Jammu and Kashmir, India:  Harvest Stories is a semi-gourmet brand from J&K that aims to be completely transparent to its consumers through its products. The brand’s product range includes products people use in their kitchens almost every day but of the best quality. The newly-found brand’s founder, Puja, started this brand due to the quality obsession and transparency she expected as a consumer. What Puja believes is that consumers mainly care about the quality of the products and in the end, if they are nutritionally gaining from it. While sourcing and processing techniques are highlighted, which is vital, there aren’t many providing their consumers with test reports. Sure, there is the standard nutritional value table, but can someone measure the curcumin or calcium one is consuming to the last of grams? Ultimately, consumers aren’t buying chia seeds only because they enjoy the gelatinous mouthfeel but mainly because they are made to believe that it is laden with nutrients. That’s why as a stubborn consumer, she gets their products tested. Puja believes that there isn't a better validation of quality and nutrition than by lab testing every batch through FSSAI-approved parameters. Lab testing products tell us about the minerals, omega-3, unsaturated fats and all, but how does it indicate purity? Apart from the nutrients acting as an indicator of purity, tests have been done that measure the purity and adulteration of products. Some of the tests spoken fondly of are curcumin, acidic value, and mineral content tests. One can easily access these tests by scanning the QR or by visiting their website. How is that for quality assurance? Now, we know how they give you solid evidence of their claims, but let’s also learn about the processes that cause these ‘positive and pleasing’ results! Principally, their grinding and extraction processes use mechanisms that prevent heat generation and how they don’t marr the nutrients affecting the quality! How do they prevent the marring of nutrients? What are the mechanisms used? What are the temperatures at which they are processed?
 
For oils, Harvest Stories use wood-press oil machines. This machine extracts the oil at a slower rate as they have a lower rpm, which generates less heat than metal expellers. One would ask how does it matter, right? Well, the oil extracted retains natural nutrients and antioxidants with this method using minimal heat. With this process, the yield is also lower as the rate at which it's extracted is also slower. The use of wood-pressed machines is also indicated by the low acidic value (within FSSAI limits) as the acidic value increases with the amount of heat produced. The greater the acidic value, the poorer the quality. Talking about their grinding methods, they process their Salem Turmeric using the air-cooled mechanism and flours using the Emery stone mill. In the air-cooled mechanism, air pressure breaks down turmeric fingers and grinds them. When the spices are immediately ground, the temperature of the turmeric is, in fact, lower than the room temperature. Usually, the curcumin percentage of Salem turmeric is around 3.3, but with this process, their curcumin percentage is 4.2%. This does indicate the quality of their produce! Flours are also processed using an Emery stone mill—the principle of grinding at low temperature and low rpm is the same!
 
This attention to detail and nitpicking of produce causes their range of products to be in the semi-gourmet space. Using ingredients of the best quality does make sense because people are gonna use them daily!
 
Currently, they have Salem turmeric, chia seeds, ragi flour, Sharbati wheat flour, black mustard oil, and Himalayan pink salt. But they are soon going to be launching their range of different kinds of honey from bee farmers across the country and Kashmiri Walnuts!
 
To be a part of their chirpy fam, as they say, one must visit their website! Customers can also find them on the sustainable marketplace Amala Earth, Amazon, and other online marketplaces. They are also present in up-market grocery stores like Foodhall Mumbai and Delhi. They are going to expand to other cities and more stores.