Results tagged “fruit snacks”

Disney Fruit Boost Blend

By: Emily W | Oct 3, 2009

Hannah Montana is taking over more than just the musical world. Just look around and you will see binders, jewelry, shoes, bed spreads ... and food? Yep, that's right. As I was reaching for a few boxes of raisins, Miss Smiley Miley herself caught my attention on a box of Disney Fruit Boost Blend, which ended up going home with me. Raisins are great, but throw dried blueberries and "pomegranate chips" into the mix and you have something that is much more entertaining for your taste buds.

Each component brings a different flavor and textural aspect to the mix. The raisins and dried blueberries speak for themselves and the "pomegranate chips" are comparable to gummies/ fruit snacks with a prominent pomegranate flavor. I buy dried fruits regularly because I use them a lot - in salads, yogurt, oatmeal and I eat them solo.

See more on: Fruity , Kids Foods , fruit snacks

Brothers All Natural Asian Pear Fruit Crisps

By: Ellen | Jul 9, 2009

Brothers All Natural Fruit Crisps truly are a find. Although the Brothers All Natural Strawberry Banana Fruit Crisps was highly rated, I decided to try something different - especially when I saw the elusive Asian Pear flavor. I came across it at a GNC (of all places), and had to try it. At $1.49 a pouch, it was pricey, but I quickly found out it was well worth it.

Whoever came up with the idea of freeze-dried fruit was a genius. These snacks are tasty, long lasting, and the freeze drying process really locks in the flavor. Plus, they're portable and not sticky. This particular flavor is great; actually, since I'd never had an Asian Pear before, I had to run right out and buy one to compare the two flavors. All I can say is, Brothers All Natural nailed it! These crisps are crunchy if you chew them, but if you let them sit in your mouth for a few seconds (weird, I know), they soften up like real slices of pear. Jazz up your regular bowl of cereal, oatmeal, yogurt - and even salads.

See more on: Fruity , fruit snacks

Brothers All Natural Strawberry Banana Fruit Crisps

By: Liza | Feb 7, 2009

Brothers All Natural Strawberry Banana Fruit Crisps have to be the best tasting dried fruit I've tried. It's really sweet and although it's dried fruit, there seems to be a sort of freshness to it than most don't have.

The flavor is rich, sweet and crisp. They are a handy snack and can be used in many different ways, like adding it to yogurt, cereal and oatmeal. They are made without any preservatives or chemicals so all you taste is the yummy flavor of sweet bananas and strawberries.

See more on: Fruity , Gluten Free , Vegetarian , fruit snacks

Fruit Smiles

By: Delia L | Sep 18, 2008

Fruit Smiles are the fruit snacks produced by Walmart's Great Value brand and are described as "naturally and artificially fruit flavored snacks." When I was a little kid, I loved eating fruit snacks. They were bite-sized and packed with fruity flavor. From a more adult perspective, it's important to remember their disadvantages - a lot of them are made with more sugar (and high fructose corn syrup) than fruit (juice).

The front of the box for these snacks boasts a few positive nutritional attributes. Each serving/pouch has 100% of the daily value of vitamin C and no trans fat - which is to be expected from any product that's mostly sugar. But despite the name "Fruit Smiles", the ingredients are primarily corn syrup, sugar, and fruit juice (in that order). Each packet holds several cylindrical smiley faces in 4 flavors: sour apple, watermelon, blue raspberry, and tropical punch. I wasn't expecting an authentic fruit flavor, but wow, they were tart! They had a nice chewy texture, but they left a very tangy feeling on my teeth.

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Funky Monkey Carnival Mix Freeze Dried Fruit Snacks

By: Tanya Patrice | May 12, 2008

Funky Monkey Fruit Snacks are freeze dried fruit - and nothing but fruit. This means they are gluten free, wheat free and of course, dairy free, with no additives or preservatives. I got a pack of the Carnival Mix which contains freeze-dried banana, pineapple, apple, papaya and raisins.

I poured out a handful and it was so delicious. Freeze dried fruits are not as crispy as the other stuff, so the texture may seem a little different from what you're used to - still crunchy though and the taste of the fruit was obvious, especially the papaya and banana. The true test was giving some to my little cousin who is a bit picky with her food, but she was also a fan. We agreed that out favorite bits where the papaya and pineapple. After that test I decided to liven up some plain yogurt with some and the added texture really made a difference.

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Florida's Natural Au'some Blueberry Fruit Juice Nuggets

By: Emily W | Jan 11, 2008

When I was younger, I used to eat gummy fruit snacks quite frequently. However, as I grew up, I realized that most of them were nothing more than high fructose corn syrup and food coloring. When I saw the Florida's Natural version of the childhood treat, I decided to give them a try.

The box contains 8 small packs (o.5 ounces each), which were pretty small. The photo on the box has a picture of blueberries with little red nuggets, but the actual product looks like a color that could be made by mixing every color crayon in the box. Once I got past the awkward color, I tried one. They are all uniquely shaped but the majority of them are square and about the size of a pea. They appear to have a thicker outer layer surrounding a chewy center. The nuggets have a natural taste, which is subtly sweet with a minor lingering blueberry taste. At first, I did not care for it but after eating about half of the pack, I got used to the major difference from the average fruit snack and began to enjoy them.

See more on: Miscellaneous , fruit snacks

Brothers All Natural Freeze Dried Fruit

By: Caroline Yoder | Aug 20, 2007

My favorite type of cereals are the ones with fruit pieces in them, like Kashi Organic Promise Strawberry Fields Cereal and Honey Bunches of Oats Cereal with Strawberries. Now, thanks to the folks that make Brothers All Natural Freeze Dried Fruit, I can now enrich all cereals with some fruity goodness.

Brothers All Natural produces six varieties of fruit crisps: strawberry, pineapple, Asian pear, banana, apple, and strawberry-banana. One of the best ways to enjoy these is to add it to your favorite cereal. When you add milk, the freeze dried fruits soften and plump up - and just add a new dimension to your cereal. I also like to mix them into homemade trail mix.

What you don't want to do is eat them straight from the bag. If you're used to traditionally dried fruit (like raisins), the texture of this fruit might seem a bit strange - like normal fruit but without any moisture, so it may seem like eating sweet styrofoam. To quote our friends over at HeatEatReview, "each little berry will suck all of the saliva out of your mouth."

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Nature Valley Fruit Crisps

By: Tanya Patrice | Jan 2, 2007

Nature Valley Fruit Crisps are baked pieces of real apples which come in Original Apple and Cinnamon Apple varieties. The Apple Crisps are meant to be thin and crispy - like chips - but they are slightly thicker and have a sweet taste. I tried the Original Apple and really liked it as a snack, but what I didn't like was that each pouch of apple crisps is really small. It might be good as a snack for kids, but for us grown ups, I need a little more substance.

Each box of Nature Valley Fruit Crisps comes with five 0.5 ounce pouches of the baked apple pieces. One pouch is only 50 calories, no fat or protein and only 13 grams of total carbohydrates which includes 1 gram of fiber (4% of the daily recommended amount) and 10 grams of sugars.

See more on: Crispy Snacks , fruit snacks

Apricots: Fresh versus Dried

By: Tanya Patrice | Jul 13, 2006

On a recent trip to the Super Target, I came across the Archer Farms brand of Dried Apricots. This got me thinking about the difference in nutrition facts of dried versus fresh fruits. The table below lists the nutrition facts of one serving (3) of fresh apricots, and a serving of dried apricots, (5 pieces) - each piece of dried apricot is about the size of a large prune. Surprise surprise - if you eat 3 apricots, you are still enjoying less calories, less sugars and more vitamin content that when you eat the dried fruit.

See more on: Fruity , fruit, fruit snacks

Del Monte Carb Clever Pear Chunks

By: Tanya Patrice | Dec 1, 2005

At first, I was going to write a scathing review of Del Monte's Carb Clever Pear Chunks. I thought, why in God's name did they now have to add Splenda (and acesulfame K) to canned fruit? Is nothing sacred? Then when I was about to write this, I did a search to see what others thought, and the low carb folks were all just so happy that they could finally eat fruit again. Awww ... Who am I to bash a product when it has made it so that people who want to enjoy the nutritious goodness of fruit, but couldn't (by choice I might add), will now once again be able to feast! So I have re-thought the review. Del Monte saw a need - a segment of the population stopped eating fruit because ... I won't go there - and they filled it - good for them.

Del Monte Carb Clever Pear Chunks are actually 'fresh' tasting probably because they weren't as sweet as the regular canned varieties. I really liked it. The lack of sweetness is obvious, but I for one am glad that there isn't a bunch of extra sugar in this. The syrup isn't thick, but there sure is a lot of it - there was a little more than a third of it left over in the can when I got done eating.

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Florida's Natural Au'some Fruit Juice Nuggets

By: Tanya Patrice | Sep 27, 2005

Florida's Natural is famous for that 100% NOT made from concentrate orange juice - freshly squeezed, nothing added. So it seems like they are branching out from juices, and this is like a natural extension, since it is, "made with real fruits and fruit juices" according to the label. Just in case you don't know what fruit juice nuggets are, they are like Gummy Bears or Fruit Roll Ups, i.e. soft and chewy. The 4 ounce box had 8 pouches with 0.5 ounces, which was a bit too small for my liking, so I doubt that having just one pouch would really constitute a snack. In fact, you could hold all the juice nuggets from one pouch into the palm of one hand. I am only complaining about the small amount because these nuggets were so good. They were sweet and chewy, but really - has a bad tasting fruit juice chewy candy ever been produced? I don't think so.

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