Love is the only reason I can justify spending $7 on a pint of frozen dessert. Tonight, when I brought my basket to the register at Garden of Eden, the checkout girl was dumbfounded when I responded $6.99 after the scanner failed to assign a price to my treat: Luna & Larry’s Bare Naked Coconut Bliss. Yes, $6.99. Believe me, if you taste it, you’ll pay it too, I said justifying the purchase.

Earlier this year I discovered the coconut milk-based frozen dessert line at a natural food market in New York’s East Village. There I purchased the four-pack of coconut bars for a similarly obscene amount, much to my roommate’s dismay. But, the damn bars were so creamy and sweet, I could resist. There’s a creamy quality to this dessert that no frozen yogurt, dairy ice cream or gelato can parallel, but there is also texture thanks to the coconut bits.

As months passed, I had trouble finding other frozen desserts that were free of dairy, sugar and of course, corn sugar corn syrup. The Trader Joe’s in NYC failed to offer a frozen dessert free of refined sugar. Oh the horror. I continued my hunt for the perfect frozen dessert but alas there is no such thing as perfect. As a consumer, you usually get what you pay for, at least when it comes to food, drink and services. Even if you find the best taste with the healthiest ingredients, sourced ethically and produced in an organic environment, you will likely sacrifice your budget.

There are plenty of suitable semi-healthy frozen desserts, such as Stonyfield’s organic frozen yogurt and Living Harvest’s hemp milk dessert, but there’s nothing quite like Coconut Bliss. The organic, fair trade, and vegan product is soy-, gluten- and dairy-free and contains no refined sugars. The only sweetener is agave nectar, a low glycemic sweetener from the desert plant also used to produce tequila.

The company is the brainchild of a couple, Larry and Luna, who created the product after giving up dairy and failing to find a suitable soy- or rice-based ice cream alternative. Using a second hand ice cream maker, Coconut Bliss was born. The product is distributed by natural food supplier UNFI, one of America’s largest distributors of natural and organic food and personal care products, which supplies most Whole Foods Markets.

Still, flavor, quality of ingredients, and ethical practices are not alone what make the company deserving of the word unique. The ethical business that embodies capitalism with a conscience understands that merely using certain ingredients may compromise its integrity. This is not to say that we should all give up sugar and cow’s milk, for if no other reason, it is unrealistic. However, there is a serious need for Americans to understand the supply chain and what happens to animals, plants and our own bodies when we encourage the consumption, and over consumption, of mass produced, processed foods. The oversized apple and perfectly orange, round tomato are signs of the chemicals and hormones that have infiltrated our food system, a vital market sector that lacks sufficient government oversight. In choosing organic coconuts and agave from private farms, this company makes the statement that we can eat what we want, when we want it, and not risk harming our body, our planet, animals, plant life, and our fellow man.

The product retails for about $5.99 a pint and comes in bars too. Flavors range from “naked coconut” to chocolate, mint, and fruits such as coconut. In addition to retail distribution, they also offer 1.5 gallon tubs for food service use. Click here for the Coconut Bliss store locator.

The Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) and BioEnergy Solutions’ biogas-to-pipeline injection project in Fresno County, California has begun production of renewable natural gas derived from cow manure. The gas emitted from cow dung will be cleaned and transmitted via a PG&E pipeline, which the power giant will then use to make energy.

A BioEnergy Solutions system reduces emissions of methane, a greenhouse gas 21 times more potent than carbon dioxide, by 70% on a 5,000-cow dairy. BioEnergy Solution’s first project was executed at Vintage Dairy, owned by dairyman and BioEnergy Solutions Founder David Albers, in Fresno County, California.

Manure from 5,000 milk-producing cows and calves is flushed into a covered lagoon the size of almost five football fields and over three stories deep. Methane gas produced as the manure decomposes and is trapped in the lagoon, where the methane is upgraded, or “scrubbed,” to remove corrosive materials to meet PG&E standards. The cleaned gas is then transmitted via PG&E pipeline and is used to deliver renewable electricity to PG&E customers in central and northern California.

Under a long-term contract approved by the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC), BioEnergy Solutions will deliver up to three billion cubic feet of renewable natural gas to PG&E annually.

Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal is suing CVS Pharmacy for allegedly selling cough and allergy medicines, antacids, baby formula, energy drinks and dairy products past their expiration dates at 20 or more of its Connecticut stores according to ConsumerAffairs.com. Blumenthal’s investigators found the expired products on CVS shelves in the summers of 2008 and 2009.

In 2008, a quarter of CVS stores surveyed were found selling expired products. In 2009, the number increased to almost half of the surveyed CVS stores. The lawsuit potentially seeks large fines for violations of the state consumer protection laws, and includes an order barring CVS from selling products with passed expiration dates.

Recently, CVS agreed to pay $875,000 to end a probe by New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo into the sale of expired products in its New York stores, and agreed to implement new policies to prevent expired goods from being sold. Rite Aid reached a similar agreement with New York last year and agreed to pay $1.3 million and adopt new internal policies.

Click here for the complete report from Consumer Affairs

Click here for the original AG’s release

Followers of the Mediterranean diet are less likely to develop depression according to the results of a recent study published in the Archives of General Psychiatry, reports NHIondemand. The Mediterranean diet is based upon traditional diet of the Mediterranean Basin region. Researchers had over 10,000 healthy, depression-free adults follow the Mediterranean diet and fill out questionnaires between 1999 and 2005. Study participants were asked to consume a diet low on meat, with a moderate level of alcohol and dairy products, and with high levels of fruits, nuts, cereals, vegetables, fish and olive oil. The researchers questioned participants again after an average of 4.4 years and found that the overall incidence of depression was 30% lower among those who had followed the diet closely. Even lower rates of depression were recognized among those that that specifically ate fruits, vegetables and olive oil. The researchers noted that adopting the Mediterranean diet is not an appropriate treatment for depression, but that the diet might serve as a preventative measure for those with a family history of depression.

Click here for the complete article.