New Foods Challenge Accepted!

Katie of Chocolate-Covered Katie announced a new contest a few weeks ago and I've finally gotten around to posting about my results. The challenge was to try either a new product, fruit, vegetable, or whatever and I think this was such a great idea since I often find myself in food ruts. While I have a lengthy list of more foods I want to try, the contest ends June 1st, so I'll post about these for now:

I was beyond excited to see the new Living Harvest Tempt hemp milk ice cream at my local Whole Foods and grabbed a pint. I was only able to find the vanilla bean, mint chip, and chocolate fudge flavors at the store, so I chose mint chip. OH MY GOODNESS!! This is fantastic! I love this ice cream because it's gluten-free, not soy-based, not terribly high in fat/sugar, and doesn't have any aftertaste like soy ice cream can have. Also, the little chocolate flakes just melt in your mouth and remind me of the mint chip ice cream of my childhood. This product is pretty rich, but I can't stop eating it and I think I'll have to have a pint in my freezer at all times.

As I went to the checkout line at Whole Foods with my hemp milk ice cream, I noticed a basket full of every flavor of Justin's almond/peanut butter squeeze packs. I've always wanted to try these after reading about them so much on other blogs, so I grabbed one pack of the classic peanut butter and one pack of the maple almond butter. The peanut butter was pretty good- nothing too special, but that's what I expected. What I was really excited to try was the maple almond butter, so I squeezed out as much as possible onto some apple slices. While this certainly is some special almond butter, I wasn't blown away. Don't get me wrong- I think this was delicious and was so glad to try it, but I tend to prefer raw almond butter so the flavor of the roasted almonds was a little overpowering for me. My favorite part of this product, though, is the convenience! I'll probably keep a few packs of the peanut butter on hand because they'll be great for traveling and school lunches (even though I only have 2 weeks left!).

Thanks so much Katie for this fun challenge! I'm already planning my next trip to the store to cross a few new foods off my list :)