Middle Eastern Delights

This time, my food parcel came from ISRAEL, from my lovely friend Simona, and the organic look of the contents and the previous art meme inspired me to lay them all out as a picture. It looked quite spectacular - unfortunately, my camera doesn't do it justice.
The totally delicious goodies are:
"hair halva" (halva=lit. sweetmeat; made from sesame seeds, honey or sugar syrup; other ingredients may be added, for instance rosewater, dried fruit, nuts, spices), two different types of Hummus snacks (savoury but not spicy-hot), chocolate coated (white and dark) raisins, caramel liquorice (!), candied strawberries, mini oranges, pomelo and papaya, and quince paste. Not in the picture are mini chocolate and halva snacks, and I also left out - for obvious reasons - the absolutely FANtastic handcream Simona sent.
What an absolutely thrilling, exciting and exotic parcel! Thank you ever so much Simona!!!
It's difficult to say what I like best - judging from what has been eaten most of, it would be the hummus snacks. But I think that's got something to do with the fact that it's not sweet, so you don't feel so guilty. Also: you can eat more savoury food in one sitting than sweet. The boys love the strawberries best, but I think I prefer the pomelo, I love the lush combination of citrus and sweet perfume. The hair halva is also absolutely gorgeous, and I could gobble it up in one go, as I adore the taste as much as the odd consistency of this sesame-honey concoction, which demands finger licking - surely one of the definitions of yummy food.
But I have to say that it was the quince paste which excited me most - simply because of this year's unsuccessful Quest for Quince... I will write more about this in The Quince Connection...
-- I know, I know, promises, promises; I never seem to get round to anything I announce. I still haven't added all those recipes from the Childhood Meme..., and, and, and, ad infinitum. But you never know - now that there are 5000 other things more urgent than the blog, I might just feel the urge to ponder the wonder of quinces...