The kitchen at Clif Bar gets a lot of use. Those of us in Research and Development work here everyday mixing up new creations. The kitchen is also used to prepare breakfast for our weekly company meetings, and for the various events that we hold in our theater space. To keep all of the equipment running smoothly, we occasionally have it professionally serviced. Today, is one of those days. There is a drain that needs to be flushed out once in a while—it is the drain from the dishwasher and our large sink. When the drain is opened up, you…

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Every now and then, someone brings in a new food or a supplier sends us a new ingredient that generates a lot of excitement here among the Research and Development team. We munch on it (maybe a little excessively) for a while, until something new catches our attention. Some of the biggest hits include: Yerba Mate This was huge! We all ordered mate gourds and bombillas and sipped on it all day long. The guys from Guayaki Yerba Mate came over and we had a nice chat with them. Eventually, we got a lot of other people into drinking mate,…

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Oh, I can't wait to tell everyone about a new LUNA that is coming out! Unfortunately, I can't say too much about it yet, just that it tastes GREAT and will be coming out early next year. Tomorrow, I'm heading down to the bakery to do another trial run of it. I have been working on it for a while, so now is the exciting time when I get to watch my creation become a reality! It moves from something I make in the here kitchen to the production line, from making 5 bars to about 5,000 bars! I expect…

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Sometimes I get a really great reminder of just how awesome this place is. This morning, we had a guest speaker come to our company meeting -- Ray Anderson. I was introduced to him from a great documentary, The Corporation. He owns a huge carpet company and suddenly decided to change his company around to work towards environmental sustainability. Anyway, his story is remarkable, extremely enlightening and inspiring.  It was a real treat to sit and listen to him talk.  He also mentioned several books worth noting:  Paul Hawken's The Ecology of Commerce and his own book, Mid-Course Correction. Listening…

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In April, I saw some really neat things while on my honeymoon in Ecuador, including some new foods that I would like to explore. There is a legume that grows wild called lupin. The plant has beautiful dark purple flowers, and dots the sides of the Andes mountains. The lupin bean is a great source of protein, similar to soybeans, I think that it could offer some great nutritional benefits and would be fun to experiment with. There is a similar plant native to California coast, but it does not produce and edible legume. Quinoa is another neat grain that is native…

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