Meet Alice, a Chocolate Company That’s Adding a Dose of Mushrooms to the Wellness Industry

It’s easy to find yourself down a rabbit hole of wellness and supplements—especially when it comes to trendy ingredients. But ask alice, a new company that makes mushroom-infused chocolate formulated for cognitive function, and they’ll tell you the “secret” ingredient in their chocolate is anything but a flash in the pan. 

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Adaptogenic and nootropic mushrooms, like lion’s mane, cordyceps, and reishi, have been used for wellness for centuries; that’s why alice adds a powerful dose of them to their two chocolate blends, Brainstorm and Nightcap. Their mushrooms are meticulously sourced, organic and hand-harvested, sun-dried, and third-party tested for safety and potency. 

We were curious to learn more about the driving passion behind such a unique new company, so we connected with the founders, Charlotte Cruze and Lindsay Goodstein, for a chat about all things Alice. 

*Interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Can you talk about the relationship, if any, between psychedelic mushrooms and the adaptogenic/nootropic mushrooms contained in alice chocolates?

Charlotte: We categorize mushrooms into three different buckets: psychedelic, culinary, and functional. Psychedelic mushrooms have a compound called psilocybin, which produces a psychedelic experience when ingested. On the other side of the spectrum, you have your culinary mushrooms, like shiitakes and oysters: incredibly nutrient-dense and good for you, but they’re not going to change the way your body works any more than eating a healthy diet would. In the middle are functional mushrooms (contained in alice chocolates). They don’t have psilocybin, so it’s impossible to have a psychedelic experience from a functional mushroom. But they have more benefits than culinary mushrooms. They can help change the way your body and brain work in the long term. Cordyceps can help your body use oxygen more efficiently and improve overall vitality. Reishi can help downregulate your nervous system and help with sleep cycles and stress. 

Alice chocolate has both nootropics and adaptogens. Can you explain the difference between the two?

Charlotte: Nootropics are substances that have been shown to help you think better and improve brain health—and they work pretty quickly. On the other hand, adaptogens can help you with a whole host of things. At their core, they help you adapt—that’s why they’re called adaptogens. Whether you’re operating at too high or too low of a level, adaptogens help you reach a level of homeostasis. But the thing about adaptogens (and although some functional mushrooms are adaptogens, not all are), a dose needs to be taken daily to allow the nutrients to compound in your body and start taking effect. It’s important with any adaptogen or functional mushroom that you’re in it for the long haul. 

So was the decision to include the nootropics for instant gratification; like, “Hey this is working!”?

Lindsay: Yes. For example, the mushroom we use in Brainstorm is called Lion’s Mane. Lion’s Mane works slowly, but it’s so molecularly light that it’s able to cross the blood-brain barrier. It triggers your neurological growth factor, which literally helps regrow your brain. It doesn’t happen instantly, so that’s why we have phosphatidylserine, a fatty acid sourced from cabbage, and guarana, a caffeinated berry from Brazil. They’ll help you feel instantly focused, but the long term nootropic is Lion’s Mane. 

Is there anything we should know when shopping for and trying functional mushrooms?

Charlotte: Alice uses exclusively uses fruiting body mushrooms that are sun-dried, which makes them high in Vitamin D. There’s the mycelium and the fruiting body. The mycelium is the root system, and the fruiting body is the portion of the mushroom that you see, above ground. The fruiting body contains the nutrients that are the most bioavailable to people, and that’s why we use it.

What does alice chocolate taste like? Is it similar or different to a traditional chocolate bar experience?

Lindsay: No one’s ever asked us that before! The best way to describe alice is that it’s delicious. It’s a dark chocolate, very fudgy. It’s smooth and buttery.

Charlotte: If you’re expecting milk or white chocolate, that’s not what we do. The Brainstorm chocolate tastes indulgent because we use coconut oil and cocoa butter to give it a melt-in-your-mouth texture with a rich flavor profile. The Nightcap is similar, but has a different flavor profile because we use chamomile in it. It’s soothing.

Do you ever pair alice with other foods or drinks?

Charlotte: In April, we drove an old 1969 Chevy ice cream truck around Southern California to show people different ways to use our chocolate. And we learned new ideas! We were melting down the Brainstorm and dipping bananas in it, then freezing them. We shaved it onto ice cream, and I got really into baking the Nightcap into chocolate chip cookies. That is far and away my favorite way to have Nightcap. We also see people put it in smoothie and yogurt bowls, and that’s a great way to use it. 

Alice is big on giving back. You donate a portion of your proceeds to The Hope Project. Can you explain how you got connected with it, and why it resonates so strongly for you?

Charlotte: It was really important for us to have some sort of giveback. There are so many people doing incredible work in the mushroom space, but we felt everything seemed male-driven. When we got connected to Allison Wilson, who runs The Hope Project, we were instantly moved. Her husband is a five-time Navy SEAL. When he came back, he struggled with PTSD, and was helped by psilocybin and other psychedelic substances. She realized many [military] wives struggled too, and it’s not something a lot of people talk about. So she wanted to start something for these women; it evolved into a resource for women who have served as well. It’s a really safe space for psychedelic experience that’s geared toward the female experience.

You also donate to The Microdosing Collective, and were founding members. The mission of The Collective is in part about informing people about the truth of microdosing and psychedelics. What fallacies need to be debunked?

Charlotte: The Microdosing Collective advocates for education, research, and policy change around microdose amounts of psychedelic substances. So much of psychedelic policy is geared around a bigger macrodose, facilitated in a treatment center; there’s therapy before, you check in, you do it under supervision of a professional, and you have integration work afterwards. That’s beneficial to a lot of people, but it requires a large amount of time and a large amount of financial commitment. The thought behind the Microdosing Collective is that small amounts of psilocybin can be really beneficial to people, and making that available outside of treatment centers is important for the psychedelic justice movement. The fallacies around microdosing are that if you do it, you’re going to hallucinate or trip, or jump out of a window and lose it. When really, a microdose is a sub perceptual dose. That means you don’t have any visuals or experiences that feel like a trip. You’re treating depression, anxiety, or PTSD in a way that some people use SSRIs.

Lindsay: It’s like comparing a sip of wine to a whole bottle. It’s a completely different experience. When we look at legalization of psychedelics, it makes more sense to first legalize the sip of wine, rather than the whole bottle.

What is your hope for the adaptogenic mushroom space and alice chocolates?

Charlotte: We wanted to make wellness not only accessible, but enjoyable also. It doesn’t have to be hard, it doesn’t have to be painful, and it doesn’t have to suck.

Lindsay: We are trying to push forward [the concepts of] indulging and celebrating in wellness. Because it’s good for you. There’s no reason it needs to be uncomfortable. And chocolate is such a good gateway to wellness.