We want to be proud of the ingredients we use in our MacroBars and Macrotreats, so we favor small growers and farms that care for their workers and the environment. Most of our ingredients are organic and our growers abide by sustainable farming techniques and fair labor conditions. It is our hope that when you purchase our products, you will feel as good as we do about supporting the companies, that provide us with high quality, healthy ingredients. Because we want to know where our food comes from we believe that you will too.

We buy most of our nut butters (organic peanut butter, organic tahini, cashew butter and almond butter) from East Wind Nut Butters.

East Wind Community was founded in 1973 and is located on 1045 acres of woods, hills and meadows in the Missouri Ozarks. Their buildings are scattered on a ridge that runs from north to south. The south end of the ridge overlooks a beautiful valley, fields, the tree line of the creek, and the densely wooded hills beyond. Their water source is their well, which taps a deep aquifer and is capable of serving the needs of a village size population. They practice an ecologically sound lifestyle. Sharing resources, and living and working in the same place means less pollution and trash, and natural waste is composted. Some heating needs are met with wood and solar energy, but most of the energy comes from conventional sources. Significant amounts of food is purchased from organic and cooperative sources.

East Wind has a large herb garden (1/8 acre), with more than 70 different medicinal and culinary herbs. Besides drying herbs, they make more than 50 different kinds of tinctures from the herb garden and from wild crafted herbs. They have 850 acres of oak-hickory forest and have established a sustainable forestry program based on individual tree selection and "low-grading" harvesting for their use only.

As an egalitarian community the members all live, work and play together. They communally run the business and in return receive housing, food and medical care. It certainly sounds like utopia where time stands still, although a lot of hard work is involved. "A place where people get what they need, give what they can, and don't obsess over accumulating stuff." National Geographic captured the atmosphere well. "On a chilly Wednesday night someone builds a bonfire on the crest of the hill just outside the music room. Drawn to the blaze, a dozen men and women pound on drums with a mesmerizing beat. As the flames light up their faces and sparks flit like fireflies into the darkness, the hours slowly disappear—and so does the beer. After a while the drumming peters out, then stops. Someone asks what time it is. But no one is wearing a watch."

We purchase our Organic Cashew Butter from Once Again Nut Butters. It was founded in 1976, as a worker cooperative dedicated to supporting organic and sustainable farming practices, with the goal of providing the natural products industry with a tasty, healthy, and nutritious peanut butter. In 1981, Once Again Nut Butter purchased and renovated a turn of the century industrial building first used for silk production. Once Again is one of the largest employers in a village of just over 1,300 people in Nunda, NY, south of Rochester. They pride themselves on providing the health-conscious consumer with products of superior quality and integrity.

In their own words they "offer a healthier alternative where every customer matters" and so do animals. An abandoned raccoon was adopted and became the company mascot.

We buy our 100% certified organic and Fair Trade cacao from Sweet Earth Chocolate. Sweet Earth Chocolates was founded in 2004 by Tom Neuhaus and his sister Joanne Currie. We support their efforts to improve working conditions for small growers. Visit their blog to learn about their trips in 2008 to Ghana and the Cote D' Ivoire and to learn more about their accomplishments. The following information is provided by Sweet Earth Chocolate to further illustrate the conditions on cocoa plantations.

Chocolate that's better for the earth
Consuming chocolate made from organically grown cocoa is one giant step toward reducing our dependence on petroleum-based agricultural inputs while supporting small growers who intercrop, growing as many as 6 crops on one small plot. This is a stark contrast with plantation-style growing, where the rain forest is cut down to permit mono-cropping and petroleum-based agricultural chemicals are commonly used. We believe that the environment has been damaged enough by these POPs (persistent organic pollutants) that kill our lakes and streams. By selling organic chocolate, we are encouraging cocoa growers to find other ways to combat plant diseases.

Chocolate that's better for the people
Fair Trade certification is a guarantee to processors, handlers, retailers and consumers, that the cocoa beans used in this chocolate were produced in a way that does no social harm. The U.S. State Department estimates that over 15,000 child-slaves work on plantations in the Ivory Coast. They have been kidnapped or sold by their parents to work from age 8 on cutting cocoa pods from trees and processing them, often at the end of a whip. In other countries of West Africa, children work with deadly chemicals, applying pesticides and fungicides to trees without wearing protective garments and without proper training. Unfortunately, some of the cocoa used in popular confections, the chocolate you eat every day, is grown and harvested under such conditions. Fair Trade certification guarantees that you are not an unwitting participant in this very inhumane situation. Fair Trade-certified cocoa only comes from certified farmers' cooperatives, organized to strengthen their farmer-members economically so they can provide for their families and educate their children.

Currently, their beans come from either the Dominican Republic, Peru or Costa Rica, the only countries in the world where there are farmers' cooperatives that are certified organic and Fair Trade. In the meantime, a portion of our profits from our chocolate bars will go to support West African cooperatives in their efforts to become organic.

All our raisins are hand-picked and hand harvested by the Hansen Family at Running Quail Ranch in Central California. They are 100% organic and certified by International Certification Sources. Dick Hansen has told us that they only use their picking machine when hand labor is not available, and they make their raisins today following the practices of their grandparents. We feel privileged to be able to purchase our raisins from them and we have included below the 100 year old history of their ranch.

RUNNING QUAIL RANCH
It’s history, It’s foundation

Late 1890s This is the Pollard home, built in 1908, and it is still standing today with the 60 acres all planted to Thompson Grapes. Granddad planted his first vines in 1912. This was the start of my family’s “Raisins” from my mother’s heritage.





1923 I was born this year, the first of five sons. My father and mother were a great team. They “pulled well” together. My father, the farming master; my mother, the visionary. Over the next 20 years, with love and work and five sons, our family prospered. My farming heritage from my father blossomed.








1958 the birth of Running Quail Ranch. We had been farming eighty acres of vineyard, but this year we leased 5,000 acres of foothill grazing land and started a 100-head cow/calf operation along with our eighty acres of vineyards. June named our farmland the “Running Quail Ranch” because of the abundance of Valley Quail who called it home.

1988 Mr. Bonner of Bonner Packing Company asked if I could make organic raisins for his company. He liked the organic concept for growing food and explained the concept of certified organic food. We have been farming organic since 1990.

Our farming heritage of “Raisins” spans nearly one hundred years. Our land is in the Raisin heartland of California. Our “Raisins” are the finest that we, with Mother Nature, can produce each year.


Enjoy our “Organic” Estate Packed:
“Running Quail Raisins”
C. Dick Hansen

We buy our oats from Gluten Free Oats in Powell, Wyoming. Founded by a family who has three generations of people with celiac disease. They are the first company in the US to offer "Safe" oats to the celiac community. They understand the importance of avoiding cross-contamination from wheat, rye or barley, and their oats are tested to be below 10 parts per million(ppm) by the Univesity of Nebraska FARRP Laboratory.

The son of the family who grows and manufactures these oats was diagnosed with celiac at the age of 2 1/2. His parents didn't let him eat wheat but he ate the oats they grew in another field. Sometimes he grew sick. As a freshman in high school, he was doing his Future Farmers of America project on no-bake cookies, when he realized that oats are contaminated by growing in fields next to fields of wheat. After searching for three months he found a source of oats he could eat and then started to roll and package the oats himself. He marketed these oats to his local celiac support group. These oats were so popular that this small endeavor grew into a family business.

Sprout Revolution™, sprouted flax seed powder, is one of the most powerful food sources on the market today. It is marketed by Pura Vida, Inc., a family owned company, dedicated to providing the highest quality health and nutritional products in the U.S. Their production facilities and products are GMP compliant and certified organic through OCCP-Pro Certification.

Their years of research and expertise in sprouting have resulted in the highest nutritional and most bio-available (quickly absorbed) flax powder on the market. Pura Vida, Inc., is changing the way the world looks at flax and other sprouted products soon to be available under the Sprout Revolution brand.

Visit us at www.sproutrevolution.com or www.puravidaproducts.com