granola

I'm always looking for additional snacks to put in my little girl's school lunches.  She's a big fan of nuts, berries, and granola.  Unfortunately Enjoy Life's very berry crunch did not measure up. 

First of all, this is not a granola.  A better comparison is that of a granola bar.  Instead of a loose collection of various items, these are little bricks stored in a pouch.  I use the term brick because they are also incredibly hard to chew.  I was afraid that I was going to bust a tooth trying to bite into one of these bricks.

The taste was not much better.  Though the package is called very berry, I could hardly taste any berry in this gluten free granola.  All I really tasted was a dry powder as I crunched through the brick.  Once I was done, I desperately wanted something to drink because my mouth was completely dry. 

Now I applaud Enjoy Life Foods goal of making foods that avoid all of the major allergens.  I realize that this is not an easy goal to achieve.  I have also enjoyed several of their other products, but I did not enjoy this.

Enjoy Life's very berry crunch granola will not be purchased again.   

Just recently, there have been several Trader Joe's opening up in our area. As I walked through one for the first time, I found this gluten free granola they sell. Now I am always looking for ways to
extend my daughter's school snacks, so I gave this a try.

The flavor was very close to a traditional granola with lots of nuts and some dried fruit. I liked the flavor, and so does my eldest daughter. However, it does not have the chewiness of a traditional granola. Its texture can be best described as the light corn crunch of a corn cereal.

You might increase the chewiness of the granola by adding additional dried fruit to the mixture. The packaging states that it is loaded with fruit and nuts. Indeed it is very heavy on the nuts, and a little light on the fruit. Now adding the additional fruit will change the taste of the granola, and make it more like a crunchy fruit snack. To me, both sound really yummy.

One other thing I should mention is that I did not find this granola as filling as regular granola. It could easily be that this granola did not have any oats, and oats are known for being filling. I found myself plowing through it as fast as I would plow through a box of cereal. This is good because it shows how much I like the taste, and bad because it did not curb my hunger greatly.

This is worth buying.