TNC Review: Seeded Crackers

entertaining platter. So I'm really looking forward to moving into my new house so i can get back to entertaining regularly. And I know you're a cheese and cracker lover as well well.

love all of their products in general. The Alinas are Tsion crackers, and we've chosen the cranberry and sunfow our seed ones and I have definitely had these land have been on my and often I'll include a style of cracker like this on my patters. Now, these retail for four dollars at calls and four dollars fifty at were worse. They're certainly not inexpensive, and I think that's often a testament to the quality of the ingredients, because the seeds

in particular can be quite expensive. So what we'll do today we might compare hundred grams, I think, because it's difficult with serving sizes because they don't necessarily specify how many crackers that is, so it will go per hundred grams. So per hundred these crackers have got seventeen one hundred and ninety kilo jules, which a quick calculation is about four hundred and fifty calories for that entire box. Oh no, is it one hundred grand box? Yes?

sixty five point six grams. A high proportion of those sugar is twenty two point one grams, and I will stress that because when we look at these ingredient lists, the dried fruit in those will be giving most of that sugar drive through five to seven point nine per hundred and seven hundred and seventy milligrams of sod, which again sounds quite high, but if you break it down to sort of three or four crackers per serve it it's pretty low overall. And we'd look at the ingredients.

Wheat flour is first, followed by flax seeds, which are extremely high in the plant source of a Mega three fat, which is a massive bonus, although we don't have the actual reading on that fat profile. Dried sweet and cranberries at ten point seven percent, so not insignificant in giving much of those sugars which have got a little bit of sugar in them, followed by raw sugar, honey, greek yogurt, which is an interesting ingredient really for this kind of product.

Sunflower seeds at five point one percent, which is also a fair whack of sunflower seeds in these products, so it doesn't give us the percentage of flax seeds, which is odd. Why they've only done it for sunflower seeds

because it's in the name, that's why. So if a food product includes the ingredient in the title, they need to include the percentage, whereas flax seeds isn't in the actual product description and hence they haven't given the percentage of those, but it will be higher than five point one percent, which is sunflower seeds, so that's reassuring. We have got quite a strong product raising agent five hundred

and then salt. They do contain gluten milk products so as as well as may contain sesame and trainut so not great for our allergies. And you can see wheat flour is the first ingredient and it's made in Australia. We believe it's an Australian company from at least seventy four percent of austrain ingredients, which is actually really highly on because we don't have a lot of seeds here in Australia, so quite a high proportion of that for this product. Now, you know what I'm finding hard to

faulter it you don't have that many of them. There are a million times better than crackers made with palm oil, which is sort of the old school cracker on cheese platters. Yes, they've got some sugars that does have a little bit of added sugar, but for me, the good fats from the high proportion of flax seed and sunflower seeds out weighs any negatives. I think they're really good. I buy them, I recommend them. I think that just keeping an eye on the portions, you'd want sort of three four five

crackers at most. But you know, I think they're pretty good in general.

of jats, and I just wouldn't find them satisfying. Yet, if I had a whole packet of these crackers, I think I'd actually be hard pressed to eat the whole packet, just because of the good profile of nuts and seeds in there. I find them a lot more satisfying cracker for cracker than if I just had like a plane like jats cracker or rice crackers. Like, let's be honest, those rice crackers are so more as you could eat two, three, four rows of them for an incredible amount of carbohydrate.

Compared to these ones, They've at least got a really good fat, nice fat profile in there which kind of slow you down and make you a little bit more, say sheated over time. So I'm a massive fan of these as well, Susie. And putting some of these on a cheese patter, Let's be honest, if you're sharing that between a group of friends, four, six, ten people there, you're probably only got to have a couple with a you know, small wedge of cheese and hopefully a couple

of veggi sticks and a bit of fresh fruit. Actually a really wonderful addition. But my only thing is I don't know why they called them cranberry and sunflower seeds. I like flat seeds. I find them far more nutritious. I would have called them cranberry and flax seeds, but maybe it's just harder to pronounce. I'm not really sure. With the higher proportion of flax seeds compared to sunflower seeds, why they put some flour in the name and not flux seeds.

of old school crackers or rice crackers. You know, in ten rice crackers there's the equivalent carbohydrate of two slices of bread. They've got to be one of the most processed nutritious food in the supermarket. Like there's nothing decent

compared to these. And one of my little boy loves these, and I love that because they're so good and he's getting some good fats from them, and there are a million times better than traditional biscuits, which are basically a mix of sugar, palm oil and refined white wheat flour. So yeah, big thumbs up from me. I love this brand and I use them all the time. Now, the next brand is a client of mine who I'm an

ambassador for, so I'll be very clear about that. It's the Carmen Supersed and nut Roasted Almond and Sesame crackers, and I do consult to Carmens, and I've been a big fan of this fantastic austrain company for some time. So maybe Leanne you take us through them, because I am probably quite biased and they are quite different from the Alina crackers we've looked at first, So you give me your take on it first before I taint you with my personal bias.

a really high proportion, a great fat profile. To kick us off, we've got a mix of some flour, sesame and limb seeds. The next ingredient is a gluten free flour blend, and then we've got chickpea fababe and tapioca flour in there. We've got some flour oil, some linseed meal, some almonds at seven percent sea salt, garlic, and some natural antioxidants being rosemoo extractor round us off. So the alunses in here are almonds, in sesame and maybe presents.

Obviously they're made on the same processing line as peanuts, soy and tree nuts, so if you've sort of that nut seed allergy, obviously being a nut seed cracker, you'd want to be very careful. But the benefit is here that they are gluten free. It's a nice Aussie brand and the ingredient list is very clean with a wonderful

fat profile. So just based on the ingredients, I can't voult it, and looking at the nutrition panel obviously again we're going to compare per one hundred grams, So we're comparing luck to like nineteen hundred and forty kilodules, fifteen point four grams of protein, thirty three point six grams of fat, with only three point two being saturated, a wonderful fat profile there, so a high percentage of fat,

but all of that being basically are good fats. Twenty one point nine grams of carbohydrate, So for that whole box,

it's actually very low carbohydrate. That that's a slice of thick bread basically the equivalent carbohydrate because it is a higher fat product, you know, predominantly it's coming from the seeds versus actual the carbohydrate, with only one point six grams of that being naturally occurring sugars, seven point seven grams of dietary fiber, and five hundred and twenty one milligrams of sodium, which sounds very high, but per serving,

you know, not too concerning, put it that way. So I love this product, And as you said, it is very different to the Alinas crackers, a very different sort of mouse feel and texture. This is what I would call like a healthy rice cracker. That's sort of how I would describe. It's more of that rice cracker type look and feel, and when you crunch it, it's a lot crunchy. It's sort of not as I guess, sort of thick and harder to eat as what the first

crackers would be like. Alna's are my favorite crackers, but I always have something like the Carmons ones on a platter because my parents both have denties and they find it really hard. They actually find the Linux crackers a bit too hard to sort of bite down and munchro So I'm a big fan of including something like the Alnas and also a bit of a softer cracker like the Carmons ones are just a little bit easier to chew if people do have gentes or bracers or anything

like that. So I'm a big fan of this as well.

I think the ingredient list and the fat profile is wonderful, And again I think they just provide more satisfaction and satiation to me versus like a plain Wis cracker, like a you know, a sour cream flavored rice cracker, which most people would really struggle not to eat the entire packet, myself included, because they are so Moorish and there's just no sustenance there, like it's all just refined carbohydrate, and most people will have that with like half a table

homas and wonder why they're not losing weight. And there's like, you know, four or five six hundred calories eating a packet of rice crackers with half a tub of homus.

go stale. So they're designed to take out a few and put on a platter and then reseal them so you don't lose the freshness, which I thought is so smart because I often throw out, you know, the alenas because I haven't used them all and they've gone stale at the end. So that's a little bit of history, is why they're packaged so differently. But I quite like that because they're portion can control quite well because they

are a higher fat product. They're great fats, they're good fats, they're fats that more Australians need to have as part of their routine diet, but they're not insignificant calorie wise, so keeping that portion it's sort of three to four of that more chunky cracker is a really good reference point for people as well, and as such they're very affordable too, so you know, very strong Australian product, and I know that you know, really common is a keen

to do more in this healthy snacking space. So I think all of them, any of these are fantastic and they're adding those really good fats to the diet. But yeah, that's why they're designed like this differently in the market to keep them fresh so you don't end up throwing any away, which is something sort of a downside of

sometimes when we open boxes of crackers. Interesting, all right, Well, the third product is one about Audi products, and I actually like this product too because it ticks the box on something that we didn't get from the other one. So it's the Demora gluten free raisin and pumpkin seed.

Now I am hastened to say that these are possibly made by Alena and the only reason I say that is that they're so very similar these crackers that you do find in AUDI to the Alena brand, and often different free companies will be making them under the Audi label. But the difference is these are a good and free variety, so they're really an Alena's. Do you have a gluten free variety of crackers like this that you'll find in

the health feed section of Wooes and Coals? So I suspect it's the same product, and the price points not dissimilarly, and you know this is quite expensive for an AUDI product,

so their quality is reference there. So the first ingredients are rice flour, followed by tabiocre starch, flax seeds raisins at twelve point eight percent, so very similar profile to the first product, with the exception of the gluten free flower based may start honey pumpkin seeds at seven point five percent, so again incredibly high load of high A Mega three plant based papeters Greek yogurt. Again this has

to be made biolin as this is their formulation. Raising agents salt, thigner, some emulsifiers, bits and pieces to keep them sort of crunchy, but again you can't really fault them, particularly for a gluten free product. It's still one hundred gram box and similar seventeen thirty kilo dules, four hundred and fourteen calories for the entire box, nine point one grams of protein, like almost identity go to the first

product we've seen in a gluten free variety. Eleven point three grams of fat, less than three percent saturated at two point one sixty five point one total carbs, twenty two point five percent total sugar is coming from that dried fruit. The raisins six point six grams of dietary fiber and relatively low sodium sixty sixty milligrams to that

entire box. So, whether it's the Alina gluten Free or at the Demora, which is the Audi brand, very similar price point again for people who need to eat or choose to eat gluten free, A really really strong product nutritionally, Yeah, I can't. I've got nothing bad to say. I can't falt it. I think it's a really strong product.

So they're losing health Stars basically because of some of the added sugars. And let's be honest, there is some added sugars in there. I just think they wouldn't taste anyone here as good if they didn't have the added sugars. I just think there would be more of that. I don't know, ZUZI helped me out here a cardboard type taste if they didn't have a little bit of that sweetness to it. So some of it's natural from the fruit, some of it is added, but it's just such a.

to put it on. But I think they'd come in at one or two, right, that would be my which means that you're comparing a jat set one or two to this at two. It is so misleading because this nutritionally is so much better as offering good fats and a food that is encouraging people to savor. And that's

the issue with health Star rating. Basically, it's not discerning enough in terms of category of food or good fats which you're getting a good dose of from products like this, so they can be This is a classic example of where the health Star needs a lot of work in terms of differentiating products that are in context actually really good compared to products that are like a two health Star is a terrible product.

It is delicious. It is something that it is a high price point, but it is something that's really nice to include as part of a really nice, bougie sort of cheese platter. So I absolutely love it. I've tried the gluten free variety and the non gluten free variety as well, and I think they're both super super strong. And as we said ZUSA, we need more of that better fat mix or fat profile through our diet as a strains because we're just getting far too much saturated

fat and trans fat. So whatever we see products with flex seeds and linseeds and pumpkin seeds and cheer seeds included, we are hands down most of the time going to recommend them. Yes, it has a little bit of added sugars in it. But I think for the large bulk of the positives that you're getting out of these products, a healthy fat profile, the fiber, even a small amount of protein because of those seeds as well, far out weighed the fact that we've got a couple of grams

of added sugar in here. And if you're sitting down to this with some cheese and a couple of veggie sticks and a bit of you know, some lened dips, I think that's going to be far better than just have a bowl, you know, bowls of chips and chocolate and you know, wine and alcohol on a Sunday night. So we're much better, you know, to recommend products like this, even if there is a little bit of added sudes in there. And that's my view anyway, one hundred percent.

to give it to health styles. So you do need to be careful, and that's why you need to listen to the nutrition couchually and because we're much more discerning when it comes to recommendations and our justifications for why, and we will let our listeners know that what we're working on at the moment is a product manual, So we're actually going to put together all of our key recommendations across categories, so making it easier for our listeners to go through and say, you know, why do we

choose these products? You know, and how can you easily have a reference point to that. So that is in the works and we'll be out before the end of the year, so watch this space particularly, And I've just thought to myself there and we need to include a whole gluten free section, which way you haven't done, so that's just a little bit more work for you branch. If you're listening, that will be coming your way in

the next few weeks, so look forward to that. That brings us to the end of the Nutrition Couch product review. If you haven't done so, please subscribe and tell all your friends so we continue to grow and bring more evidence based nutrition to Australians and people around the world.

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