Pure Joy Wellness Approved! HU Almond Butter + Puffed Quinoa Dark Chocolate
/The wellness industry is saturated with products. (It’s a multi-trillion dollar industry, afterall.) My goal with this series, Pure Joy Wellness Approved, is to help you cut through the noise, and give you insight into the items and brands that I use on a regular basis. Every month, I’ll be featuring a product I love that can make achieving your health goals easier—whether you want to lose weight, take better care of your skin, develop an exercise routine, find balance with your nutrition, or improve your mental health, to name a few.
Welcome to the fifth edition of my monthly blog series: Pure Joy Wellness Approved!
This month’s product is one of my all-time favorite healthy treats...
Like many people, I admittedly have a serious sweet tooth. Sweets aren’t something I need all the time, but when my sweet tooth kicks in, there’s nothing better than chocolate. Instead of reaching for something ultra-processed and unhealthy, though, I opt for a few squares of Hu Kitchen’s Chocolate Bars to satisfy my sugar cravings. Here’s why I choose Hu Chocolate, and why I think you should, too.
Why I Love Them
They’re paleo, vegan, gluten-free, dairy-free, soy-free, and made with mostly organic ingredients.
If you have food allergies, dietary limitations, or are just trying to eat a little cleaner, chocolate probably isn’t something you’re able to have very often. That’s why Hu Kitchen Chocolate Bars are a true godsend—they’re free of most major allergens! (Some bars do contain nuts, but there are other flavors that don’t.) Hu Kitchen makes their chocolate with super high quality ingredients, and they steer clear of cane sugar, refined sugar, and sugar alcohols (all of which aren’t great for the body). Whatever diet or lifestyle you adhere to, these bars almost certainly fit the bill.
They have very few ingredients.
Anyone who’s ever looked at the back of a candy bar knows that the list of ingredients is long and full of unknown ingredients (looking at you, synthetic chemicals). What I love the most about Hu Kitchen Chocolate Bars—besides the taste—is how few ingredients they have. Take the Almond Butter & Puffed Quinoa Dark Chocolate bar, aka my personal favorite. Here’s what's in the bar:
Organic cacao
Almond
Unrefined organic coconut sugar
Organic fair-trade cocoa butter
Organic quinoa
Less than 2% of cashew and hazelnut
THAT’S IT. Frankly, other than completely unsweetened raw chocolate (which is hard to find, expensive, and not particularly appealing taste-wise), this is the cleanest list of ingredients I’ve ever seen on a chocolate bar.
No refined sugar, no soy, no artificial sweeteners or ingredients, and no chemicals.
It bears repeating that the majority of chocolate and candy bars are packed with sugar, stabilizers, and other artificial additives, because they’re engineered to generate certain responses from our brain (aka, they’re designed to be addicting). Hu Kitchen bars, though, are all natural. By using unrefined coconut sugar and leaving out artificial sweeteners, Hu has created bars that are lower in calories and glycemic index than your typical chocolate bar, and packed with health benefits. Cacao powder, for example, is high in iron, magnesium, and antioxidants, and cocoa butter contains healthy fats and polyphenols that can help fight aging. These bars aren’t here to play tricks on your body or disrupt your hormones—you can have your chocolate and improve your health too!
Hu Kitchen bars are available online, but nowadays, you can find them at health food and grocery stores (think Whole Foods, Mother’s market, and even Fairway and Foodtown!). They’re a bit pricier than regular chocolate bars, but I say with the confidence of someone who has spent years eating these that they’re absolutely worth it. They come in numerous flavors and varieties, and in my opinion, they’re all delicious!
I hope you’ll try Hu Kitchen Chocolate Bars and let me know what you think! To do so, head on over to our Private Pure Joy Wellness Facebook Group and request to join.
Xoxo,
Renata