Salted Mixed Nuts

Healthy and delicious almond 'cheese' on toast with radish and green peas.

Try this healthy recipe for Halloween! Delicious cookies with almonds as fingernails. They are vegan, dairy-free, egg-free, refined sugar-free, paleo friendly and spooky!

This healthy and beautiful dish is delicious and nutritious! Eggplant stuffed with couscous, walnuts and almonds with a tomato salad - a great combination of Mediterranean flavours.

Almond & Peach Cake

Banana & Almond Muffins

Move over, water biscuits. These Golden Flaxseed Crackers are the crunchy, herb-flecked upgrade your cheeseboard has been waiting for. Fragrant with woody rosemary and finished with a proper kick of cracked black pepper, they’re light, nutty, and—dangerously—moreish.

It's time our kids go back to school! If you are looking for healthy snacks that are perfect for taking to school or after school, then this short list is for you. Eating healthy snacks can benefit your children in many ways. These healthy snacks will help your kids grow, develop and learn. To make your life easier, you can buy healthy snacks online and fill up your pantry with nuts, dried fruits, seeds, popcorn and dark chocolate. This way, you will always have some healthy snacks at hand. Popcorn Popcorn is a whole grain that is low in fat and rich in complex carbohydrates, making it a perfect snack for kids (if you don't add butter and salt). Corn has excellent health benefits for children. It contains a lot of dietary fibre, essential vitamins and minerals. High fibre improves digestion, helps avoid constipation, and stimulates digestive juices' secretion, keeping the bowels healthy. Popcorn also contains a good quantity of iron and calcium, manganese and phosphorous, which are vital for maintaining healthy bones and the functioning of cells. Additionally, corn is loaded with B vitamins, including vitamins B3, B6, pantothenic and folate acid, which are great for the brain and mood. Popcorn contains carotenoid antioxidants like zeaxanthin and lutein that help protect eye health. Nuts A handful of organic nuts or a serving of as little as 30g daily can benefit your kids in many ways. Nuts like almonds, walnuts, hazelnuts, peanuts, cashews, pistachios, macadamias and Brazil nuts are loaded with nutrients, protein and fibre to help children thrive and are an excellent fuel for the brain. In general, all kinds of nuts offer amazing health benefits, but every kind of nuts can also offer something special including preventing depression and anxiety. Walnuts contain high amounts of omega-3 fatty acids and DHA, which help fight inflammation. They contain twice as many antioxidants as other nuts, which improve cognitive functioning. Hazelnuts, almonds, pecans and macadamia nuts are heart-healthy. Almonds help improve your kid's memory. Pistachios are rich in oils that help preserve fatty acids and prevent inflammation. Macadamias also help in normal brain functioning. Dark chocolate Dark chocolate is a very healthy snack when consumed in moderation. It contains powerful antioxidants and flavonoids. Flavonoids improve blood flow to the brain, which can significantly improve memory and brain functioning. Veggies and Fruits Fresh vegetables are an obvious healthy snack. Packed with vitamins, they contain everything your children need to grow and develop in the right way. Dried fruits can be an excellent replacement for fresh fruits due to their longer shelf life. They contain all the nutrients of fruits but can last longer in your pantry. Your kids will love dried fruits like cranberries, dried apricots, cranberries, dates and figs.

Adding more whole grains and nuts to your diet can have an amazing impact on your brain health! If you want to keep your brain healthy, try to avoid simple carbohydrates. They break down quickly into sugars. When you eat simple carbs you may feel a spike of energy that will last only for a short while. High sugar makes your brain work functioning decrease. Replace bad carbs with good carbs When shopping for food and preparing meals at home try to cut out refined carbohydrates and replace them with whole grains and nuts. They contain complex carbohydrates that processed by your body in a good way. These carbs break down slowly and sugars are released gradually. That means the energy is released slowly and your body and brain will function in a more efficient way. Stock your pantry with healthy whole grains Whole grains, such as brown rice, barley, oats, barley, and quinoa are high in B vitamins and can potentially preserving your memory. Vitamins B help reduce inflammation of the brain and work to convert homocysteine (amino acid) into essential brain chemicals used for learning and maintaining memories. Whole grains are also significantly rich in magnesium which keeps your brain cells and nervous system healthily connected. Magnesium helps pass on the signals between your brain and body. It improves the functioning of the neurotransmitters responsible for attention. Add nuts to your diet Add more nuts to your diet. Walnuts for example, contain the beneficial Omega-3 fatty acid. Eating more walnuts can improve cognitive function of your brain and help reduce the risk of diseases, such as depression, type 2 diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and dementia. Almonds and Hazelnuts are great sources of vitamin E. This vitamin is associated with reducing the cognitive decline related to aging. Peanuts contain a lot of niacin. Niacin deficiencies are related to cognitive decline as well as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. Plus, nuts are also packed with magnesium! Tips and swaps for a healthy brain Here's the list of tips for healthy whole grain swaps and alternatives for refined carbohydrates: swap instant oat meal or ready-to-eat cereal mixes with whole oats choose buckwheat instead of potatoes or white rice go for bulgur and barley regularly replace white rice with brown rice eat more quinoa always have nuts & seeds near you for a healthy snack replace white bread and past with whole grain brad and pasta Adding more whole foods to your diet offer many health benefits for your whole body, including nervous system and brain. Move away the processed foods and swap unhealthy products with whole grains, legumes, nuts and seeds. Start adding more whole foods to your diet little and you will see the difference!

Dietary Fibre is an essential component of your diet. It helps keep your digestive system healthy, increases the good bacteria in your gut, and can even reduce the risk of certain diseases. The recommended daily fibre intake for adults is approximately 25 grams for women, and 38 grams for men, per day. For a more in depth look at the reasons you need to be getting enough fibre in your diet, why not take a gander at our previous article Why is Fibre Important? To make life easier, and make sure you’re hitting your RDA for fibre, we’ve compiled a handy list of some high fibre foods. They’re not just great sources of fibre, but also healthy, tasty, and satisfying – so without further ado, let’s get on with the list! Nuts First up on the list, is the small but mighty nut! Not only are nuts nutritional powerhouses, they’re an excellent supply of fibre too. Pine nuts, pistachios, hazelnuts, and pecans are all great choices when it comes to upping your daily fibre. However, almonds are the clear winner when it comes to the highest fibre content. Fibre content: Almonds – Approx. 13.3 grams per 100 grams Popcorn If you’re looking to increase your fibre intake, then popcorn just might be one of the best snacks you can choose to munch on. Plain, air-popped popcorn is extremely high in fibre, calorie for calorie. Just remember, if you add a lot of sugar, or fat, such as oil, to your popcorn, the fibre-to-calorie ratio will be considerably lower. Fibre content: Approx. 14 grams per 100 grams Chia Seeds If you haven’t heard about chia seeds yet – let us introduce you! Chia seeds are tiny black seeds that are becoming increasingly popular and may just be one of the best fibre sources on the planet. They are often referred to as a superfood due to their exceptionally high nutritional value, containing high amounts of magnesium, phosphorus, and calcium. Head over to our recipe page to find a wide range of Chia seed recipes from Blueberry Jam to Banana Muffins – delicious! Fibre content: Approx. 34.4 grams per 100 grams Beans Not only are beans a great source of plant protein, making them a great meat alternative, they are also an excellent way to get more fibre in your diet. Black beans, pinto beans, mung beans and aduki beans are all great choices for upping your fibre intake. However, haricot beans take the crown as the highest fibre bean in town. Fibre content: Haricot Beans - Approx. 8 grams per 100 grams Apples You’ve probably heard the saying ‘An apple a day, keeps the doctor away’. Turns out, there could be a lot of truth to that. Many fruits are filled with fibre, but apples, especially with the skin on, are the perfect pick for increasing your fibre intake. Plus, they count as one of your five a day! Fibre content: Approx. 2.4 grams per 100 grams, or 4.4 grams in a medium-sized apple. Lentils Looking for a cheap, simple, and nutritious food source? Well, look no further than lentils! Along with being high in fibre, they’re also as high in protein and loaded with many important nutrients. Lentils are an easy addition to your diet, add them to soups, stews, curries, salads and even desserts! Fibre content: 13.1 grams per cup of cooked lentils, or 7.3 grams per 100 grams Sweet Potatoes Are you a sweet potato lover? If so, we have good news for you! Sweet potatoes are bountiful in vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, and of course, fibre. Not to mention, they provide a wide range of health benefits and are a simple, and delicious, addition to your diet. Fibre content: Approx. 2.5 grams per 100 grams or 3.8 grams for a medium-sized boiled sweet Chickpeas Another type of legume that’s loaded with not just healthy fibre, but also vitamins, minerals, and plant protein is chickpeas. Easily included in your diet, they can be used in many different recipes. Chickpeas are also the main ingredient of hummus, which is a simple spread you can make yourself. Fibre content: 12.5 grams per cup of cooked chickpeas, or 7.6 per 100 grams Berries Berries get a lot of attention for their antioxidants, but they’re filled with healthy fibre too. Raspberries are a particularly rich source, but blackberries, strawberries, and blueberries are also a great choice for increasing your fibre intake. Another one of the biggest benefits of eating berries is that they’re also naturally low in calories. Sounds like a win-win to us! Fibre content: Raspberries - Approx. 7 grams per 100 grams Quinoa Quinoa is a pseudo-cereal that is an excellent source of plant protein, along with being high in fibre. It has many other health benefits and is packed full of other nutrients including, zinc, iron, magnesium, potassium, and antioxidants. Fibre content: Approx. 3 grams per 100 grams

There are few kitchen disappointments quite like reaching for a handful of nuts and getting that sharp, bitter, slightly paint-like taste of rancidity. Nuts are not cheap, so throwing away a spoiled bag is a real waste of money as well as good food. The good news is that keeping nuts fresh is easy once you understand why they turn in the first place. Here are our best, practical tips for storing nuts so they stay fresh far longer. Why do nuts go rancid? Nuts are rich in natural oils, and those oils are mostly unsaturated fats. This is great news for your health, but it is exactly what makes nuts prone to spoiling. When unsaturated fats are exposed to oxygen, they slowly oxidise, and it is this oxidation that produces the stale, bitter, off flavour we call rancidity. Three things speed the process up: oxygen, heat and light. Moisture is the fourth enemy, because damp nuts can grow mould as well as spoil. This also explains why some nuts keep better than others. Nuts especially high in delicate polyunsaturated fats, such as walnuts, pecans and pine nuts, tend to turn fastest. Nuts with more stable fats, like almonds and cashews, generally last a little longer. Whatever the type, the aim of good storage is simple: keep oxygen, heat, light and moisture away for as long as possible. How to tell if a nut has gone off Your nose is the best test. Fresh nuts smell mild, sweet and buttery. Rancid ones smell sharp and bitter, a bit like old cooking oil, crayons or paint. The taste is unmistakably bitter and unpleasant. Rancid nuts are not usually dangerous, but they taste horrible and the oxidation degrades some of their nutrients, so it is best to throw them away rather than push through. If in doubt, give them a sniff before you use them. The golden rules of storing nuts Keeping nuts fresh comes down to a handful of simple habits. Use an airtight container. The less contact nuts have with air, the slower they oxidise. Transfer opened bags into a glass jar (the best option!) rather than leaving them clipped shut and half open. This one change alone makes a noticeable difference. Keep them cool and dark. Heat and light both accelerate spoilage, so store nuts in a cupboard away from the oven, the hob and any sunny windowsill. A cool, dark cupboard is the bare minimum, and cooler is always better. Keep them dry. Moisture invites mould, so make sure containers are completely dry before you fill them, and never store nuts somewhere steamy like above a kettle. Use the fridge and freezer. This is the single most effective tip. Nuts store beautifully in the cold, which dramatically slows the oxidation of their oils. The fridge is ideal for nuts you will get through over a few months, while the freezer is perfect for longer storage or for bulk buys. Nuts freeze well, do not need defrosting before use, and can keep for a year or more this way. Just seal them well to keep out moisture and fridge or freezer odours. Buy whole where you can. The more a nut is broken down, the more surface area is exposed to air, so chopped, flaked and especially ground nuts and nut flours go rancid faster than whole ones. If you buy nuts whole and chop or grind them as needed, they will keep far longer. Smart habits for bulk buyers Buying nuts in larger bags is the best way to get good value, and it works perfectly well as long as you store them sensibly. The trick is not to keep dipping into one big open bag over months, letting air in every time. Instead, decant your bulk nuts into smaller airtight portions, keep one out for everyday use, and store the rest sealed in the fridge or freezer. It is also worth labelling containers with the date so you can use older stock first. This approach means you can stock up on quality nuts without any worry. Our Organic Brazil Nuts come in a generous 1kg bag, and storing most of the bag in the freezer keeps them tasting freshly harvested for months. The same goes for more delicate nuts like our Organic Walnut Halves, which, being higher in fragile fats, especially benefit from a spell in the fridge or freezer. How long do nuts actually keep? Exact times vary by type, but as a rough guide, most raw nuts kept in an airtight container in a cool, dark cupboard will stay good for a few months. Move them to the fridge and you can often extend that to around six months or more. In the freezer, many nuts will keep for a year or beyond. Nuts still in their shells last longest of all, because the shell is a natural barrier against air and light. Always trust your nose over the calendar, though: a quick sniff tells you far more than a date ever will. Fresh nuts, every time Storing nuts well is genuinely simple. Keep them airtight, cool, dark and dry, lean on your fridge and freezer, buy whole where you can, and portion up your bulk bags rather than leaving them open to the air. Do that, and you will get the full flavour, goodness and value out of every nut, with none of that bitter, rancid disappointment. Stock up with confidence, and store smart.

Nuts are one of the most nutritious foods you can eat, but they are rarely cheap. Weigh a handful of almonds or Brazil nuts against a bag of crisps and the price gap is obvious. There are good reasons for it, and none of them is simply greed. From slow-growing trees to thirsty crops and difficult harvests, here is an evidence-based look at why nuts cost what they do. Nut trees take years to pay off Unlike a field of wheat that is sown and harvested within a year, most nuts grow on trees that take several years to mature before they produce a worthwhile crop. That long lead time makes supply slow to respond to demand. If prices rise, a grower cannot simply plant more and cash in next season, they face years of waiting and investment first. This lag keeps supply tight and prices firm, especially when demand for nuts is growing as more people eat them for their health. Some nuts are extremely thirsty Water is a major hidden cost. Almonds are the classic example: they are grown heavily in California, a region repeatedly hit by drought, and they need a lot of water to produce each kernel. When water is scarce or expensive, the cost of growing feeds straight through into the price. Concentrating so much of the world's supply of a nut in one climate-vulnerable region also means a single bad season can move global prices. Harvesting and shelling can be hard, manual work Getting the edible kernel out is often far more involved than it looks. Cashews are a striking case. They grow attached to the cashew apple, and their shells contain a caustic irritant, so shelling is delicate, often manual work that has to be done carefully. That labour is a big part of why cashews cost what they do. Across many nuts, harvesting, sorting, drying and grading all add cost before the nut ever reaches a shelf. Some nuts cannot really be farmed at all Brazil nuts are perhaps the best example of why nuts can be expensive. They come almost entirely from wild trees in the Amazon rainforest, not from plantations. The trees rely on specific pollinators and on rainforest wildlife to spread their seeds, which means they resist being grown in neat, farmed rows. Brazil nuts are therefore gathered from the wild, by hand, across vast areas of forest. Their price reflects that genuinely limited, labour-intensive supply, and it is tied to the health of the rainforest itself. If you would like to try some, our Organic Brazil Nuts are wild-harvested in Bolivia and sold in a 1kg bag, which works out far better value per kilo than small snack packs. Storage, transport and waste all add up Nuts are rich in natural oils, which makes them prone to going rancid if they are not stored and transported carefully. Keeping them fresh means careful handling, good packaging and sometimes temperature control, all of which cost money. Add in the long distances most nuts travel from where they grow to where they are eaten, and the price climbs further. How to get better value from nuts Because nuts keep reasonably well when stored properly, buying them in larger quantities is usually the single best way to save. A big bag almost always works out cheaper per kilo than repeated small packs, and you can decant what you need and keep the rest sealed in a cool, dark place, or even in the freezer to extend its life. Choosing broken or pieces rather than perfect whole kernels is another easy saving when you are baking or chopping them anyway. Honest reasons to be expensive Nuts are expensive for honest reasons: slow-growing trees, thirsty crops, labour-heavy harvesting and, in the case of Brazil nuts, a supply that comes straight from the wild. Understanding that makes the price easier to accept, and buying in bulk from a transparent source is the simplest way to enjoy them for less.

Not all almonds are equal. The ones we source come from Spain, and that is a deliberate choice rather than a happy accident. Spanish almonds have a reputation among bakers, chocolatiers and chefs for a reason: more flavour, more oil, and a depth you simply do not get from the big, uniform, heavily irrigated nuts that dominate the global market. Here is where they grow, how they grow, and why the Spanish way produces such a good almond. Where they grow Spain is one of the oldest almond-growing countries in the world, and its orchards stretch across a sun-drenched belt down the eastern and southern side of the country. The classic regions are the Levante in the southeast, around Alicante and Murcia, along with Catalonia, Valencia, Aragon and Andalusia. Each area has its own microclimate and soil, which is why Spain grows such a rich mix of traditional varieties rather than a single commercial one. Two of those varieties stand out. Marcona is the famous one: round, plump and buttery, with a sweet, delicate flavour that makes it the almond behind classic turron and marzipan. It is a pure native Spanish variety, not a graft or a hybrid, and is thought to have originated around Alicante. Largueta is the other great Spanish almond, longer and flatter with a firmer bite, traditionally grown across Catalonia, Valencia, Aragon and Murcia. Between them they show off exactly what Spanish terroir can do. How they grow: the dry-farming difference This is the heart of why Spanish almonds taste the way they do. Most of Spain's almond trees, around 83 percent of the planted area, are grown rainfed, or dry-farmed. That means the trees are not irrigated on demand. Instead they live on winter rainfall held deep in the soil, and they have to work for it through the long, hot Mediterranean summer. That mild-winter, hot-summer climate is ideal for almonds, but the lack of irrigation is the clever part. A tree under gentle water stress produces fewer, smaller nuts, but it concentrates everything into them. Spanish almonds end up with a higher oil content, which is what gives them that soft, juicy texture and intense flavour. Research on rainfed Spanish orchards has even found that this kind of water stress can raise the almonds' polyphenol and antioxidant levels, so the nuts are not just tastier but nutritionally richer too. Soil and weather, working together Spain's almond belt sits on a varied patchwork of soils, from clay to sandy to limestone, and different varieties are matched to the ground that suits them best. Combine those soils with hot, dry, sunny summers and cool winters, and you get slow, natural ripening with no shortcuts. The weather does the work that irrigation does elsewhere, and the result shows up in the cup, or in this case, the kernel. Why we choose organic, from there Dry-farmed Spanish orchards are a natural fit for organic growing. Because the trees are already adapted to a low-input, low-water way of life, organic methods suit them rather than fight them. Good growers use legume cover crops between the trees, which restore soil fertility, hold moisture, prevent erosion and keep the ground alive without synthetic inputs. Organic rainfed farming does come at a cost: yields are a little lower, by roughly ten percent, which is part of why these almonds command a higher price. But studies of these marginal, low-input growing areas consistently find the nuts come out with higher nutritional quality. For us that trade-off is worth it. We would rather have fewer, better almonds, grown in a way that looks after the soil, than a cheaper nut grown intensively. The harvest Almonds are harvested at the end of the long summer, usually from late August into autumn, once the green outer hull has split to reveal the shell inside. Timing is everything, because harvest date has a real effect on the almond's chemical make-up and flavour, so the nuts are picked when they are properly ripe rather than to suit a schedule. Traditionally the trees are shaken and the fallen nuts gathered, then hulled, dried and sorted. It is a rhythm that has barely changed in centuries, and it still produces a better nut. Spanish almonds are not the biggest or the cheapest, and that is exactly the point. Grown on old varieties, dry-farmed under the Mediterranean sun, ripened slowly in varied soils and harvested when they are ready, they offer more oil, more flavour and more goodness per nut. Choosing organic from Spain means choosing the way of growing almonds that puts quality and the land ahead of sheer volume, and you can taste the difference. Variety availability and growing practices vary by season and supplier. Check the product information for details on each almond we stock.