Archive for the ‘Beef’ Category

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Healthy Choice Beef Tips Portabello

Wednesday, October 7th, 2009

Healthy Choice Beef Tips Portabello - Ad

Healthy Choice Beef Tips Portabello

Looks: The beef looks much dryer (drier?) than pictured, and the mushrooms in the sauce are practically non-existent. The vegetables looks like shrunken versions of themselves, but the potatoes and caramel apple dessert aren’t too far off. I’m feeling generous today, so I’ll give it… 3 out of 5

Taste: The beef turned out to be just as dry as it looked – stringy and tasteless. The potatoes were gummy, and the broccoli was watery. (The carrots were surprisingly ok, with just a little hardness left in them.) The gold-medal winner of this meal was the caramel apple dessert – quite possibly the best tv-dinner-corner-pocket dessert I’ve ever had. It almost redeemed the stringy beef and bland potatoes. 2 out of 5

Posted in Apple, Beef, Broccoli, Caramel, Carrots, Gravy, Healthy Choice, Mushrooms, Potatoes | 4 Comments »

Chef Boyardee Beef Ravioli

Sunday, September 6th, 2009

Chef Boyardee Beef Ravioli - Ad

Chef Boyardee Beef Ravioli - Closeup

Looks: Once you’ve shaken them out of the can and swirled them around a bit, the ravioli do have the same basic shape as depicted on the wrapper, and the sauce is almost the right color. However, the meat inside is not a healthy brown, but rather a sickly gray. (The pasta too is miscolored – more a pasty white than a golden yellow.) Additionally, the sauce doesn’t coat the ravioli like it’s supposed to, and the pasta pieces are more like flared-out boxes of meat than fluffy little beef pillows. 2.5 out of 5

Taste: There isn’t much. The sauce is really the only thing with a flavor, so it’s a good thing it’s decent for having come out of a can that may have been on the shelf for years. The “pasta” is so soft that you can chew the whole meal with just your tongue and the roof of your mouth, so add another point to the score if you’re suffering from lockjaw. 1 out of 5

Posted in Beef, Canned, Chef Boyardee, Hall of Shame (Taste), Microwave, Pasta, Ravioli | 31 Comments »

Culver’s ButterBurger with Cheese

Wednesday, September 2nd, 2009

culvers-butterburger-ad

(Double ButterBurger)

Culver's Butterburger with Cheese

(Single ButterBurger)

Looks: I could only find an official picture of the double Butterburger, but even accounting for that difference, the real deal doesn’t quite stack up. The bun isn’t as fluffy, the toppings (under the patty) aren’t as evenly placed, and the meat doesn’t extend beyond the edge of the bread. 3.5 out of 5

Taste: Who cares how it looks? The Culver’s ButterBurger is the single best fast-food hamburger in America. I’ve had McDonald’s, Burger King, Hardee’s, Carl’s Jr., Wendy’s, A&W, In-N-Out, Lion’s Tap, and many others, and none of them top Culver’s. The bread has just the right amount of chewiness, and the cheese melts into the burger, almost infusing its flavor into the beef. Putting the lettuce/tomato/etc. beneath the patty and sealing them in with the cheese prevents them from sliding out while you eat, and each bite of the beef patty makes you see a little bit of heaven. I’m not afraid to say that when the burger was gone, I cried a little bit. 5 out of 5

Posted in Beef, Cheese, Cheeseburger, Culvers, Fast Food, Hall of Fame (Taste) | 26 Comments »

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