Chicago Food Swap: Seriously Yummy.

My sister and I had a great experience at the 2nd Chicago Food Swap back in March, and we signed up immediately for the 3rd one, which was today. Just like last time, my friends Emily and Vanessa did a fabulous job of organizing the event.

New this time was the location: the folks at the Savory Spice Shop in Hinsdale were kind enough to host. I wanted to give a shout-out to Dave and the rest of his crew over there, because they have a great store (the smells! so good!) and we all really appreciated their allowing us to “clutter up” the shop for two hours! (Thanks, Savory Spice Shop staff!)

Today’s swap was bigger than the one in March, too. I think I remember hearing that in March there were twenty people signed up, and today there were thirty people signed up. The offerings were diverse and plentiful, that’s for sure! Here’s just a sampling:

Food swap collage

I am almost embarrassed to tell you how much I baked for this.

ALMOST.

I baked twelve chocolate chip banana breads (I make more of this than anything else I bake in my life, truly.) and took ten to swap, plus one for sampling. I also made two full-sized whiskey cakes, which I cut in half so I had four to offer at the swap, and a mini one for sampling. I went in figuring that if I didn’t swap it all out, I would freeze whatever was left.

My food swap stuff

I was happy to see Emily and Vanessa of course, as well as some of the swappers from March (my sister grabbed up a jar of limoncello that she missed out on at the last swap!), and was thrilled to see my good friends Tracey and Michelle there, too!

I went in with a mission, by the way. My neighbor brought over some leftover baked chicken that she got from a caterer for a party she threw on Friday night, and I wanted to find something at the swap to go with it for dinner tonight. As it turned out, Julesie and I were able to pick up some homemade tortillas from one swapper and homemade salsa from Tracey. Mexican night!

Here’s the rest of what I got (Julesie’s is not pictured!):

Food Swap treasures

What you see there from the blue-covered container clockwise is: cranberry orange mustard, raspberry/fig/port jam, homemade tortillas, mini challah, chocolate-drizzled popcorn, cinnamon-honey plums, whoopie pies, chocolate-and-m&m-covered pretzel rods, poppyseed cake, chocolate fudge, salsa, and spicy honey mustard.

SERIOUSLY.

The next Chicago Food Swap will be on Sunday, August 26 (location TBD). I already have it on my calendar and plan to register as soon as they publicize the link. How about you? You can follow the Chicago Food Swap Facebook page if you want to stay on top of it. Hope to see you there!

(Curious about how the Chicago Food Swap works? I laid it all out in my post from back in March, or you could always check out the Chicago Food Swap site!)

10 Comments

  • Michelle Sherman

    I’m bummed that I couldn’t make it today. Looks like it was a success. I hope to make the next one.

  • Toni

    I love, love, love this 🙂 I vowed to go to the next one, so I could see how an actual swap runs, before going through with starting one here…except…August 26th?? Grrr…I’m covering the Dig-In Festival in Indianapolis…sigh…maybe I can attend one sometime before the year 2020. 😀 Glad you had a great time!!

  • mags

    This inspired me to go look to see if we have one of these in Boston and sure enough, we do! I just registered for next week’s food swap. 🙂 I’m so excited!!!!!

  • Grandma W

    The food looks great did you bring any bananna bread back? I love the idea I don’t know if we have one here.

    I have a couple ideas for the next time for you. Like Pumpkin bread and have you tried black and white cookies? I will let you know more later.
    Makes me want to bake. But I made chicken soup today, Dads request.
    Love
    Grandma W

  • Abigail

    Okay, you’ve nearly convinced me to come to the next one. Cooking is not exactly my comfort zone but it does look like a lot of fun.