Snack Attack: Review of Evolution Harvest snacks

I’ve mostly given up things like potato chips, cookies, and other processed snacks that used to be my go-to in between meals. I really don’t miss them at all. But I still love a good snack, so I’m always in search of minimally processed yet flavorful options. I stumbled upon Evolution Harvest snacks at Starbucks when I was picking up a green tea. They’ve got them right up at the counter so it was easy to tack a few onto my purchase.

Over the course of a few weeks, I have tried two of their nut blends and two different snack bars. They all tasted great but I wondered if they were true to their marketing. After a little research, I found out that Evolution is actually owned by Starbucks so I was even more skeptical of a huge corporation’s promise to deliver a better snack.

They really do taste GREAT. I enjoy the nut combos, and the snack bars have a nice balance – not too earthy and not too sweet.

So, are they really better options? Let’s compare the Evolution Harvest Roasted Soybean Pepita Almond snack bar to one of my old favorites, a Nature Valley Trail Mix bar. This isn’t an apples to apples comparison because they are two different styles of bars, but I think it’s pretty clear from the ingredients that we have a definitive winner here… 9 ingredients in the Evolution bar vs. 18 ingredients in the Nature Valley bar, many of which are highly suspect (high maltose corn syrup, sugar, fructose, maltodextrin…)

Ingredients in the Evolution Harvest snack bar

Yikes…

Ingredients in the Nature Valley Trail Mix granola bar

I won’t commit to saying that the Evolution Harvest snacks are perfect but I feel good about recommending them as a better snacking option – especially over some of the more common packaged snacks that market themselves as healthy. If forced to choose between a bag of Lay’s potato chips and a Nature Valley granola bar, you might be better off choosing the potato chips – at least they only contain potatoes, oil and salt!

Give Evolution Harvest snacks a try if you can find them at your local Starbucks, and let us know what you think!