A Brief Comparison of Power Bars

Before leaving to Europe, I bought a bunch of food bars that I could eat on a train or just on a day when I didn’t want to dish out money for lunch. And I really didn’t need to do that. First off, one of my main priorities here is food. I’d rather cruise around town looking for cool cafes and cute little patisseries than tour the inside of the Notre Dame, which is exactly what Im doing now. So when would I ever choose to eat a cliff bar instead of sitting down with a coffee and a warm broccoli and smoked salmon quiche and a good book? Never. But while I’ve got these bars, I may as well lay out a comparison.

So far, Cliff bars are my favorite. Some people think they taste like turds, but really they don’t. They only look like turds. There are actually many very good flavors. The best flavors so far are Peanut Toffee Buzz (that one takes care of the need for both the quiche, AND the coffee) and I think there was a White Chocolate Macadamia Nut (or some combination like that) and that was pretty good too. I also have Mojo bars that are good. Those look a little less like flattened bear poop and don’t have that ambiguous musty power bar taste. They’re more of a fruit and nut concoction but can take on the consistency of peanut brittle, which makes eating them a bit of a struggle. Especially when trying to be subtle about eating while walking through a hushed museum. Also they’re a little bit too sweet for my taste. And the last kind of bar I brought are Odwalla bars. Odwalla makes great smoothies but the bars are not so good. They don’t really taste like anything and are just not that good.
Bottom line, Im focusing on the patisseries and boulangeries. There are these incredible sandwiches, Im really not sure how they make them so good, that are called “jambon buerre” and they’re just exactly that. A small baguette cut in half with butter and ham. And that’s all. No American style, “We have 45 toppings, choose your favorite 15”. No, this is just bread, butter and ham (or salami) and it’s incredible. The bread here really truly is good.