Healthier/more natural substitute for coffee creamer?

[Tulpen88]

I am trying really hard to move towards more organic and natural foods & I'm trying to cut out all the corn syrup and hydrogenated oils from our diets. One thing that I am not sure how to replace is coffee creamer. We've been using the powdered creamer for awhile, mainly because it's low fat & low calorie (at least compared to using half & half). I really want to use something else, but I don't want to use half & half because of the calories & fat. I don't think DH would go for any milk substitute (like soy/almond/coconut). I have checked some local stores for organic fat free half & half and haven't found any (probably because the only one out there seems to be Land O Lakes & it has corn syrup in it). Does it exist?! Are there other options for coffee out there?

[serenbat]

NO clue where you are-

but my local grocery has it's own brand of ORGANIC creamers--yummy

Shop-Rite on the east-coast

[fruitfulmomma]

Is there a reason you need it to be low-fat?

Organic Valley's is the best I've found that is free of pretty much everything.

http://www.organicvalley.coop/products/milk-and-cream/

I looked through every brand on the shelf of 3 stores before settling on this one because we have major food intolerances with my youngest. I made some delicious whipped cream with their heavy whipping cream and the difference between that and Cool Whip, which I won't touch, was like night and day.

[BedHead]

Raw cream. MMmmmmm. You can't beat it.

[BetsyPage]

Originally Posted by BedHead

Raw cream. MMmmmmm. You can't beat it.

That's what I'm going to start using. I've been using pasteurized half & half.

[Punchy Kaby]

Grass fed half and half. To the OP-low fat is missing the point of 'Traditional Food'. If you are worried about calories/weight loss cut grains add good fats!

[PreggieUBA2C]

Originally Posted by Tulpen88

I am trying really hard to move towards more organic and natural foods & I'm trying to cut out all the corn syrup and hydrogenated oils from our diets. One thing that I am not sure how to replace is coffee creamer. We've been using the powdered creamer for awhile, mainly because it's low fat & low calorie (at least compared to using half & half). I really want to use something else, but I don't want to use half & half because of the calories & fat. I don't think DH would go for any milk substitute (like soy/almond/coconut). I have checked some local stores for organic fat free half & half and haven't found any (probably because the only one out there seems to be Land O Lakes & it has corn syrup in it). Does it exist?! Are there other options for coffee out there?

Originally Posted by Punchy Kaby

Grass fed half and half. To the OP-low fat is missing the point of 'Traditional Food'. If you are worried about calories/weight loss cut grains add good fats!

Yup. Using full fat raw cram is one way to baby-step into eating more real fats if you are not used to them.

We eat high fat, almost exclusively from animal saturates; nobody in my family is overweight (doing so healed my heart problems and has been essential to healing hypothyroid and hypoadrenia for me; low fat would make me very ill very quickly) and this was the same before we began TF, but my dh still lost ten pounds the first month (I lost15, but I was nursing, so not so reliable a result) I had us eating copious amounts of butter and cream with every meal. He was sure he was going to balloon out, but he trusted me anyway and he lost weight. Your body won't store fat when it receives it regularly/predictably.

Some people use unrefined coconut oil in their coffee, but check out the recent thread about it so that you don't end up with a common brand that tastes nasty if you choose to try it out. A long time ago, I used to use coconut milk just because I really like it. This is of course also high in fat, but real, nourishing fat is a very good thing!!!

[Viola]

I know this is the traditional foods forum and you are getting responses based on that, but if you are looking for a non-dairy creamer, some of the soy ones are actually pretty good, although they taste a little sweeter than something like half & half.

You could also just used evaporated milk.

I don't really have convenient access to raw milk in my neck of the woods, but I think that you could use something like whole milk or cream in your coffee, and you don't have to use as much when it is cream as you would of plain milk

A teaspoon of regular non-dairy creamer has about 1/2 gram of fat and 10 calories. A tablespoon of half & half has about 18 calories and 1.5g of fat, heavy cream has about 5.5 grams of fat. I think if you want to watch fat, you could just use regular milk, or the evaporated which is less watery--a tablespoon of that has 10 calories and 1g of fat.

[rhiandmoi]

My DH loves to put sweetened condensed milk in his coffee. If you have a Hispanic foods aisle it comes in a squeezy bottle if you are not boycotting Nestle products. He says the canned ones are good but not as convenient as the squeeze bottle. I don't know as I don't drink coffee.

Another thing to consider is foaming your milk. It's not as convenient as stirring something in, but it changes the texture of the coffee which gives it a different feel and flavor than just stirring in cream.

[CookAMH]

You're looking for a healthier, more natural sub for coffee creamer. I'm a sucker for good cream in my coffee . This isn't to knock other posters, but I do NOT recommend soy creamers or sweetened condensed milk. I think pasteurized half & half is better than soy, imo. If you do find organic creamers, do NOT buy ultra pasteurized creamers. They last longer, but are very unnhealthy for you because of the extreme heating of the cream. There is nothing good left in it.

I agree with raw cream! Yum. I still need to check this out more myself, but So Delicious has coconut creamer. I'm just not sure of the processing since it lists 0g fat (?!) and some additives that I don't know about. It's a nearly indetectible coconut flavor but thick.

I also agree about not trying to go low fat, even in pasteurized dairy products. Low fat products contain powdered milk which is chemically changed to be a free radical in your body (NOT good).

HTH.

btw, way to go with eliminating corn syrup and oils. Just so you know, canola is a terrible oil despite what mainstream folks say or what the label says. Just wanna mention that as I misunderstood that myself a while back.

Stick around!

P.S. Where do you live? We could point you toward some resources for more natural foods if you're interested or you could check www.eatwild.com

[Brigio]

Well this is the traditional food forum so fat is usually very encouraged..! I find cream to be too much (taste wise) so I do half and half.

[Kailey's mom]

vanilla rice milk is good

[CaraboosMama]

Coconut Milk!! So Delicious also have a coconut milk coffee creamer available - haven"t tried it yet - but plan will look for it the next time we go to Whole Foods.

Just a little fyi as far as half &half is concerned...unless you make it yourself (ie you use a little cream & a little milk) most commercial half&half's do have other chemicals in to stabilize the texture.

[rachelsmama]

What about exploring to find a coffee that you can handle drinking black?

[tolovemercy]

Raw cream + flavored liquid stevia drops= best coffeemate substitute EVER.

[Arduinna]

You could try whole milk or half and half. I don't drink coffee but I do put milk in my tea sometimes and I use whole milk for that since it's what I alway shave on hand.

[Jenille]

So Delicious coconut milk creamer is the way to go! No corn syrup or hydrogenated oils and very tasty! (I love the French vanilla.) I was curious about the 0 fat gm per serving, too, so I wrote to the company. They said that there actually is fat in there, but since it's less than half a gram per serving, the labeling guidelines say they can put zero. If you drank the whole carton straight up, my guess is that you'd be getting like 10 or 15 gm of fat.

[artemis33]

Another vote for real cream.

I can't get raw cream ATM so I just pour a bit of the cream off the top of my raw milk...mmmmmmmm.

If you can't get raw, you could try to find non-homogenized milk and do the same thing.

[Tulpen88]

Thanks everyone! I am new to MDC, so I guess I misunderstood what "traditional foods" meant. But I got lots of great recommendations, so I'll look into them. I may be able to find something at Whole Foods - I hadn't tried there yet. DH and I went back to plain half & half today and we both agree it doesn't taste nearly as creamy as the creamer did. I told him that once we adjust to not having all that corn syrup in our diets, we'll get used to the way food is supposed to taste again!

Thanks for the eatwild.com link. I have already picked out some farms I'm interested in checking out, and DH and I are planning a trip to the farmer's market to find out about the meat/milk/egg selection there.

I've heard of raw milk, but never looked into it. I don't like milk, except in cereal or chocolate milk so I've just stuck with buying organic milk for DH and DS. Would I get real cream from a similar source? Maybe a local farmer's market?

Oh, I'm East Coast, by the way. NC.

[jocelyndale]

I find that I don't need nearly as much cream in my coffee as I needed those fake creamers back in the day. A little bit goes a long way. If you're using flavored creamers, you can certainly add some of your favorite flavors to your coffee while you're brewing/steeping it. I usually shake in some cinnamon with my ground coffee.