FDBusiness.com

Savvy Foods has launched a new range of organic and completely natural carob-based foods, produced from “the best carob in the world”.

The OzCarob line includes raw and oven-roasted carob powders; date, chocolate and gold original varieties of carob sesame spread; as well as raw carob nibbles made from kibble – or the dried pods of the carob tree.

The line-up is high in fibre and free from refined sugars, wheat, dairy, soya, saturated fats, gluten and palm oil. There are also huge health benefits from the products, Savvy Foods said, especially for athletes, growing children and those with active lifestyles – with the ingredients providing a good source of energy without anything added.

Sustainably farmed and naturally dried, Savvy’s organic Australian carob has claimed to be the only certified nut-free and allergy-free carob in the world, sourced from trees that have been selected and reared specially for their taste and quality. What’s more, its nibbles are the only ones on the food market in the EU, Savvy Foods said.

The products are available to buy online and the company is in discussion with various large companies about making the products more commercially available. Savvy Foods is now registered with a global ingredients sourcing company as the sole European distributor for the Australian-produced carob, and has fielded “enquiries from large cereal companies”. It also has numerous new products in the pipeline for 2016, it said.

Savvy Foods CEO and co-founder Jonathan Drury told FoodBev: “We have an exclusive Europe and Turkey agreement with the farm that produces the best carob in the world. The farmer has learned from his previous employer the special qualities of certain varieties of carob and selected five of the best varieties, to plant over 6,000 of these desert-dwelling trees. The Australian climate is perfect at currently around 40° and the processes are the highest standard anywhere in the world. It is claimed by the farmer it is the only certified nut-free and allergen-free carob facility in existence. This is really important considering other companies’ carob recalls last year in the USA due to their contamination with other products resulting in cases of salmonella. The reputation of carob taste is also on the about-turn – the taste is so good that the pure kibble is being sold as healthy snacks and the powders (the finest milled in the world) for drinking and baking [is being sold] via major retailers as well as to cereal manufacturers. Carob kibble of this grade has not previously been available as a snack in this part of the world.

“Since I learned about [the traditional spread] tahin-pekmez in Turkey 25 years ago and have made my own for all this time, in 2013 my wife suggested we take the product to market. The products became a success and then the Australian farmer saw this and got in touch. We were so impressed with the carob that we raised our profile, sold some business equity and gained organic status. All of our products are now fully organic, certified by the UK Soil Association. We now have an excellent arrangement as exclusive suppliers.”