Green Blends in Plastic Tubs are Often NOT Green!

Pines introduced green superfoods‬ to the Natural Food Market in 1976. As the first green superfood grower, Pines was the only source of wheatgrass, barley grass, and oat grass‬ for several decades. In addition to our own products, we sold to other brands for their green‬ blends. Because of the demand, China along with several US growers started offering those grasses but at later harvest for greater yield but lower quality. They dried the grasses using facilities built for the animal feed industry.

Questionable Growing for Grasses Some Green Blends

Pines serves as the only Kansas company with modern stainless steel driers. We only use them for 100% certified organic, Non-GMO Project Verified, Kosher, vegan-friendly wholefood greens. Furthermore, Pines only produces human food and no animal feed. As a result of more then 40 years of research and sales, Pines has earned the respect of those who seek quality. That's because we have proven our commitment to produce the most nutrient dense green superfood on the market. Sadly, others do not share our commitment. They grow and sell material with poor color as "green food." The picture above shows some other products from these animal feed sources compared with Pines.

We present below another view of Pines' own products compared to products from companies that do not source from Pines.

Many Green Blends Represent Very Poor Quality

We recently received a request for a sample of Pines Wheat Grass as an ingredient from the Director of a DEA registered and inspected laboratory. He is an authority on product quality and serves on standards committees for US Pharmacopoeia and USP. He says this about the sample he received:

"It is amazing how lovely this material is compared to what we usually see coming out of China. This is properly harvested juvenile crop material. We had already tested another sample of yours for one of your customers. It also was beautiful. The organoleptic properties were rich. Your products set the standard for high quality material that others should strive to achieve. They showcase the quality differences between your crops and other domestic and offshore crops that are sold in our industry."

If You Use a Green Blend, Are the Ingredients from Pines?

Using green blends that source their greens from 70-year old animal feed facilities is not what most consumers want. Designed to produce pesticide-based feed for the meat industry, these old animal feed driers along with poor harvesting methods result in very low quality.

We grow all Pines products using research that determined the best growing and harvest methods. Pines uses modern driers used only for 100% certified organic, Non-GMO Project Verified, gluten free, vegan-friendly human food.

Contrast our methods with those located in semi-arid regions. These old animal feed operations require irrigation. For more than 70 years, they have abused and wasted the once-pristine and abundant fresh water source known as the Ogallala aquifer. As a result, farmers have depleted and contaminated it with chemicals used to grow animal feed. Even more depletion and contamination has resulted from growing GMO corn used to make ethanol. Ethanol costs three times more to produce than its market price thanks to taxpayer subsidies.

By contrast, Pines does not use irrigation. Further, we also do not practice dual farming where a farmer grows both organic and non-organic crops. As a result, all our products are 100% organic human food grown by 100% organic farmers. Our passion for organic farming spans more than 40 years.

Many quality green blends source their ingredients from Pines. If they don't source from Pines, they most likely source from facilities built for the meat industry that use irrigation. To know if your green blend contains greens from Pines, please contact the company. Then, if they say they source from Pines, ask them to permit us to confirm it. As long as we have their permission, we will gladly confirm that we supply to them.

We Have Green Blends as Well as Single Ingredient Choices

delicious - white to right

Some green blends consist of ten or more ingredients. Our blends are simple formulas with only one, two or three ingredients. Complex blends can be a way to disguise low grade ingredients. Many who prepare food like to examine each ingredient for quality and color. You can't do that with a complex blend. If you are already using a green blend that sources from Pines, good for you. If not, we urge you to try Pines products in oxygen-free, earth-friendly glass bottles. Please use our locator to find a store near you or use our shopping cart.