Our Top Picks Of 2020

by Karin Olsen / Plant Power Productions

If there’s anything we have learned from this year, it’s finding the “life hacks” to make things a little easier. But that’s often hard to do when you’re also trying to meet all of your nutritional needs.

Lucky for the vegan and health-concious community at large, more brands are stepping up to help the modern consumer with time-management with no compromise on taste or nutrition. Here are our Top Picks to wrap up 2020 with every-day staples that have been fueling us to not just survive, but thrive this year.

DAILY KNEADS

Statistics show that 192.34 million Americans consumed whole wheat/multigrain bread in 2019. As a basic food worldwide, bread provides energy for daily living, as carbohydrates are an essential parts of our diet to provide us with energy. But as we all know, one cannot live on bread alone, as much as we may want to sometimes! With any vegan diet, vegetables, or complex carbohydrates are imperative for a robust, nutritionally-dense diet.

The founders of Daily Kneads grew up hearing “Eat your vegetables”, yet with bread ever-present. As Michael and Bill Itskovich grew up and had their own kids, the idea of a “life hack” of having your veggies and eating bread too sunk in.

They brought the vegetable bread idea to life with three objectives: 1. Create great tasting bread. 2. Make an All-Natural product, using whole ingredients, no artificial flavors, and colors. 3. Infuse a serving of vegetables in a serving of bread. Their breads, bagels, and wraps come in a variety of colorful, vegetable-heavy flavors like Carrot Pumpkin, Spinach Leek, Cauliflower, Sweet Beet, and Roasted Red Pepper.

Today, Daily Kneads is selling their variety of breads and will shortly launch an Oatmeal Vegetable cookie line. You could say it’s become a “daily habit” for us to create fun and easy meals with Daily Kneads at breakfast, lunch, and dinner! As Daily Kneads’ motto reads, “Bread is the essence of life. Eating good bread daily satisfies. Eating Daily Kneads Bread gratifies”.

dailykneadsbread.com

FORAGER PROJECT SOUR CREAM

We think it’s safe to say that Forager Project has been stocked on our shelf throughout this year, simply because it’s just to easy to put their products in everything!

It’s no wonder that their products stand out from the rest, as each is well-crafted with simple, pure plant ingredients “foraged” in the most sustainable form for company of their size. Sourcing from Vietnam, the family-owned and operated company works with small farming cooperatives who produce the highest quality of cashews available.

**If you missed our Q&A with Founder of Forager, Steven Stephen Williamson in our last issue, make your way over to read up on his passion for foraging not only the business, but encouraging others to “forage” their lives.

Our current favorite product by Forager is their dairyfree sour cream. Made from organic cashew and coconut milk, their vegan sour cream is thick, creamy, and just the right touch of tangy, making it an ideal substitute for any traditional sour cream. Their Sour Cream is made with lactic acid, distilled vinegar, and probiotic cultures that gives the it that extra tang.

By using the same cultures as their Cashewmilk Yogurt, they ferment it longer to get that extra tang necessary for a true sour cream we love to top our bowls of chili and nachos with, not to mention the endless dip options we’ll sure to be creating this holiday season!

foragerproject.com

WAKEUP WAFFLES

In the spirit of making life easier, being more time efficient, AND not having to compromise on flavors, we are glad we don’t have to part ways with waffles for breakfast, thanks to Wake Up Waffles!

Think Eggos, only completely vegan, gluten, soy, and nut free, and maded with thoughtfully chosen ingredients like whole grain oats, golden flaxseed, and date powder to sweeten.

It has been nostalgic to pop these freezer-frendly waffles into the toaster and enjoy the smell of freshly toasted as they bake! The taste of crispy, subtly sweet waffles makes this quick and easy breakfast all the more bewildering to believe they’re so high in nutrients!

Being so allergen-friendly, our favorite part is how we can share these breakfast classics with just about anyone, no matter their dietary restrictions! Yay for breakfast!

wakeupfoods.com

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Vegan for eight years and vegetarian for many years before, Karin Olsen is passionate about living and sharing the plant-based lifestyle. Born in Dallas and raised in Tulsa, she grew up in cattle country, knowing from a young age that she didn’t like eating meat and didn’t understand why some animals are pets and others are food. Karin believes food is medicine and has a passion for helping people heal themselves through plants-not-pills. She is a certified (but amateur) health coach and Bikram Yoga instructor. After many years of working in PR and marketing in Los Angeles and New York, she moved to Dallas where she recently launched Plant Power Productions. The company offers consulting services in PR, marketing, communications, content creation, business development and sales. She has a special interest in whole-food/plant-based/vegan lifestyle, wholistic health and healing, sustainable living, and animal welfare.