Recipes, Carrot-Chocolate, Acacia Fiber, etc.

We'll be sending out little cards with recipes for Constant Health soon -- with free samples of both the vanilla and chocolate travel packs (single serving size). So, I've been thinking about recipes of late.

This morning, when out for coffee this morning, I ordered fresh carrot-orange juice and got a plain carrot juice instead. I didn't want to go back so I took my carrot juice home and shook it up with what I thought was the French Vanilla version of Constant Health. I added some psyllium fiber too.

Lo and behold, I had taken a jar of Chocolate Constant Health home, and there it was, a carrot-chocolate shake. I tasted it and thought it was an interesting flavor -- with some of the spices in the formula, it tasted a bit like carrot cake, especially with the extra fiber thickening the drink!

I enjoyed my shake on my way to work, and I even enjoyed watching the deep orangey fluid stick to the shaker bottle - like some kind of melting pumpkin tapioca or abstract art piece. I know, not exactly of a good marketing image but we're all friends here, right?

Anyway, when I told Tess about my morning drink, she made a terrible face and let out a long "eeeeewwww." This made me laugh out loud. She shook her head repeatedly and said this is why I'm fired from any more taste testing.

By the way, I personally like acacia fiber better than psyllium, as it doesn't do such disgraceful things to the texture of a drink. But the psyllium was handy and I'm always looking for ways to boost my fiber, so in it went, but on the recipe cards, it will not go! :-)

Meanwhile, here are some interesting facts about acacia fiber:

• Acacia is from the acacia gum tree, which thrives in arid environments, and is growing in expanded farmland in sub-Saharan Africa
• Acacia doesn't have the negative effect on texture of foods and drinks that other fibers have
• Acacia has fewer negative symptoms (like bloating, abdominal cramping) compared with fructo-oligosaccharides
• Acacia also increases friendly bacteria in the gut (four-fold increase at 10-15 grams a day)

Lastly, while on the topic of fiber, for those of you who are regular readers, I did look into the modified citrus pectin that I wrote about earlier this month. So far I have not found any reasonable pricing on raw material. Too bad, as modified citrus pectin shows much promise as a natural anti-cancer agent.

So, acacia fiber may end up in our product line much earlier than modified citrus pectin!