Modest Mylk ditches the carton for sustainable nut beverage bases

24-Jan-2019 - Last updated on 24-Jan-2019 at 09:28 GMT

“People just have to be willing to take 60 seconds to make it."

A new make-your-own nut-based milk alternative is hitting the market this month. Modest Mylk is a nut paste sold in glass jars designed to blend with water into a ‘milk-like’ beverage, which the company says is more sustainable and affordable than conventional carton products.

The Modest Mylk nut bases are organic, vegan and free from gluten, preservatives and stabilizers. The brand is housed under Bom Dia Brands, which also sells organic coffee products.

Owner and founder Rachel Gutierrez had the idea for Modest Mylk after looking for a more affordable way to customize her nut beverage at home. She tried making it herself, but found the overnight soaking process cumbersome, time-consuming and messy.

The Modest Mylk bases allow for sweet additives like honey, dates or maple syrup and can be enjoyed with other beverages and foods like all milk and milk alternative products.

A 60 second commitment

Customers are instructed to add a scoop of the nut base to a blender along with 16oz of water and blend on high for one minute. Each jar retails for $14.99, and can make up to 42 8oz servings.

“It’s a huge value, people just have to be willing to take 60 seconds to make it and I think that’s not a huge barrier to convince people it’s worth their time to do,” Gutierrez told DairyReporter.

At $0.36 per serving, it is roughly 50-80% less expensive than conventional nut beverage options. Gutierrez said each glass jar also saves about 11 beverage cartons from landfills.

“We wanted to be sustainable because [conventional] cartons are not recyclable. A lot of people don’t even try to recycle them, but the cartons are pressed materials that are unable to be separated at recycling centers,” she said.

The product is launching with six flavors, each with a unique nut. Vanilla and Chocolate are sweetened and come from a base of cashews and almonds. The other four are unsweetened--Oat-Nut is a blend of oats and nuts, and Cashew, Macadamia and Coco-Nut are based from cashews, macadamia nuts and coconuts, respectively.

First-to-market trends

Gutierrez created the first form of Modest Mylk in her own kitchen and has since partnered with a co-packer specializing in nut butter-alternatives to develop the final formula. She shared that finding the right flavors and consistency was a difficult part of the process, as well as securing proper machinery to manufacture it.

“We didn’t want to add anything that was foreign or unnatural like stabilizers. So we use a little bit of arrowroot powder from the arrowroot vegetable. It’s completely natural and helps us to thicken it a little bit,” Gutierrez said.

Modest Mylk is the first-to-market a nut beverage base in the US, representing the continued popularity of a plant-based diet.

Jars of Modest Mylk are available for shipping across the US on the company website, with plans to launch on Amazon in the next few weeks. Gutierrez anticipates a retail launch this year, particularly targeting Whole Foods and other premium health food stores.