I was one of those kids who ate peanut butter every day of my childhood. By the time I reached voting age, I couldn’t even look at the stuff. But lately my view has changed, and all because of some truly excellent peanut butter products I discovered right here in New England. Vermont Peanut Butter of Morrisville, VT has become one of those products that I can’t help but push on my friends. Like SmartWool socks, only tastier.
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The founder of Vermont Peanut Butter is not a mompreneur but a dadpreneur. Chris Kaiser describes himself as an “athlete turned financial planner turned mountain hippie.” (And you wonder why I love Vermont.)
“I love peanut butter,” says Kaiser. “I’ve always eaten it, I’ve always made milkshakes with it. I’ve always made crazy sandwiches with it. To make a living you have to sell something. I thought wouldn’t it be nice to sell something that makes people really happy?”
Vermont Peanut Butter does that by making its product far from ordinary. My favorite flavor is called Good Karma. It has—brace yourself—dark chocolate in it. It was not the first flavor I tried. We went through a few jars of the high quality Creamy variety first. Kaiser sources all his peanuts from small growers in North Carolina and Virginia which practice organic farming. The ingredients in Creamy are: dry roasted peanuts and sea salt.
It took me awhile to try Good Karma, because I didn’t want to add sugar to my kids’ lunches. But when I finally stopped to do the math, I realized that the jam I put on their sandwiches had more sugar. Vermont Peanut Butter's tag line is “We’re Nutty About Nutrition,” which makes Kaiser a man after my own heart. For a nerd-mom in-depth analysis, see my personal nutritional comparison, below. Kaiser has taken the unusual step of adding whey protein to his flavored varieties, boosting the protein in Good Karma from the natural 7g to 10g.
But the taste! It’s amazing. Spread some on a little toasted sourdough, and you’re in heaven. And I haven’t even tried Maple Walnut yet. There are flavors with dried fruits, and one with honey.
It feels good to support a young Vermont business. Kaiser sold his first jars in July of 2009. I discovered Vermont Peanut Butter in my local food co-op in 2010. But now the company is going coast to coast, in Whole Foods, Shaws and Hannafords. They even have a distributor in… Italy. Take that, nutella!
Sarah Is Nutty About Nutrition, Too
VT Creamy Peanut Butter: 1g sugar (from the nuts) in a 2 tablespoon serving
Jam has about 13g per tablespoon!
Good Karma has only 4g sugar in a 2T serving—and one of those grams comes naturally from the nuts
Nutella, by the way, has a whopping 21 grams of sugar, and sugar is the first ingredient