Initially I found this company's products a little disturbing: A slightly unhinged-looking lady stared at me from a jar of almond butter, and I couldn't tell if her expression was seductive or homicidal. And the company's name reeked of Northern California brainwashing -- "Living Tree Community." Wait: Is it a company at all, or an end-of-the-world cult? Is this almond butter going to be like Jonestown Kool-Aid? I really didn't know what to think. Every week or so I'd visit the nut butter isle at Whole Foods and return the crazy flower child's gaze for a few heartbeats, then walk away.
Then I read their webpage. Not all of it, mind you -- there's a lot of content there. I read just enough to become convinced that these people are passionate. Whether I agree with all of their views or not, they are clearly passionate. So I placed an order on-line.
Here's what I bought: Tahini, almond butter (not roasted), cashew butter, Muir's trail mix, olive oil, walnuts, and chocolate treats filled with almond butter.
I could go on about the virtues of these wonderful products for some time, but I prefer to be brief. Here's what I found: The chocolate bars with almond butter were amazing; the tahini is out of this world (I eat it on multigrain toast with orange marmalade); I've been buying trail mixes for years and years, being an avid backpacker, but the Living Tree Community's mix is unparalleled. (We all have our own preferences; since I tend to like a nut-heavy trail mix, I added the walnuts I bought from the Community to the John Muir trail mix, and that made it perfect. However, my wife likes to add the Muir trail mix as-is to her morning oatmeal, which makes it oh-so-indulgent.) The almond butter puts other almond butters to shame; it is in a category all its own.
Since that initial order, I've also bought the Community's roasted almond butter and black sesame tahini (which I understand is unhulled, and while it doesn't have quite the nutritional content that their regular tahini does -- at least according to the standard measures printed on the jar's label -- I strongly suspect it is higher in certain phytonutrients).
The Living Tree Community's products are pricier than their competitors'. And in my opinion, that's wholly justified; the difference in quality is undeniable.
Yes, the labels seem a little weird, and the products have a "cult-ish" feel. Ironically, though, it's all the other junk in the market that evidences actual brainwashing. These people are the real deal; they are the peerless non-conformists who set standards that leave the bigger corporations nipping at their skyward heels. read more