Crsipy Green

I am not sure when exactly it happened, but I turned into a snacker. In many ways, this is not a bad thing. What it means mostly is that I don't tend to sit down and eat all at once. For breakfast, as example, I will start my day with a banana. Then, a little later in the morning I will prepare myself some oatmeal. Then, I'll have some other fruit a little later in the day. I started packing my lunch so that I could 'save' something from it for the middle of the afternoon. Then, the exception to my day tends to be dinner. I generally will eat my dinner all in one sitting and only very occasionally have a snack in the evening.

When it comes to snacks, I am generally try to keep them healthy - a piece of fruit, a cup of yogurt (or pudding :-0!), some carrot sticks, etc. But sometimes, I find myself craving something crunchy. Yes, you could argue that carrots and apples are both crunchy, but they don't meet that crunchy snack craving that I have. Perhaps they are too 'wet'.

So, a while back, when I came across Crispy Green, I thought this is a snack that I must try. Crispy Green are 100% freeze-dried fruit. Now, when I think of freeze-dried, the first thing that comes to mind is that astronaut ice cream we used to get on field trips to the science museum. The first that I tried was the Crispy Mangoes. The first thing that I noticed on the package is that indeed, the only ingredient is Mangoes. The Crispy Mangoes have just 40 calories in a bag. The sweet and crispy bites of fruit were both sweet and crispy, offering just the right combination of sweet and crunchy to perfectly fit my snack craving.

I soon came to find that there is a whole variety of Crispy Green products. In the crispy fruit product, they offer five tasty fruits - Crispy Apples, Crispy Bananas, Crispy Asian Pears, Crispy Pineapples and Crispy Mangoes. In addition, they also have a line that they is called FruitziO, which is also freeze dried fruit, but with a bit of cane sugar added for a light, sweet and crunchy taste. The FruitziO line offers - FruitziO Apples and Strawberries, FruitziO Apricots, FruitziO Kiwi, FruitziO Peaches and FruitziO Strawberries.

At first, I wondered about the addition of cane sugar, but realized after tasting that it didn't make the product 'sweet' but mostly balanced the tartness of the fruits. The bags, which are resealable, only have 100 calories in them. So, it still makes for a yummy snack without much guilt. In fact, they are labeled as containing 2.5 servings, which based on the bag I took to work seems about right. I found myself enjoying the strawberries a handful at a time. The slightly sweet, crunchy snack was just what I needed mid-afternoon to get me through the rest of the day.

My kids have been very excited to try all of the different flavors and have share many bags. My son's favorite: Crispy Apples. My daughter's favorite: Crispy Bananas. My son says that he likes them because they taste exactly like an apple. My daughter says because they taste like the fruit that she is having. As a mom, having them excited about fruit is a good thing (not that they don't request fresh fruit too, but bags of freeze dried fruit are more portable).

You can find a store near you that carries Crispy Green, by using their product locator. Interestingly, the store that I bought them at, Earth Fare, was not listed. You can purchase online through Crispy Green. They are currently offering free shipping on orders over $75 and if you purchase in bulk, they work out to be less per bag than you would pay at the store.

No compensation was received for this post. I received a variety pack of their products for the purposes of trying and sharing with my family. Images are from the Crispy Green Website. All opinions expressed are my own or that of my family.