Foodie penpals - a late report from July and August

It's been a tad busy here in Thrift Street so my Foodie Penpal reports for July and August have been a little neglected. Interestingly both my parcels for these months came from Germany (rather ironic then that my tardiness in posting about them stems partly from my recent visit). My July parcel was sadly consumed before any record could be taken of it's contents. This is what happens when the parcels are delivered to work and I have a crowd of nosy colleagues keen to help in the unwrapping. I was rather more careful with my August parcel from Christine (although I have to admit that both chocolate boxes in the photo below are actually empty, the temptation became too much during a particularly slow afternoon in the office).

Christine's lovely parcel included an interesting mango and papaya spread which I have yet to try. It's for bread but I expect that it will make a lovely filling for a coconut dusted cake and I've squirrelled it away for a rainy afternoons baking during the colder months. Also in the box was an elderberry mustard, a little tube of French honey (a perfect size for self catering weekends), a muesli drink (not shown, same fate as the chocolate I'm afraid), butter vanilla oil for baking, Earl Grey Tea (with green sencha), a bag of spices, Himalayan salt and tea bags to infuse cold water for iced tea. I'm particularly looking forward to sampling the mustard (what a perfect excuse for sausages!).