June 30, Starbucks unveiled a healthier menu, over hauling the recipes of some of their most popular snacks and pastries, to eliminate unhealthy ingredients like artificial flavors, dyes, trans fats and high fructose corn syrup (HFCS).
You can still find your favorites, just with slightly different ingredient lists. Starbucks has replaced their “essence of blueberry” (very sly choice of words) with the real thing. Their Blueberry Streusel Muffin now includes real blueberries, and the new Blueberry Oat Bar is made with two types of organic blueberries. The Banana Walnut Bread’s recipe has also been overhauled to make it nearly 30% pure banana.
The Strawberry Banana Vivanno smoothie is made simply with 2% milk, strawberry puree, banana, and whey protein: a good source of fruit, dairy and protein. You can make it even healthier to ask it to be made with Fat free milk instead.
Many of the other recipes, including the Gluten-free Valencia Orange Cake, have been revamped to offer shorter, more simple ingredient lists, eliminating unhealthy chemicals, and high fructose corn syrup.
The changes aren’t huge, and they don’t cut the calories or fat much, if at all, so still view these guys as treats. Pastries and baked goods, of course, are never going to be a healthy choice, but the elimination of artificial ingredients can ease your mind a bit when you do choose to indulge.
There are other healthy options, however, you can pick up anytime, guilt-free. My favorite when I’m in a rush is the Reduced-fat Turkey Bacon Breakfast Sandwich which offers turkey bacon, low fat cheese, and an egg white sandwiched between a multi-grain English muffin. I find it a little dry, but a little ketchup livens it up perfectly. The only way this little guy could be any better is if the English muffin were whole grain (multigrain doesn’t mean healthier- it just means there are multiple types of grains in it.)
You can also try the Perfect Oatmeal, if you skip the sugar, or the Egg white, Spinach and Feta Wrap, with roasted tomatoes, that packs a mere 280 calories.
These changes to the menu were quiet, which I find is an odd choice, as healthier options are a great way to drive business nowadays and Starbucks has been suffering as of late, but a healthier menu is a great service to their customers. Now there is no excuse to not have a well rounded breakfast, when its just as easy as ordering a cup of coffee.
Comments
Sagan
September 11th, 2009 - 1:02:19 PM
I think it's nice that they did it quietly. I feel almost as though it's a show of caring for health rather than just doing it to jump on the bandwagon. I also really like how Starbucks has the recipe cards for some of their baked goods available. You're right, they're still treats- but at least the ingredients are real food!
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