What to Look for When Buying Baking Soda

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I was originally going to write about how there is aluminum in baking soda and how I had switched to aluminum free baking soda. However, as I dug a little deeper into my research, I found out that most baking soda is now aluminum free.

Companies like Bob’s Red Mill label theirs as aluminum free because originally other baking sodas used to use aluminum. However, now most companies do not contain aluminum but Bob’s Red Mill still has their aluminum free label.

So aluminum free baking soda is any baking soda apparently. This was a nice thing to find out, although it meant that maybe I had bought my baking soda in vain.

I mean, I bought this stuff (that comes at a much higher price) because I thought that I was avoiding aluminum. Was there even a reason to know what to look for when buying baking soda?

However, I kept researching and found out that there are some reasons that buying Bob’s Red Mill is still a better choice.

What to Look for When Buying Baking Soda

Cruelty Free

This is a concern to many and so it’s nice to hear that Bob’s Red Mill doesn’t test on animals. This is not true of other baking soda companies (ahem, orange and white box I’m talking about you).

I also found out that most grocery store generic versions are really just repackaged big brand labels so odds are the generic is just as bad as other animal testing brands.

Chemical Free

Ok, baking soda is a chemical in its self but I’m talking about how you get baking soda. Bob’s Red Mill baking soda doesn’t use chemicals to make their baking soda. Basically you can get baking soda from either mining it (in Colorado apparently) or making it.

If it’s made then there are all kinds of chemicals used. These chemicals are supposedly removed in the refining process to like 99%. However, there is of course that tiny bit left. Also the chemicals cause issues like pollution.

Maybe there’s no aluminum worry with baking soda but at least I know that I have other reasons to keep buying Bob’s Red Mill baking soda. There’s probably other brands that are just as good but I haven’t looked and Bob’s Red Mill is pretty easy to find.

Now baking powder is a whole other story…