Green Queen: A Protein Smoothie Made from Leaves? Palmetto Superfoods Has You Covered

Originally published by Green Queen on February 5, 2026

Author: Anay Mridul

Original article:

https://newsroom.co.nz/2025/12/17/americas-cup-champions-breakthrough-to-fuel-female-athletes/

Why this matters

This partnership with Palmetto Superfoods opens a new retail channel for Leaft Blade through a highly respected US health-focused food brand. Moving Blade into an established smoothie chain creates regular consumer exposure and introduces the product in an environment built around health and nutrition.

For Leaft, it brings both scale and credibility. Palmetto’s backing validates Blade as a functional product that performs in real food applications, while providing a pathway to materially higher volumes as the rollout expands across stores.

Excerpt from the article

"Bay Area chain Palmetto Superfoods has introduced a new Blade Smoothie, featuring Leaft Foods’s alfalfa-derived Leaf Rubisco protein and an “unmatched” amino acid profile.

Californians can now walk into a store and drink a protein smoothie made from 50,000 leaves.

Palmetto Superfoods, which operates 15 locations in the Golden State, has teamed up with New Zealand startup Leaft Foods to roll out a new drink built on the latter’s Leaf Rubisco protein.

Rubisco is the world’s most abundant protein, and is found in the leaves, not seeds, of green plants. Leaft Foods’s version, called Leaft Blade, is sourced from alfalfa grown in the Canterbury region.

This forms the base of the new Blade Smoothie at the acai chain, which is packed with fruits, seeds and superfoods, and fits right into the demand for high-fibre, high-protein options."

(Excerpt reproduced for commentary purposes. All rights remain with the original publisher.)