March 26th Graze, snack #1: Pina Colada

Graze box, March 23^rd 26^th, 2014 (overview here)

First item (to be eaten): Pina Colada

Appx. value: $1.50

Contents: Dried pineapple, coconut flakes, and mango

First impression: Looks great; all flavors I love! There are a lot of teeny tiny coconut flakes, though (as well as some bigger ones), so it could be a bit messy and hard to get it all. The portions for all of the snacks are about 80% of what I was expecting, but it works as a delicate little tray of healthy snack food.

Taste – Parts: I’ve always been a fan of dried mango, so it wasn’t a surprise to like those yummy morsels. As chewy as always, and just as delicious. I’d never had dried pineapple, and was pleasantly surprised. It had a similar level of chewiness, and tasted surprisingly similar to the mango when dried – still distinctly different, but more alike than I’d been expecting. The coconut however…

I’ve been spoiled in my life, where “coconut” always refers to sweetened coconut “flakes” that more closely resemble grated Parmesan cheese than their form in nature. I had ignorantly assumed that these coconut flakes would be just as sweet. I was very disappointed – and that was entirely my own fault. In fact, I’m glad to have realized it now, so I can go through and take a second look at the other mixes I’d kept as “try” to decide which I may no longer be interested in. If you like natural, unsweetened coconut, you’ll do a lot better with this mix than I did.

Taste – Whole: All combined together, the mixed bite wasn’t bad. Not as sweet as its namesake, that was certain, but it had a nice acidity to it that woke me up in my early-afternoon stupor. The bitter blandness of the unsweetened coconut is a lot easier to handle when combined with other flavors, but, once I realized I didn’t like the coconut, the mix seemed overwhelmed with it.

How was it to eat?: The dried ingredients in this tray weren’t sticky at all, and were easy to pick up without feeling the need to wipe my hands after. However, those tiny coconut flakes were a bit of a pain; they were hard to pick out of the tray, and hard to ration into bites with the larger pieces of dried fruit, and they would be really hard to pick out of a carpet or off of a floor if you happened to spill. This is definitely a vacuum-necessary cleanup.

So, final thoughts?

Parts: 2/3 (lets give it a 3 out of 5)

Whole: 3.6

Texture: 4

Overall: 10.6/15 – Moved it to the trash list for now, but I could see it coming back if I have a craving.

‘Til the next box review!

-BoxxyGirl

PS: Graze is a $6/box snack subscription. Interested in trying it? Use this link to get your first and fifth boxes FREE! Tallying it up to 4 boxes a month, that makes each of your first two months $18 – cheaper than a lot of other monthly snack boxes!