14 Best Bagged Popcorns Popped in Healthy Oils

My next article for Super Bowl snack food is another entry in the salty snacks category And that is popcorn. After potato and tortilla chips, popcorn is the next most popular salted treat. The snack food industry makes $86 million on popcorn during the Super Bowl. 

Year round, oeople in the United States consume 13 billion quarts of popcorn. This is more than any other country as the majority of popcorn is grown in the U.S. The only variety of corn which can be turned into popcorn is known as Zea mays everta. This variety has small ears and its kernels bust when exposed to dry heat. 

The Zea may everta variety has been shown to date back at least 5,600 years ago. Early uses of popcorn are found in Peru, Mexico, Guatemala, and other places in Central and South America. In the 16th century,  Aztecs wore headdresses with popcorn during ceremonies honoring Tlaloc, the god of maize and fertility.

In the mid-1800’s popcorn became popular in the United States. Candy store owner Charles Cretors helped its popularity grow by inventing a steam run machine for popping it. By 1900, Charles had horse drawn wagons serving popcorn throughout the streets of Chicago. Throughout the century, more people began to discover popcorn by the means of Cracker Jacks at baseball games, movie theatres, and microwaves.

I love popcorn; but for too long, popcorns were all cooked using seed oils such as canola or soybean. We’re now beginning to see popcorns using healthy oils, including as coconut, avocado, and olive oil as well as ghee. 

Another issue with bagged popcorn is the ingredients along with the popcorn, salt, and oil. This can be anything from artificial flavors, chemical preservatives, GMOs, and other unnatural additives. The brands I’m recommending all pride themselves on using real ingredients. 

In alphabetical order, here are the 14 best bagged popcorns popped in healthy oils:

 

Confusion Snacks 

As a child of the Indian diaspora, Confusion Snacks founder Aadit Patel grew up with both maintaining his Indian heritage while adapting to U.S. culture. Originally a confusion of his two nationalities, it turned into a unique fusion of the two cultures. Aadit is able to share this experience with his Confusion Snacks’ popcorn and roasted peanuts. His popcorn fusions are black truffle masala and chili masala.

 

Dr. Linda’s 

Dr. Linda Robins, M.D. went from being a fertility specialist to opening a homeopathy practice. Her transition into homeopathy occurred after she was unable to cure her chronic back pain ailment with traditional medicine. While being a homepath, Dr. Linda discovered how important food is in terms of health. So she started teaching her patients about the benefits of nutrient dense foods. Delving further, she learned about the key role which magnesium plays in our health and how the essential mineral is lacking in the current standard diet. In 2013, she decided it was time to integrate magnesium so it could found easier and created the Dr. Linda’s magnesium-rich product line. She began with offering nuts and seaweed sourced from sustainable and environmentally conscious farms. More recently, they added popcorn cooked in coconut oil and seasoned with seaweed and real salt. 

 

Foods You Know

Foods You Know sees that the best food is both great tasting and sourced with recognizable and beneficial ingredients. In terms of ingredients, their top priorities are organic, grass fed, and from sustainable farms. The popcorn, branded as Gheelish, replaces seed oils with high-quality ghee. The options for Gheelish popcorn are lightly buttered, sweet cinnamon, and salt & pepper.

 

Healthy Traditions

In 1998, Healthy Traditions founder Brian Shilhavy learned about the benefits of coconut oil when he moved to the Philippines with his Filipino wife and their three children. Unfortunately, at this time, coconut farmers couldn’t support their families due to the 80s and 90s negative U.S. campaigns against tropical oils. So Brian began making coconut oil himself and by the way of traditional methods from older generations. He put the coconut oil up for sale on the Internet and the demand for coconut oil skyrocketed. When Brian’s family was forced to leave the Philippines, they had to transition from buying fresh farms from their local community and shopping at a local public market to buying food on the shelves at stores with little to no information of who the food producers were. So Brian sought out well sourced food and healthy products. In 2002, he launched Tropical Traditions and then changed the name to Healthy Traditions in 2017.  Today, Healthy Traditions offers a huge assortment of healthy products using traditional methods and their products contain all types of healthy oils and fats. For popcorn, they have popcorn popped in their own coconut oil and in the flavors of Himalayan salt, cinnamon & sugar, hot and spicy, and the heirloom lady finger popcorn. 

 

Lesser Evil 

President and CEO Charles Coristine came to Lesser Evil as he thought it could be a great opportunity to have the company carry out his practices of mindfulness and healthy living, not to mention he loved the name. He saw the goal of Lesser Evil as creating organic, sustainably made delicious snacks that inspire mindful snacking. Examples of their sustainable practices are the energy efficient facility they own, composting their food waste, and packaging the products in NEO Plastics. Lesser Evil has seven different flavors of its popcorn, cooked in either coconut oil, ghee, avocado oil, or olive oil. They have other better snack choices ranging in everything from cassava flour puffs and curls to veggie sticks to paleo cookies.

 

Little Lad’s 

Restaurant owners Larry & Maria Fleming founded Little Lad’s Herbal Corn when they were trying to come up with an alternative side to the sandwiches at their Maine restaurant. Larry & Maria started making popcorn and seasoning it with herbs and spices. Their popcorn is cooked in either coconut or olive oil and free of chemical ingredients, artificial flavors such as MSG, hard to pronounce ingredients, harmful spices, and inedible preservatives. Little Lad’s comes in several flavors, including sea salt & olive oil and herbal corn. 

 

Living Intentions 

Joshua McHugh founded Living Intentions as he wanted to start a company providing innovative snacks  healthier than the alternative out there. Joshua focused on sourcing unique top quality ingredients and herbal extracts from other functional foods. In the beginning, he was sprouting foods in five gallon buckets day and night in his home kitchen with food dehydrators stacked up all over his house. Living Intentions is now based in Point Richmond, CA with a newly built processing facility designed specifically for sprouting. After becoming a pioneer in the raw and sprouted food movement with their nuts and seeds, Living Intentions has expanded into many other areas of snack food. In 2016, they introduced their activated popcorn line. Joshua launched this because he wanted to take popcorn to the next level. Many companies were popping it in coconut oil. Only a few companies used organic popcorn. He wanted to have popcorn which did both of these plus made it a functional snack with probiotics and superfood ingredients. Living Intentions’ popcorn can be found in varieties like Himalayan salt MCT, salsa verde, and tandoori turmeric. 

 

Pop Art Snacks

Pop Art Snacks founder Mike and Venessa Dobson both come from an art background. Their company is all about making snacks not just healthy but also fun. They add that they do for snack food what Andy Warhol did for Campbell’s soup cans. Pop Art’s products take the traditional popcorn snack and elevate it into a savory “taste of art”. Their products are all sourced with organic and natural ingredients. Pop Art’s popcorn comes in bold flavors, including cheddar jalapeño, Hawaiian sea salt, and dill pickle ranch. All of those flavors are with kernels cooked in avocado oil.

 

Pop Daddy Snacks

Mark and Erin Sarafa, the founders of Pop Daddy Snacks, had been eating microwave popcorn almost every evening before Mark decided to do some research. He learned about the chemicals found in microwave popcorn and knew it was time to come up with a healthier snack to feed his family. Mark bought a large popcorn maker for his basement and experimented with different kernels and flavors. He then had his friends, family, and neighbors sample the popcorn and they loved it. After two years of giving away the popcorn for free, Mark made Pop Daddy his full time job in 2013 and purchased an older bakery in Highland, MI. He originally shared a bakery with three other businesses. In 2015, he moved out of the bakery into a larger space in Whitmore Lake, MI. The facility has consistently grown in size to the 14,500 square feet it is today. The kernels are popped in olive oil and come in numerous flavors, such as original, white cheddar, and chipotle BBQ. 

 

Poptastic

Originating in British Columbia, the folks at Hardbite were determined to handcraft an all natural chip which tasted as good as the big brands but didn’t have any artificial flavors or preservatives. They experimented with cooking them until they got the perfect crunch, taste, and flavor. Along with using all natural ingredients, they were advocates of non-GMO before the movement was well known. Hardbite also buys the highest quality potatoes from like-minded farmers. As the company has grown, its product line has grown too. Hardbite has now introduced a sister brand known as Poptastic, which cooks popcorn in avocado oil and in the flavours (as they spell it in Canada) of honey sea salt, black sea salt, and spicy Canadian cheddah, and buttah for days.

 

PopZup

Founders Julie & Marty Lapham created Popzup in 2016 with the purpose of offering a healthy snack which is better both for the people and the planet. Popzup has popcorn made with pure and simple ingredients which are sourced at least 50% from the local community and 100% within the eastern United States. The kernels are popped in coconut oil. Their cleverly named popcorn flavors are butter me up, cheddar head, cheesie herbie, and maple cinnamon toast. Popzup also sells popcorn kernels and seasonings. 

 

Sweet Chaos

In 2016, Sweet Chaos began popping corn in its kettles. Sweet has more than one meaning to them. They’re about being sweet (meaning awesome), their snacks tasting sweet, and being sweet to others. Sweet Chaos is owned by KLN Family Brands, a third generation family owned company. Their popcorn is made in coconut oil and free of artificial colors and flavors. Their offerings come in three different categories: regular popcorn in various flavors, drizzled popcorn, and seasonal drizzles. 

 

Tochi

Ian Seah, Dina Shi, and Marc Seah are first generation Asians who love Asian snacks as much as the next person, but want ones without hard to pronounce ingredients. So they founded a company called Tochi as tochi means land. The concept behind Tochi was infusing their favorite Asian flavors inspired by their homeland into functional protein rich snacks without any of the junk ingredients. Their product lines consist of popcorn and salmon chips. The popcorn uses coconut oil and comes in the Asian inspired flavors of salted egg, milk tea, black sesame, matcha, and ube. 

 

Valley Pop

Valley Pop‘s popcorn originates from seeds in the midwest where the soil in the farmland is abundant in phosphorus and potassium, which adds extra flavor to the popcorn. These seeds are sent to Valley Pop in 2200 pound bags. Once the bag is opened, the seeds become popcorn and shipped to consumers in the next 24 hours. No chemicals of any type are added. The salt is added directly to the kettle while the kernels are popped and the salt melts and blends with the coconut oil and popcorn. Valley Pop is able infuse the oil, salt, and popcorn together well through its high heat, low volume process. This approach also results in less unpopped kernels and hulls. Valley comes in multiple flavors, such as sea salt and cheddar cheese. They also sell popcorn kernels and kits with kernels, salt, and coconut oil which are free of any artificial ingredients 

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