Hola!

Not much going on for me today other than work. I’m hoping to get out of here at a reasonable time so I can get in a workout tonight. I was lazy this morning and didn’t get up in time to get one in before leaving for the office.

I also wanted to share a new food find. I went by Trader Joes today on my lunch hour to pick up a few things. I went by the aisle with the protein bars to pick up a few of my beloved Z Bars from Clif. (Yes, I am fully aware they are for kids, but they’re tasty!) While I was there, I noticed a new bar called Nectar Cacao which was also by Clif. Two things immediately caught my eye. 1) The flavor was “Dark Chocolate Walnut”, and 2) it was organic. After checking the nutrition label to be sure it would fit into my food plan, I decided to pick one up to give it a try as my afternoon snack today.

When I got back to my office, I started looking more closely at the label. I was amazed when I noticed it claimed to have 2 servings of fruit. I was thinking, “Ok, how the hell does this have 2 servings of fruit when it’s dark chocolate walnut? I flipped over and looking at the nutrition label more closely and was shocked to find that the primary ingredient is actually organic dates! YAY!! I love dates! You just HAVE to love a product for which the entire ingredient list is organic dates, organic walnuts, organic unsweetened chocolate, organic cocoa, and organic vanilla. Not a single artificial ingredient in the bunch and no high fructose corn syrup!

When snack time rolled around, I opened up the bar. It was a bit smaller than I was expecting (1.6 oz./45g), but still not bad for a light snack I think to myself. I’m not going to kid you, it definitely had more of a date taste than it did a chocolate taste. Fortunately, since I love dates, that was fine by me. I thoroughly enjoyed the bar, and with it’s 6 grams of fiber, it was pretty filling as well.

Here are the overall nutritionals: 160 calories, 6g fat (0g trans fat), 27g carbs, 6g fiber, 18g sugar, and 3g protein. For those on Weight Watchers, that makes it come in at 3 points. Even though it’s a point higher than my Z Bars, it was definitely a nice change of pace and I loved that I got in a couple of fruit servings to boot. All in all, I’d give it 4 out of 5 stars if I were rating it. I definitely want to check out some of the other flavors now, too.

I forgot to mention a few days ago that something odd happened to me on Friday. It’s only happened to me one other time in my life, so it was pretty monumental to me. I got a speeding ticket. So, on Wednesday, July 16, I’ll be heading off to traffic court. Since I’ve never had a single infraction on my driving record since moving to California over 11 years ago, odds are definitely on my side that the judge will let me go to traffic school to avoid having a point go on my license. The lesson learned here for me is to not get so involved in watching the traffic when merging onto the freeway that I forget to watch my speedometer. Oh, yeah, and if I’d stop being such a damned lead foot, it wouldn’t hurt either.

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