Miami Living Magazine features the best Miami has to offer. Click on any magazine below and enjoy. You can download our free app on iTunes. Ideal for iPad and iPhone users.
Issue link: https://digital.miamilivingmagazine.com/i/757449
GOOD INGREDIENTS Ranging from Salted Caramel, Sea Salt, Velvet, and Black Truffles, each truffle is made with single-origin, organic cacao beans hand-harvested from farmers in Peru and Ecuador before being finished by expert Swiss chocolatiers. But the best part is the undeniably addicting creamy center. The delicious secret? Coconut oil. A sustainable alternative to palm oil, coconut oil is used as a tried-and-true staple in everything from beauty routines to cooking. The brand crafts each truffle's core with the versatile coconut byproduct, which has seen a renaissance of sorts in recent years. Simply put, coconut oil contains a great deal of goodness. Its production is quickly replacing palm oil, which clears a devastating equivalent of 300 football fields of rainforest every hour across the globe. Coconut trees, on the other hand, can grow in almost any soil and sand and can bear fruit for more than sixty years, allowing farming families to sustain their crop for three generations. Like all Alter Eco products, the truffles are made with ingredients that are Certified Gluten-Free, Fair Trade Certified, Non-GMO Project Verified, and Carbon Neutral Certified. FAIR TRADE Working with small producers across the globe, the brand partners with Fair Trade Alliance Kerala (FTAK) in Kerala, India for its pure organic coconut oil and additional cooperatives throughout Peru and Ecuador for its cacao. With the goal of making a positive social and environmental impact, each truffle helps provide fair trade premiums to support the advancement of each cooperative, its farmers and families, and communities. In 2015 alone, Alter Eco provided $126,133 in fair trade premiums to cooperatives for their investment and support in its social and environmental projects. Since 2009, the company has paid $1.2 million in fair trade premiums. CARBON NEUTRAL Giving chocolate lovers another reason to rejoice this holiday season, the truffles also aid in sequestering 100 percent of carbon emissions generated by Alter Eco. The brand plants trees each year, having planted nearly 29,000 trees since 2008 and 8,000 by end of 2016, within its cacao fields in Peru so farmers can cultivate the highest quality cacao. Each tree also helps increase biodiversity, enrich and restore soils, protect wildlife and maintain a rainy microclimate necessary for successful cacao cultivation. Compostable Wrappers Enclosed in 100 percent compostable wrappers, the truffle packaging is designed to help reduce the millions of pounds of plastics that are tossed in U.S. landfills every year. Each wrapper will also decompose in approximately six weeks and is made with birch, eucalyptus and non-toxic ink, all while keeping each truffle perfectly intact and full of flavor on shelf. Convinced to taste these good-for-the-earth goodies yet? Visit AlterEcoFoods.com for holiday gift sets and individual 10-packs. ML For more information, visit www.alterecofoods.com and follow them on Facebook: AlterEcoSF Twitter: @AlterEcoSF, Instagram: AlterEcoSF, and Pinterest: Alter Eco