I am/was working on some theme changes. So if things went berserk on ya while ya visited here (as if I think people actually visit my blog) that’s why.

I’m growing tired of this theme.. and I’m looking to clean things up. Just can’t seem to find anything worthwhile or at least something I like.

Heh heh..

Hmmm..

I have been trying to figure out what the black garbage bag in the passenger side rear door is for?

The window is up. The door is closed (and locked?).

Was the window glass broken? Or can’t the window be rolled up all the way?

Hmmm.

I was contacted by a public relations exec about these new products called Wings of Nature. They promote purely organic, healthy, nutritious and ‘tasty’ health bars like none other.

Directly from their website:

Wings of Nature™ by Fresh Harvest Products
We are committed to connecting people and nature through food™ by helping people take charge of their own health and wellness in a variety of ways, including: offering a wide selection of delicious, natural, and nutritious foods. The finest natural ingredients in every product offering the best product grown without artificial pesticides or chemicals to keep our food pure and to protect our environment.

Wings of Nature – Organic – Fresh Harvest Products – Natural, Nutritious

It piqued my interest, so I decided to try my own ‘taste test’. Now let me be clear here, I’m simply a neutral consumer test-driving a new health product. I’m all about being healthy, eating healthy and staying healthy, but not at the cost of force-feeding a certain taste (or lack there of). I think there should be a ‘healthy’ balance (yes – pun intended) between something good for you & something that tastes good. At the very least the product should be healthier than most and it better not taste like a piece of a cardboard-tasting Powerbar (that’s a whole story by itself).

So my goal was something nutritiously healthy, decent tasting and didn’t empty your pocket books.

I was sent three separate flavors to sample:

Almond Raisin

Cranberry Crunch

Espresso Coffee

According to their website a box of 24 bars costs $31.99 which is roughly $1.33/ bar. I can’t say that’s very promising of a price for such a small item.

So right off the bat all three are quite similar in nutritious value. In my opinion all three bars pack quite a wallop of calories (between 170 & 180) for such a small bar (1.4 oz). I mean one bar really wouldn’t suppress my hunger pangs to be honest, just by shear size of the bar. And even with the calories aside, the amount of fat was average (10 g). So neither good nor bad. I can’t say the overall nutritional value ‘grabbed’ my attention.

To put things in perspective a 1oz cup of of your run-of-the-mill trail mix also averages between 150 – 190 calories. I won’t bore you with the disparities and breakdown of good fat and bad fat, simple sugars and starched carbohydrates, sodium, protein, etc. These are all miniscule when looking at the ‘big’ picture of a health bar. I mean lets be honest here, if you were being that critical about your nutrition – you wouldn’t be getting it from a bar! But none the less, this bar wasn’t processed, it was organic.

So the nutritional value is average and comparable to what you might find elsewhere.

The packaging was nice. It was definitely flavor sealed. The plastic wrapping was ‘thicker’ than I expected. Unwrapping each one of the bars was *cough* *cough* a challenge! Wow. I mean I had a dandy of a time ripping open or pealing away the wrapping. Needless to say you don’t have to worry about the products seal.

I was surprised when I opened the packages to find each one of the bars was ‘sticky’ and ‘tacky’. There was an outer coating that made the bars difficult to handle. The outer coating stuck to your fingers like glue.

Even after all that I was still hopeful on their taste. I figured with this gooey outer surface it must be a winner!

Unfortunately the taste lacked the mouth-watering flavor I was expecting.

The Cranberry Crunch was my least favorite, but I think it has a lot to do with my affinity for cranberries (blegh). My wife on the other hand thought they were tasty.

The Almond Raisin was a close second. The almonds presence got in the way of any other flavor (neither good or bad).

The Coffee Espresso was probably the only one that I may consider consuming a second time – and I’d really be hesitant.

All three of them had a grainy, bland-like taste. None of them had the ‘type’ of taste you would have expected from their name-sake. I had my wife try the Almond Raisin bar as well and she like the Cranberry Crunch much better. It was choc-full of grains and seeds.

I don’t know if it was the texture, or the sticky-gooey nature of the bars, but they just weren’t my cup of tea.

I understand whole-heartedly that the product is promoting a more ‘natural’ bar, which includes grains and anything organic. So the grains and the seeds should be expected. It’s just not something I enjoy.

Pro’s:

• Good curb appeal – packaged very well (good flavor seal)
• Talks the talk – they were as nutritious as their competitors
• Organic – better for you than processed any day of the week

Con’s:

• Short on taste – little to none
• Texture – Too grainy for my interest
• Size – extrem
  ely small bar to curb one’s appetite
• Price – not a whole lot of bang for your buck

Recommendation:

I may recommend the bars for their nutritional value, but I don’t think it would save you any money. In the end I might be able to find an equally priced bar that is of greater or equal size, and hopefully a little better tasting.