Palm Oil Free Guide to Christmas Food

This Christmas, you can buy your mince pies, chocolates, biscuits and Christmas puddings from companies that only use sustainable palm oil.

Or you could choose to boycott palm oil completely and buy palm oil free products. 

We've put together a list of companies which receive our best rating for palm oil, either for being a palm oil free company or for using best practices in their sourcing.

For example, a company must have all of the possible palm products (palm oil, palm kernel oil, palm oil derivatives) used in its global supply chain certified by the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) plus something extra like full disclosure of volumes, suppliers, or traceability to the mill. Or else a high proportion certified and even more other positive initiatives.

The higher proportion of palm sourced from 'segregated' supply chains, the easier it is for a company to achieve our best rating.

Another way companies can demonstrate engagement on this issue is by sourcing palm oil that is certified as organic.

For all of the best-rated companies, we list their individual products that are palm oil free.

See our full list of palm-oil free products. 

How do the supermarkets rate for palm oil?

In general, most supermarkets lose some points in our rating system for their palm oil policies and usage in own-brand products and don't achieve a 'best' rating. Our guide to supermarkets has more information about how they score for palm oil.

Although Iceland own brand products were palm oil free for a while, currently they are using some palm and other oils in some of their products due to the war in Ukraine and supply issues with sunflower oil.

If you're shopping in a supermarket for things like mince pies check the ingredients if you're looking for certified or palm oil free products.

Why is palm oil a hot topic?

Read our articles about what palm oil is and what it's used for to find out about the ethical and environmental issues associated with palm oil, what sustainable palm oil is, and criticisms of RSPO, the body who oversee some sustainable palm oil.

Palm Oil Free Mince Pies

• Palm oil is often used in the vegetable suet in the mincemeat.
• All the palm oil free mince pies listed in the table below are organic.

• The following are palm oil free, organic and vegan: 
  • Authentic Bread Co Organic & Vegan Gluten-less Mince Pies, 
  • Riverford organic & vegan mince pies
  • Abel & Cole vegan mini organic mince pies

Supermarkets

Our Mince Pies guide  found that the following supermarkets sold some palm oil free mince pies: Aldi, Asda, Iceland, M&S (all palm oil free except puff pastry ones), Tesco, Waitrose.

But they probably won't be labelled as palm oil free so you'll have to check the list of ingredients.

Make your own mince pies

You could make your own mince pies using palm oil free mincemeat.

Authentic Bread Co*, Infinity Foods, both sell jars of organic, vegan, suet-free mincemeat.

Or you could make your own mincemeat from scratch but check that the vegetable suet you buy is palm oil free or make it without suet (see eg. Doves Farm recipe).

Palm Oil Free Christmas Puddings

• Vegan, organic and palm oil free - Riverford, Roots & Wings
• Organic and palm oil free - Roots and Wings, Abel & Cole

Palm Oil Free Chocolate

All the companies below only make palm oil free chocolate.

Biscuits, crispbreads & crackers

Mr Organic is palm oil free across its whole range. The other brands have some products which are palm oil free.

Biscuits containing sustainable palm oil

The following companies get our best rating for their palm oil policy and sell biscuits containing RSPO certified sustainable, Fairtrade or organic palm oil:

• Island Bakery, use sustainable palm oil in Sweet FA biscuits
• Against the Grain, use organic palm oil. All biscuits vegan and gluten free
• Doves Farm, use organic palm oil. All biscuits are organic and vegan
• Biona, all biscuits and cookies contain organic palm oil. All vegan except blueberry and raspberry cookies.
• Nairn's, all contain palm oil. Everything, except cheese and salted caramel varieties, is vegan.
• Hill's, all contain palm oil. Some are vegan.

See our biscuits product guide to see how the companies compare on their overall corporate responsibility. 

*Shopping online

If you choose to shop online, you may like to support us and some carefully chosen affiliate companies.

We have affiliate links with the following online retailers who stock the above products (along with many other things):

• Abel & Cole
• Ethical Shop
• Ethical Superstore
• Oxfam

Ethical Consumer makes a small amount of money from your purchase with our affiliates. This goes to fund our research and campaigning. We ethically screen all the sites we link to.

Which ethical online retailers stock which products?

Although stockists and availability vary, the current list below was correct as of 27th November 2024. Some producers and stockists only sell certain items like mince pies at specific times of the year.