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RE Botanicals Becomes the First National, Certified Organic CBD Brand for US-Grown Hemp

As you may have already realized, CBD (short for cannabidiol — a cannabis compound) is exploding in popularity and is showing up in an increasing number of food, beverage and personal care products.

Despite the explosion of CBD oils and CBD-infused drinks, almost all of these products do not contain the USDA organic seal.

Boulder-based RE Botanicals has bucked this trend and has become the first national CBD brand to receive USDA organic certification for U.S.-grown hemp. Given who is behind RE Botanicals, the fact that it has achieved this milestone should not come as a surprise at all.

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Expo West – Day 3 Recap

Sunday, the last day of Expo West, was noticeably much more quiet and did not have nearly the same size crowd as on Friday or Saturday. Nevertheless, I saw some fantastic new organic products, got to speak to a lot of interesting people and rounded out my two Top 5 Lists — Top 5 Organic Products and Top 5 Non-Organic Food Products of Expo West.

The lists will be compiled very soon as their own blog posts.

The only video I shot that day was with Minh Tsai of Hodo Soy Beanery, an artisinal tofu maker based in San Francisco. The video should be up within the next week or so.

Here are some pictures with several friends of mine from the organic food industry.

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Top 5 Organic Food Trends for 2012

I see these five products, issues and technologies making some real noise in the organic food industry this year.

AFRICAN SUPERFOODS

In the U.S., we are very familiar and comfortable with superfoods from Latin America, such as maca, chia seeds, and acai.

Yet, Africa has its own group of superfoods as well, and they are only going to grow in popularity.

These extremely nutritious, protein-rich and antioxidant-heavy foods, such as moringa (above) and baobab, will become much more ubiquitous and prominent in 2012.

I have read that moringa has 10x the Vitamin A of carrots, 17x the calcium of milk, 15x the potassium of bananas, 25x the iron of spinach, and 4x the chlorophyll of wheatgrass.

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Kur Delights, a Fantastic Organic Snack, Officially Launch in the U.S.

There were several highlights from last year’s 2011 Natural Products Expo East trade show in Baltimore.

One of them was staying at the amazing Inn at the Black Olive hotel, the most green hotel that I have ever visited.

Another was speaking on one of the panels at the show titled “Allergies, Additives and Special Diets” – the first trade show panel that I was asked to be on.

And another one was a memory I have of driving back home to New York City from Baltimore. I was absolutely famished and reached into my bag looking for a food sample that I had received at the show.

I pulled out a Kur Delight, ripped open the wrapper, and bit into it. To this day, I vividly remember saying to myself “Wow, this is amazing.” I could not believe it how great it tasted.

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Artisana Organic Coconut Oil – Why I Bought This Product

I don’t know why it has been so difficult lately but it has taken me several days to find an organic coconut oil that I wanted to buy.

Yesterday, I stumbled across Artisana’s Organic Coconut Oil and immediately picked it up.

The Requirements

There are three main things that I have to see when buying coconut oil.

1) It has to be organic This goes without saying.

2) It has to be in a glass jar As I have written about before, I carry glass water bottles to work and want to use glass, instead of plastic, as much as I can.

I often see several different brands of coconut oil in plastic containers. Regardless of how badly I want or need the coconut oil, I don’t buy it and prefer to wait in order to get something that I am happy with.

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What I Ate in Los Angeles Yesterday and Took on the Plane Back to NYC

Very quickly, my trip to California came to end. Yesterday was my last day in Los Angeles and I had a noon flight back to NYC. Needless to say, I had an amazing trip to Expo West.

BREAKFAST

I started off with a double shot of wheatgrass.

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Best Trade Show Booths from Expo West 2017 – Kashi, Stonyfield, Gaia Herbs

One of the most unheralded but important aspects of Natural Products Expo West are the trade show booths themselves.

Some companies put a tremendous amount of thought and effort into their booths, and I like to acknowledge those brands that go above and beyond what is generally expected.

As such, after each Natural Products Expo West, I give awards to my the best trade show booths. For me, the themes of this year’s winners were originality, artistic creativity, and interactive experiences.

Here are my best trade show booths from Natural Products Expo West 2017.

KASHI

What might very well be the most unusual but arguably the most compelling trade show booth I have ever seen was from Kashi.

Not only was there no traditional booth, but the company wasn’t even passing out samples of its food! Literally, it had absolutely no samples to give out, which is unheard of at a food trade show.

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