I need to find a way to make almond butter at home. I tried once in my food processor, and it was a failure. More googling is needed, but maybe I need to roast the almonds prior to grinding.