Weekly Pickups: Mesquite chocolate, mozz sticks, and pineapple jerky.
Plus: More gift guides!!!!
Welcome back to Weekly Pickups!
This week, we released two more gift guides! We’re so grateful for all the great feedback on these so far, and are so excited to hear that you also like the things that we think are cool.
And today, we have a gift for YOU, too! We’re excited to team up with Spring Cash for our favorite gift to give: cold hard cash (not really but also… really).
Following its $336 million raise from GB Bank and others, Spring Cash is giving CPG brands a 0% APR (up to $50K) advance on any of your unpaid retailer or distributor invoices.
It’s insanely easy to use: Just submit an invoice to their site, and Spring Cash’s AI approves invoices within six (6!!!) minutes and sends you money immediately.
Brands like Laurel’s Coffee, Supermush, Flock Foods, and Cloud 23 are using Spring Cash to get paid immediately for invoices from Costco, Target, Whole Foods, and more.
No more waiting on a retailer—your sale turns into instant cash in the bank that you can put back into your brand and keep growing.
Now, let’s get into what we’ve been loving this week →
Nate’s Pickup:
Mad Mutz Mozzarella Sticks
If you don’t like mozzarella sticks, I don’t think we can be friends. Oh, you’re lactose intolerant? I’m sorry—so am I. I power through. Take a Lactaid. You got this! Oh, you’re gluten-free? Well they have a gluten-free version. So no excuses here. Fried dairy sticks are very very much worth it.
Quick Facts: Part of the Tony Boloney’s family, which I’m told is a big deal if you’re in NJ. And after meeting founder Mike Hauke, I can see why. These are frozen, gourmet, hand-pulled mozzarella sticks made with farm-fresh dairy and available in a bunch of creative flavors. These are filler-free, 100% vegetarian, have no preservatives, and have a higher ratio of cheese to breading compared to standard frozen mozzarella sticks.
Reasons to love
The cheese pull is unreal. Like I said, these have a ton of mozz in them and it definitely shows. It’s satisfying both because, you know, cheese—but also this thing can PULL. Like a mile long. A stretch that makes you feel like you’re in a commercial where they CGI the whole thing. Jenna and I actually tried these back at Summer Fancy Food show, and my god do these things have pull.
Excellent flavors. Not only do these come in a ton of varieties, but the flavors actually deliver. They have flavors like a classic one, a Calabrian chili one, a truffle one, a Chimichurri one, a jalapeño popper one, a smokey one, and my favorite the Cacio e Pepe one. But like a rainbow bagel, I’m also partial to the Unicorn one (the flavor is color effectively).
Tied to an established restaurant. I love when a brand takes an iconic menu item—or even a vibe—to the grocery store. We’ve seen it work brilliantly with Momofuku’s noodles and chili crunch, and Rao’s turned their legendary marinara into a grocery aisle staple (yes, Rao’s is a restaurant for those who don’t know—an impossible-to-get-into Italian spot in East Harlem). Mad Mutz is following that same playbook, and it makes me want to visit Tony Boloney’s in person (if not for the fun name alone).
Where to buy: Online at madmutz.com (retail coming soon!)
Jenna’s Pickup:
Mez - Mini Sweet M!lk Pistachio Cups
🚨PASSIONATE REVIEW INCOMING: I just tried my new favorite sweet treat. I’ve been excited to try Mez for a long time now, and finally got my hands on their latest invention: chocolate cups. Needless to say, I am a massive fan, and these will quickly become both a pantry staple and my favorite treat to gift others (if I can manage to get them to the destination without ripping ‘er open).
Quick Facts: Plant-based “chocolate” cups made from mesquite, with a creamy and crunchy pistachio and tahini filling.
Reasons to love:
Cacao-free = sustainable. Chocolate production has a long and complicated history of supply chain and environmental issues (too long and complicated, in fact, to get into here). That’s why Mez’s whole shtick is creating craveable “chocolate” without any cocoa. Instead, they use the beans from mesquite trees, which is something you probably only associate with barbecue wood. Turns out, it’s something of a miracle tree: it’s native to hot, dry climates, requires almost no water or fertilization to grow, and it’s regenerative, meaning it improves soil quality for other plants just by existing. Mez gives mesquite trees a reason to exist, and the planet is better off for it.
cutie beans!!! Impossible to have just one, and that’s okay. These are ADDICTING. Made without any dairy or artificial sweeteners, they’re still utterly creamy and have only 4g of added sugar and 80 calories per two-cup serving—which literally feels like voodoo magic. You will be having more than one, but that’s easy to justify with this simple ingredient list and low sugar content with none of the artificial stuff.
Pistachio trend, but made all its own. Admittedly, I didn’t have crazy expectations for a pistachio chocolate—the Dubai chocolate trend has been chewed up and spat out by so many brands now. But holy moly, these may be even better than the OG Dubai chocolate (don’t sue me for saying that). They’re creamy from the tahini filling and mesquite chocolate; crunchy from the gluten-free bread crumbs, real pistachio, and chufa flour; a smidge salty yet delightfully sweet; the perfect ratio of filling to cup; and simply five stars across the board. If you told me you got these at an upscale French-owned chocolatier, I wouldn’t question it for a single second (which is bonkers, because these technically aren’t even chocolate 🤯).
I cannot WAIT to try the other flavors—Peanut Butter, Candy Cane, Ube Pumpkin Spice, and S’mores.
Where to buy: Online (on sale today!!!)
✨ Special Guest ✨ Jon Silverman, Senior VP of Business Development & Innovation @ Spindrift
We’re so excited to welcome Jon to the newsletter! We had the absolute pleasure of (virtually) meeting Jon last month, when he sent us an email about one of our podcast episodes (turns out, we all have passionate beliefs about grass-fed whey protein). He is now one of our favorite people in CPG, and you will very quickly see why. Beyond being the brilliant innovation mind behind Spindrift, Jon has a long history in CPG—from being a buyer and ultimately VP at Williams Sonoma to GM and VP at Grove Collaborative. He also is simply hilarious and a delight to talk to.
Let’s get into his pickup →
What is it? Solely Organic Pineapple Jerky. Here’s the thing…I could eat a box (6, 12, 18…keep going) of these things, but only the jerky and only the pineapple. They make other forms (pieces, halves, strips, gummies) and other flavors (mango, mango + a bunch of other flavors) but I’m only here for the pineapple. Laser-strike on the pineapple.
Where’d you purchase it, and why that channel? I typically pick it up at Whole Foods, but my local Whole Foods closed for construction…and then we got Amazon-ified and they closed it forever so I am having to do my shopping at a few different places (less-cool Whole foods, Good Earth, etc.) and when my pineapple jerky is in stock I am picking it up. But stock levels are spotty, probs cause I buy all of the local supply and the replenishment algorithms don’t expect me to to shop like the apocalypse is tomorrow.
What about this product intrigued you? I have a long history with jerky, and a medium history with my daughter, both of which have led me to Solely.
Jerky: the format is kind of the best in the world. I don’t eat meat anymore but was always a fan of jerky…I still eat fish and ordered some obscure Alaskan salmon jerky a few weeks ago. Why wouldn’t you want all-natural protein in your pocket? Does it even need packaging…only if you mind some pocket-goobers and loose change stuck to your food. Getting my molars in on the chewfest makes me feel ~4% hunter-gatherer.
As much as I like the jerky format, when it comes to fruit I only only like it for a few types: strawberries, pineapple, grape. And there really aren’t good brands out there. I used to love that Stretch Island fruit leather but I think they are out of business. (I used to eat so many sugar-laden fruit roll-ups as a kid and then my mom told me they stunt your growth…and I believed her!) I have bought a couple of dehydrators over the years (jerky prices are whack) but they 30% didn’t work great, 25%, took up more space than my wife let me have and whatever % is left made too much fan noise all night long.
My family has been eating Solely dried mango pieces for a while, even though I mostly refuse to buy them based on price and so I sub Whole Foods 365 or bulk food bins. I myself won’t touch dried mango…not my thang.
My daughter loves jerky as much as I do. We are always trying different bars/fruits/gummies that are kind of fruit-derived. I don’t let her have the seemingly healthy but with sugar ones and there are a bunch she doesn’t like for reasons she never shares.
We both ate our own Solely pineapple right in the store and looked at each other and then, wordlessly, grabbed all of the other ones on the shelf and ran to the checkout!
Why do you love it? If you were to recommend it to a friend, what attributes would you share first + foremost?
Me: Hi, you should eat this pineapple jerky.
Friend(ish): kind of rich pricing. Really?
Me: We’re not friends anymore, but anyhow. It’s JUST organic pineapple. And pineapple crushes. And you will eat all of them fast. Pineapple and nothing but. Organic, and nothing but. Jerky…for the win!!
Check out our latest podcast, where we uncover how non-alc brands can still win, the new frontier of skincare and clean beauty, and how Target is changing online shopping forever.
How non-alc brands can still win
Welcome back to another episode of The Curious Consumer! This week, we’ve got a great lineup of consumer goods stories—from the beverage brand that’s secretly winning through foodservice, to the new era of medical-grade skincare platforms.
Thanks for reading! Anything you think we should try for an upcoming edition of Express Checkout? Email us at hello@expresscheckout.co