Whew, it has been a busy 2 weeks (hosted our first team of the year and had a blast!)... which explains why my blog has been so quiet, but here I am and ready to share with you an easy, yummy snack. A mixture of this and that... also called trail mix.
There's nothing like homemade trail mix.
The crunchy & sweet mixture of nuts, dried fruit & (sometimes) chocolate makes a great snack to carry along and take the edge off when the hunger strikes. Especially when you have 3 little ones with needed energy to burn!
But I find that pre-made trail mix lack freshness and there's almost always something in the mix that we don't really like or not in the mood for or might contain too much sugar.
So, the solution would be for me to make our own personal blends. It's super easy, much cheaper than the pre-made stuff and I can make it to match our tastes & moods.
Another benefit of making your own is being able to soak & dehydrate your nuts to make them more nutritious and easier to digest. Yes, it is another thing to do... but easy and simple when you plan ahead.
Why do I soak and dehydrate nuts and seeds? You can read my post about why soaking your nuts & seeds is beneficial, but let me share with you my personal reasons.
I find that raw nuts & seeds don't taste that good... to me, they have this bland, waxy flavor that just doesn't appeal to me. Even my kids don't really like to eat them raw! I sometimes get headaches and feel bloated if I eat too much raw nuts & seeds. That's a sure sign that my body is not digesting them well and can lean to nut allergies. Thankfully, soaking and dehydrating them takes care of that issue.
With orange season in full swing... I dried a few pounds worth of orange slices and wanted to find ways to use them other than making orange powder.
Sometimes I like to eat a few dried orange slices when I'm in the mood for something tangy and if I want to tone down the tangy bite, I throw in some chocolate chips. Hmm!
Then one day, dried cherries and almonds got thrown into the mix... and that's how I came about with this delicious trail mix.
As you can see below, my little man couldn't keep his hands out of the bowl (or the picture!)... he was trying to get all the chocolate chips. Swiper!
My kids really enjoy this mix. Of course, they go for the chocolate first :o)
I LOVE this mix because cherries are my favorite and when mixed together with dried oranges, almonds & chocolate... it is simply delicious.
If you are not a fan of cherries (like my hubby), you can use cranberries instead... just don't tell me if you do that ;o)
I have other blends of trail mix that I will (hopefully) share with you later, but for now... let's make some Cherries & Sunshine Trail Mix!
1 1/2 cups almonds (preferably soaked & dehydrated)
1 cup dried cherries
1/3 - 1/2 cup dark or semi-sweet chocolate
Break the dried orange slices into pieces. You can remove the peel and just throw in the flesh part, but I enjoy eating both peel & flesh. Mix the ingredients together in a big bowl and store in an airtight container. Stores well for several week.
Do you like trail mix? What blends do you like? Please share in the comments below!
– This is by far the best investment we’ve made for our USA travels over the last few years. Almost daily my hubby makes a comment about how he is so glad that I suggested the idea of getting one. Through my WAPF group a gal was selling her 1.5 gallon Travel Berkey for a seriously awesome deal (Thanks C Bear!!). The timing was perfect, Thanks to the Lord! Our biggest concern when traveling in the states was getting good sources of water that is free of chlorine, fluoride, arsenic, pollutions and still have a good amount of natural minerals. Yes, we could buy water bottles – but they don’t really taste very good, aren’t always pure and add up waste with all the plastic. Yes, we have water bottles with filters that we often use in Honduras, but they don’t filtered out fluoride. 
to add into our little Berkey guy. How can we survive without good, pure water? It is important to us that we do our best to be in good health during our travels. I’m sure many of you would agree!
– Now, this is not just any ordinary cooler… this is a cooler with a cooling system in it that we can plug into the car and into the wall. It keeps our raw milk, kefir, yogurt and raw cheese cold without any need of ice! We LOVE it because we don’t have to deal with soggy food, draining out water and refilling the cooler with ice to keep the milk cold enough to stay fresh. I have milk in there right now that is over a week old and still tasting fresh!
and simply fill up with free tap water. We love that it filters out the junk and lets us thoroughly quench our thirst. I always end up feeling more thirsting after drinking bottle water because it is purely dead, tasteless water and 
(favorites: 
& 
)
for packing our snacks and individual 
for our meals. For cleaning our hands I often just have us wash with water and then use 
, which smells so much better then the commercial kinds you see everywhere. I like to pump some into a small ziplock bag because of the restrictions on liquids.
that my mother-in-law got for me. They make fantastic snacks for all of us, especially now that Naomi is going to Kindergarden in the mornings (primarily to learn Spanish). Like clockwork, she asks for her snack exactly at 9:30! She's funny that way :o)
. I got this recipe from 
with oil and coconut flour. Spoon in 1 Tbsp of batter into each cup. Bake for 10 - 15 minutes. Let it cool completely before removing it from the cups to insure that it the whole muffin will come out.
){kind=link}