BOS to AUS Food Swap

I participated in a food swap in December organized by Boston Food Bloggers and the Austin Food Blogger Alliance. I thought the idea of sending local foods to someone in Texas and getting some Texas goodies in return sounded like an awesome idea, so I picked up some maple syrup, raspberry applesauce, and Taza chocolate from the Somerville Winter Farmers Market and sent them to Rebecca Otis of rebeccammendations.com.

I also sent Rebecca a box of Sunsational and a jar of my homemade icebox cookies (I  don't think anyone could tell that I replaced some of the all purpose flour with brown rice and whole wheat flours this year! I'll try to post that recipe soon.).

In return, I received this awesome box of Texas goodies! Didn't Rebecca do an awesome job packaging everything so beautifully? Presentation was so much better than my box, which consisted of lots of reused bubble wrap and packing paper. Thanks, Rebecca!!

I did tell Rebecca that we love to add heat to our food and eat a lot of rice and bean dishes, so I'm really excited to try some of this spicy stuff out and will try my best to let you know how we end up using it! If I ever make it to Austin, you can be that the Tears of Joy hot sauce shop will be high on my list of places to go. It sounds to me like James' version of paradise.

Overall, I thought this food swap was an awesome idea. It was a lot of fun to get to know a food blogger in another state. Rebecca and I exchanged emails and chatted online a few times and she's sweeter than those longhorns. It was certainly challenging to find local foods that I thought would transport well, but to me, maple syrup and Taza chocolate were no-brainers and all of the ingredients in that applesauce are grown here in MA, so that was a fun find. The Sunsational isn't widely available yet, but the company was started by someone based locally and I happened to have a few extra boxes on hand. And I really wanted to send something homemade, so freshly baked cookies rounded out my box to Rebecca.


QUESTION for New Englanders: Do you think I missed any local favorites that you would have sent to someone in Texas?