Health

At Turtle Mountain, LLC we are keenly aware of how foods affect a person’s well-being and quality of life.  As we listen to the needs and desires of our customers, we have learned that the success of our products is as much about what they do not contain as it is about what they do contain.  To this end, we use only the highest quality ingredients, and employ the most stringent testing, production, and packaging methods.

 

Allergen Testing

It is Turtle Mountain’s policy to exclude all allergens from our products unless they are known constituents of an ingredient and the allergen is declared on the package. We use state of the art testing procedures with sensitivity to the allergen down to five parts per million (5 ppm).  Our allergen program involves validating the cleanliness of the processing line, auditing the raw materials and testing the intermediates and finished products.

To validate the cleanliness of the processing line, samples of the post cleaning rinse water are drawn for each machine and belt.  These are tested using allergen tests that complex with the specific target allergen.  When the line is deemed to be free of allergens the product is produced. 

When a raw material has the potential, either through the nature of the ingredient or the method in which it is processed, to contain an allergen, Turtle Mountain quality control requires that the supplier test the ingredient on a lot by lot basis and provide documentation of it’s cleanliness via a Certificate of Analysis.  These Certificates of Analysis are audited during ingredient receipt inspection to ensure compliance with our allergen program.

Co-packers are required to process our products using the same procedures that exclude allergens from entering the system and products that our company plants do. These procedures include all of the above and any combination of the following:

• Using specified ingredients from approved suppliers.
• Use of allergen excluding scheduling.
• Warehousing using methods that prevent cross contamination.

 

Equipment Cleaning

We clean our processing plants using a 4-step process, utilizing the highest standards practiced in the industry.  This process includes a hot water rinse, a caustic wash, a hot water rinse and finally a sanitizer rinse.  To ensure that the all of the caustic wash is removed during the rinse phase the rinse water is tested.

 

Packaging

None of the containers and lids that our products are packaged in contain Bisphenol-A (BPA’s).  We hold documentation from each of the manufacturers for our containers, bottles, cups and lids stating that they do not use this substance as a raw material. We also analytically test each packaging component randomly to verify that it is BPA free.