Traveling Without Actually Going Anywhere: Universal Yums from Ukraine
Our March 2024 box came packed with goodies from the country of Ukraine. We had also had a box from Ukraine in February 2021. One of the pages of the booklet explained how the Universal Yums company worked with Ukrainian suppliers to get the snacks to the U.S. despite the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, blackouts, and a heavily restricted port. It was nice to know that Universal Yums wanted to support Ukrainian businesses and employees during a tough time.
Our first treats were Bread Chips, which were similar to a product in the February 2021 box. There were not many chips in the bag. They had a strong smell; these stiff rye chips were a bit spicy, and not my favorite treat. We then tasted Wasabi Chips, which we had also tried before in the February 2021 box. They were very thin and very spicy. My husband, David, likes wasabi, so he obviously liked these chips.
Next, we ate a Sponge Cake with Condensed Milk. It was very soft and fluffy with white creamy filling. It had a weird taste, and we could not tell what flavor it had. The orange packaging tricked me, because I thought it was supposed to have orange flavoring. A Crostata with Black Currant was our next snack that looked and tasted like a little pie. I really enjoyed this, and David said it was ‘berry’ good!
We then ate Choco Shocks; David said he thought it was like a cookie and cream Kit Kat. It had a wafer with a blob of cookie and cream filling on top, and I liked it. Next, we tried Chewing Sweets, which was basically a bubblegum flavored marshmallow. I am not a huge fan of bubblegum flavoring, so I did not like it, and David hated it. Our final treat consisted of Glazed Sweets. These sweets had a very thin chocolate coating over a large piece of lemon candy. It reminded me of a larger piece of candy typically found in a box of Valentines’ Day candy, which I hated, but David loved it.
We had some hits and misses in this month’s box, but it was nice to support the people of Ukraine and learn more about their country. Did you know that the country has a museum that houses 10,000 different traditional Ukrainian Easter eggs? Also, the city of Odessa in Ukraine has catacombs that span over 1,500 miles! The world’s longest instrument can be found in Ukraine: the trembita which is a long wooden horn anywhere from three to ten feet. Also, a Ukrainian founded the world’s first beekeeping school in the ninth-century. And my last fun fact to share is that Ukrainians celebrate Pancake Week the week before Lent!
