Foodie Pen Pals Reveal

I've been a bit of a slacker lately. Between swimming lessons, and story hours, and spring cleaning, and church, and well... Just the hustle and bustle of day to day life, I've gotten a bit behind on this whole blogging thing.  I need to be better about this.  So, as promised, even if I am a day late, I want to tell you all about my first Foodie Pen Pals experience.
I found out about this whole Foodie Penpals thing on a fellow Mommy's blog.  I pretty much thought it sounded like one of the coolest ideas ever, and had to find out more.  So, I googled it, and the results brought me to The Lean Green Bean website. In a nutshell, without sounding too redundant (since I already kind of explained this in a previous post), Foodie Pen Pals is a program where foodies all over the world get to share their love of food by sending and receiving an amazing care package full of goodies.  You must sign up on the website by the 5th of each month, and shortly after you will get an email with your pen pal assignment.  It is then your responsibility to reach out to this person, and get their information, as well as any likes, dislikes, or allergies when it comes to food.  then you have until the 15th of the month and a $15 spending limit to gather up your goodies and get your package shipped out.  Also, you MUST include one hand written item in your package... A recipe, a note, whatever, as long as it is hand written!
The lucky person who got me as a foodie pen pal, just so happened to be from the lovely Brooklyn, NY. When she first emailed me, I let her know I had zero food allergies, and was pretty easy going as far as what she put in my package.  I did tell her that we had given up sweets in our house for Lent, and that we were currently trying to eat somewhat healthy, but I knew full well, if there was junk food in my package, it would, of course, get eaten eventually!

Okay, okay.... When my package arrived in the mail, I was so excited, I could not wait to open it! No, really, I actually opened it while still sitting in my car! My foodie pen pal did an awesome job! First of all she sent me a copy of Shape magazine, which I thought was awesome. I am a HUGE magazine fan, and I'm always looking for ways to "recycle" copies that I have read, and then am done with... So I may have to borrow this idea for one of my own future packages. Now... On to the food. There were 2 Blueberry Crisp flavored Clif bars, a jar of PB2, a small jar of fancy ketchup, a box of Godiva chocolate covered pretzels, a bag of Lundberg Christmas red rice, a bag of Wicked Wolf coffee beans, and a small macadamia nut chocolate bar.  I know, so many goodies!
Now for the breakdown.  I love Clif bars... These didn't stand a chance.  I'm pretty sure I ate one while also still sitting in my car.  I don't think I had tried this flavor before, but I will definitely be having it again.  PB2 is a new obsession of mine.  I've been going through the stuff like crazy.  It's a powdered low fat peanut butter, that you can read more about here.  I eat it on apples, and use it in smoothies and shakes... I love the stuff.  I used the jar of Sir Kensington ketchup as a topper for my turkey meatloaf, and it was delicious. Chocolate covered pretzels are my husband's favorite, so I had to hide these from him.  Thankfully, he got plenty of his own for Easter.  We like to eat ours frozen, so I stashed this little box in the freezer, and have now been snacking on few here and there, when I just must have something sweet. I haven't yet tried the rice, but I am looking forward to it, and will definitely keep you posted. I'm a coffee addict, so the bag of Wicked Wolf certainly did not disappoint! Lastly, to be honest, I forgot about the little chocolate bar since I stashed it until Lent was over, but now that I have been reminded, I have a feeling it will be gone before the end of the day.
All in all, this was such a neat and fun program to take part in, and I will, for sure, be signing up again in the future! For the month of April, however, my fabulous foodie cousin and I have decided to do a little foodie pen pal swap of our own... Which I am soooooo excited about! So keep your eye out for a future post about this!  I'm off to find that candy bar!