The best way to get a mix with everything you like — and just that.
I like trail mix as a snack food, especially on a long drive or hike. But I’m also pretty picky about what’s in my trail mix. This leads me to a never-ending search for the right blend — and often paying a premium to get it.
The solution, of course, is to make my own trail mix with just the ingredients I like. With that in mind, I went shopping at Trader Joe’s.
Trader Joe’s is a good source of dried fruits and nuts. Although they also have a bunch of different pre-formulated trail mixes, I don’t really like any of them. Instead, I bought the following and made my own:
- Dried apples
- Pitted dates
- Dried tangerines
- Dried (slightly sweetened) coconut strips
- Honey roasted peanuts
- Raw almonds
My custom blend trail mix.
I chopped a bunch of it up — except the peanuts, which I left whole — and mixed it in a yogurt container I had a cover for. I had some chocolate chips and thought I might add them, but the mix turned out to be sweet enough without them. Also, I knew I’d be spending some time in warm weather and I didn’t want melted chocolate in my trail mix.
The result: perfection — at least as far as I’m concerned.
Best of all, I have enough ingredients to keep me in trail mix for the rest of my winter travel season.
If you like trail mix, give it a try with your favorite ingredients. I think it’s a good, budget-conscious way to get plenty of trail mix just for your taste.
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Looks yummy! Of course, you know that trail mix only has two ingredients: chocolate and disappointment…
That combination looks very tasty.
The picture put me in mind of the ‘muesli wars’ on Salt Spring Island (BC). When I first visited, an enterprising local had started to sell her own brand of ‘Five Grain and Nut Museli’ at Ganges market (this might just be the prettiest place on earth, where you can shop in a beautiful open market and watch the DHC Beaver floatplanes fly in from Vancouver to tie-up at the harbour just 70 yards away).
Then other folk got in on her act. Ten years ago the best seller was ’11 Grain and Nut’, five years later it was 13.
It’s probably 17 by now (always an odd number, for some reason)
Problem is that the new grains are now so rare and exotic that no one has a clue if the are heathy or toxic.
The more grains the better, eh? I admit I’m a sucker for that. When given the choice between 7-grain and 9-grain bread, I always go with 9. Hope none of those grains are toxic.
What really amazes me is how many people still eat plain old white bread. Ick.
Agreed, white bread is tasteless filler. Why people eat ‘fluff’ when so many interesting breads are available remains a mystery.
On the colour thing, when in the US we find that nearly all eggs are white, while brown eggs (or mixed boxes) are the norm in the UK and most of Europe. Once broken an egg is an egg, the taste depends on the chicken’s diet; so I’m guessing that most American hens have been bred for white-laying genes. If this hunch is correct it must be a non-random effect of consumer choice?