Trick-or-Treaters will be knocking on doors in just about 48 hours.  I have yet to purchase Halloween candy – time to get to the grocery store!  Maybe this year I will hand out candy alternatives as I wrote about last year. Sometimes its fun to think outside the box!

If you decide to pass out candy to little ghosts, goblins and princesses, choose sweet treats that do not contain palm oil.  Production of this ingredient devastates rain forests in tropical areas of Asia, Africa and South America, and threatens endangered species like orangutans, elephants and tigers.  Many food manufacturers rely on this ingredient because of its low cost and ability to withstand high temperatures during cooking or frying.

You can find palm oil in many processed foods like Girl Scout Cookies, Cheeze-Its and Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream.  Its almost as pervasive as high fructose corn syrup, another no-no in our house.  Remember, the easiest way to let a company know you don’t like an ingredient is to not buy the product in the first place!

To find candy without palm oil, check out this handy guide http://www.cmzoo.org/docs/palmOilCandyGuide2010.pdf or stick to candy made by companies that belong to the Round Table on Sustainable Palm Oil.  Any products made by Nestle, Kellogg’s, PepsiCo (Frito Lay), Hershey’s, Mars, Walmart (Great Value Brand) and ConAgra are palm oil-free choices.