(After giving you all butter and chocolate and nuts in baked goods yesterday, I felt the need to get a little healthy today)

I like to bring a snack to work most days, since I frequently end up with 4 hours straight doing busy things like moving boxes or shelving and I get kinda hungry. Now, if I were to scavenge at work, I’d end up eating Skittles or Sour Patch Kids or whatever baked good happens to be residing in the break room, and none of those things are particularly healthy (or even always particularly tasty).

As such, I’ve taken to making my own snack mix in a big 1 gallon jar canister thing that I inherited from my husband’s grandmother. A big plastic container works just as well, or a zip top baggie. It requires no cooking, stays fresh for quite awhile in an airtight container, and is awesome.

Anyway, the ingredients are pretty flexible, but this is my current favorite mix.

• 1 big bag of plain almonds
• 1 big bag of plain walnut halves
• Dried or Freeze-dried Fruit – three small-medium bags (usually apples, blueberries, and mango, preferably unsweetened)

If I’m feeling luxurious, I’ll add some sesame sticks from the open stock bulk section at the grocery store, some chunks of super-dark chocolate, or some Annie’s Organic Bunny Pretzels, but that’s a special treat.

Everything gets dumped into the container, shaken well, and sealed up. I keep a little plastic container in my lunchbox that holds about 1 cup, and that’s my daily snack. I’ll much on and off when I get hungry, and it helps keep me from getting RAVENOUS to the point of scarfing down way too much dinner all at once. The mix is quite sweet tasting (even the almonds taste sweet) and since I’ve taken to drinking lots of water at work (always with lime, I still can’t drink plain water), I don’t get that bloated too-much-salt feeling much anymore.

Also, if I make the mistake of leaving it unattended on my cart, it provides fodder for sneaky coworkers, some of whom have discovered the wonder that is dried mango. But since they almost always ask first, I don’t usually mind sharing 🙂