Pineapple cakes are a popular treat in Asia, there are lots of different fruits available as alternatives. This is the first time I've seen one of my favourite fruits, hami melon, as the main ingredient. And I was very pleased to discover that it actually tasted and smelled like hami melon! Would have wanted more jam in the cake, but still great. It puts me in mind to make some hami melon jam.
These wafer bars, which can be found in health food stores in Thailand, are interesting because they contain a large amount of real durian (as it says in the ingredient listing, real durian). The rest of the ingredients are mostly sugar and flour, but there is a definite taste and smell of durian from the wafers. Not something I'd eat all the time, and not something I'd think to even find in a health food store, but maybe the standards are different in Thailand.
Many companies make crispy wafers with hazelnut filling, these were made in Israel. They came very cheap. I don't like that they are only hazelnut flavoured (I see why they are cheap), and I found them very sweet and will not ever eat them again.
Lundberg has been around since 1937, growing rice in harmony with nature. These tortilla chips are made from a combination of brown rice, masa corn flour and white rice flour. I like the barbecue flavour of these, not too much of a kick but a good spice. I also like that they use no artificial colours or flavours. You can find these chips in most large health food stores.
I’ve tried Terra Chip’s Exotic Vegetable Chips - Original and Sweets and Beets, both of which contain sweet potato chips; this one contains only sweet potato chips. The chips look a little dark, perhaps overcooked a little, but taste very good, sweet and full of the good sweet potato flavour. We bought a second bag.
I’ve talked about the superior flavour of Thai bananas, this is a snack that’s really healthy, just Thai bananas baked with honey (and only 1% of the total). Because these are fresh with little preservatives (honey is itself a natural preservative, and very little can grow in it), the shelf life is very short (compared to all the other snacks out there). The banana ends up being chewy with a honey flavour. Interesting, but I think I prefer the fresh banana.
I can’t really recommend these potato chips, though if you are a fan of plain potato chips, and I mean plain, then these are the ones for you! Made from Organic potatoes using Organic sunflower oil, and sea salt, it should at least be reasonably good for you (compared to the more commercial less expensive ones).
I like roselle (or hibiscus) and the Taiwanese pineapple cakes, this combination sounded great (and a welcome surprise from my beautiful Bride). The roselle in the cake is jam made from roselle juice with wax gourd.
I would be very generous in saying that this tastes a lot like the roselle I like, the excellent sourness it has. The roselle jam is quite subtle, but not bad. An interesting idea, but not well delivered.
The American company New England Herbal Foods makes chips out of fruits and vegetables; these are made from coconut (other products in this line are pineapple, banana, durian!, mango, jackfruit, pumpkin, carrot, sweet potato, okra and taro). They are labelled as 100% All-Natural, no Trans Fats, no Gluten and no Preservatives. The coconut comes from Thailand. They are roasted and then baked using vacuum pressure. The only other ingredients are sugar and salt. These ended up tasting quite good, like roasted coconut, though perhaps a little sweet. They were crunchy, and all enjoyed these.
Annie's makes several better-for-you products, this one is a replacement for cheese crackers like Pepperidge Farm's Goldfish Crackers, and are in the shape of bunnies. They contain good ingredients, like organic wheat flour (though there is a Whole Grain version of the Goldfish Crackers that are fairly good), sunflower or safflower oil (so no hydrogenated oils), aged cheddar cheese (real cheese!) and real spices.
How do they taste? I like the cheese flavour better, though my toddler daughter doesn't much - and we really buy them for her! I would, and have, buy these again.
We again went to the Thai Society of Ontario's Saturday Market, and picked up a few items.
These are Gleeb Lum Duan, which are made of cake flour. We think these are too brightly coloured, and would not be like this in Thailand.
These are Kha Nom Pia, Thai pastries filled with taro and green bean.
This is an Isaan-style sausage. There is pork and rice with herbs. There is also vinegar mixed in, which gives it a sharp and interesting taste, though I would prefer the Northern Thailand style sausages, which are mostly meat.
I got this recipe out of a new chocolate cookbook, called "Health by Chocolate" by Victoria Laine, a take on Death by Chocolate, which implies that these recipes are good for you, rather than "Death". There is lots of evidence to indicate that Chocolate is good for you, has ingredients within that are healthy and healthful, I don't need another reason to eat it. The Death by Chocolate is not really Eat this and Die, but perhaps it might be "I love this so much I can die happy" or "this dessert is to die for". The recipes in this cookbook choose more healthy ingredients, substitutions for those high-fat, high-caloric ingredients, things like dates, nut butters, avocado and whole grains. This particular recipe turned out great, though I would say that the next time I make it, I would only add 1-1/2 cups of the puffed cereal, there was lots left over after fashioning the balls; no problem, I enjoyed the nutty-sweet puffed cereal as part of my breakfast. You can use cocoa powder for the chocolate, I used carob powder. Carob powder is similar to cocoa, though it has a milder taste. My daughter likes them too, she first tried them at my Sister's, she made them for a party.
Carob-Quinoa ChewsHeat cashew butter and honey on medium heat or double boiler, stirring constantly, until mixture just begins to bubble (about 2-3 minutes).
Take off heat and stir in vanilla.
Mix in sifted carob powder and puffed cereal. Cool several minutes.
Mold into balls. Cool on counter or in refrigerator until firm.
We picked these up in a Japanese gift store in Mississauga, really because my beautiful Bride likes green tea in baked goods, especially Japanese ones, as well as red bean. The roll is a cylinder of crispy wafer that is filled with various sweetened ingredients, in this case matcha green tea powder and powdered red azuki bean. The roll is crispy, and it definitely tastes of the green tea, but I didn't get much of anything in terms of the red bean. Not something I'd eat on a regular basis, but it's interesting to try.
Not for everyone's taste, and certainly my boss said it must be an acquired taste, the salted licorice flavour is quite salty. Avoid too, if you are on a low salt program. Eat in moderation.
I find double salt licorice interesting, and remember eating them, enjoying them, when young; I also like eating hard-boiled eggs with lots of salt, too. Well, salted nuts might be as salty. These taste like I remember. Oddly enough, I found these in Canada, my boss couldn't find them in the Netherlands.
They are authentic, they have the "DZ" for "Dubbel Zoute" on each piece.
I've tried other versions of this hazelnut creme-filled wafers drenched with chocolate, this is a tasty version from Hans Freitag in Germany. The hazelnut taste of the hazelnut creme is fairly strong (the hazelnut content is 6%), and the chocolate was not bad, though is a milk chocolate (at 30% cacao content). I think I would buy these again.
The second of two pretzels from the Lancaster Pennsylvania baker HK Anderson I tried, having found these in a Chinese supermarket, is a more traditional tasting pretzel, though it is also less traditional, in that is comes in the form of braided twists; some three normal stick pretzels are twisted to make one large pretzel. They taste like pretzels should, pretty good.
I like the ancient grain chia seed (used by Aztecs for energy and as food), and use it often in my morning cereal, Salba is a company which sells chia as a health food. They have also created several food products using their white chia seed, including this bar, which is a mixture of their chia seed, oats, wheat flakes, blueberries & almonds all bound together with honey. To me, it has the taste and consistency of a rice krispie bar (made with marshmallows), the blueberries were few and far between and small and dried, and I find the whole bar a little sweet. It's not bad, but not something I would enjoy on a regular basis.
This is the second of the three new offerings from Kashi, the other one I tried is Ripe Strawberry. The main ingredient in this is the blackberry filling, which is a mixture of blackberry puree concentrate with some sugar, cornstarch and pear juice concentrate and apple powder and apple fiber; surrounding this is their signature seven whole grain and sesame blend. This, like the Ripe Strawberry one, reminds me very much of Voortman's turnover cookies, they were very soft and crumbly, and, small (still, 120 calories for a 35 g bar). The blackberry filling was sweet and, well, not that evocative of blackberries. I think I still prefer their granola bars.
HK Anderson has been making pretzels since 1888 in Lancaster Pennsylvania, though, oddly enough, I found this in a Chinese supermarket. I have enjoyed honey mustard pretzel bites, bought at Bulk Barn, and these are fairly similar. The pretzels are the dry pretzels, and the honey mustard is not strong nor overwhelming, a good version of these, though I don't know if I could regularly find this product anywhere in the Mississauga area.
I came across this new offering from Kashi (it's so new it's not on the Canadian website, I had to go to the US one to find out more about it) in Loblaws; I like their granola bars, so I thought I'd give this a try (six bars cost $3). They also had Apple Cinnamon and Blackberry ones. The main ingredient in this is the strawberry filling, which is a mixture of strawberry puree concentrate with some sugar, cornstarch and pear juice concentrate and apple powder; surrounding this is their signature seven whole grain and sesame blend. This reminds me very much of Voortman's turnover cookies, they were very soft and crumbly, and, well, small (still, 120 calories for a 35 g bar). The strawberry filling was sweet and strawberry, but it didn't evoke in me the sense of ripe strawberries. I think I still prefer their granola bars.
