Archive for the ‘Peppers’ Category

Healthy Choice Grilled Vegetables Mediterranean Cafe Steamer

Friday, May 7th, 2010

Healthy Choice Grilled Vegetables Mediterranean Cage Steamer - Ad

Healthy Choice Grilled Vegetables Mediterranean Cage Steamer

Ah, lunchtime. Those thirty magical minutes when you can forget about the troubles of your job, the upcoming credit card bills, and your soul-crushing loneliness. All food brings comfort, but there’s nothing in the world that will lift your spirit like a bowl full of vegetables. Yes sirree, with their fresh taste unlocked by the magic of steam, this meal of “Grilled (but actually steamed) Mediterranean (but also found in America) Vegetables” is just what you need to turn that frown upside-down. (Note: Upside-down frown may not be experienced by all customers.)

The best part of this meal is the obvious lack of meat. You won’t have to waste time on tender marinated chicken or juicy slow-cooked beef just to get to the delicious vegetable side dishes, like in most meals. When you open this box, you’ll feel like you died and went to heaven… vegetable heaven, that is! The broccoli tastes like broccoli. The eggplant tastes like eggplant. And the snozzberries — don’t get me started on the snozzberries!

Who cares if you’ve been taking cold showers for a week because you’re late on the gas bill? So what if your wife left you and took your dog with her? You’ve still managed to keep the lights on, and that’s worth a reward. So set your microwave for two and a half minutes, and let your cares drift away – you’ve got some eating to do.

Looks: 5 out of 5 Taste: 3 out of 5

Kashi Sicilian Veggie Pizza

Thursday, April 22nd, 2010

Kashi Sicilian Veggie Pizza - Ad

Kashi Sicilian Veggie Pizza

Today’s review comes from reader Megan W. of Lawrence, Kansas:

Looks: The actual pizza appeared to have more, and larger, pieces of vegetables than are shown on the box. The crust didn’t brown much at all. The sauce is as startlingly orange as it appears on the box. The vegetables had actual grill marks exactly as shown. When I first unwrapped the pizza some of the vegetables had migrated to one side so I arranged them to be more even across the pizza.4 out of 5

Taste: This was a delicious pizza. The crust very good: just salty enough with a nice mix of crisp and chewy. The sauce, although orange, was tasty and had noticeable tomato flavor. The vegetables were plentiful, not too soft, and actually tasted grilled (apparently the grill-marks weren’t just for appearances). Although the pizza was flavorful, it was a bit under-seasoned. It could have benefited from some Italian herbs and/or pepper. 4.5 out of 5

My only comment is that it appears that Kashi forgot to add the cheese. Even more embarrassingly, they forgot to add the cheese to the pizza they photographed for the box. Crazy!

Lawson VL Mix Pizza

Monday, March 22nd, 2010

Today’s submission is from Shari, who blogs at Japanese Snack Reviews. She sent in these pictures and descriptions of a Japanese pizza.

Lawson VL Mix Pizza - Ad

Lawson VL Mix Pizza

Looks: “This is a tiny, tiny single serving pizza at 15 cm. (6 in.). There are perforations in the crust to allow for easy division of the pieces. It comes out of the toaster oven looking much sweatier (due to the grease) than the pizza on the package. The green pepper pieces are mere small shreds and there are no visible bits of red pepper. Perhaps the manufacturer was worried about lactose intolerance in Asian consumers and decided to use less cheese than the picture on the package would imply. The image looks like it has been shot through the kind of soft focus lens that is used to make wrinkles harder to see on aging actresses. The real pizza looks rather stark in comparison.” 3 out of 5

Taste: “The crust is really just very soft bread with a little sweetness to it. It’s common in Japan for sugar to be a bigger component in regular bread-based products and you can sense it in this pizza. The sausage is greasy and has the faintest whisper of pork taste, but really doesn’t taste like much of anything. Mainly, you taste the bread and the corn and get an oily mouth. The cheese is a minor textural element. It reminds me of the lame pizza bread I used to have in the elementary school cafeteria, only with more oil. Because of nostalgia, I’ll give it a 2 out of 5.”

If you’d like to see your food featured on FoodIRL, send pictures and descriptions to food@foodirl.com.

DiGiorno 200 Calorie Portions

Wednesday, February 17th, 2010

Digiorno 200 Calorie Portions - Ad

Digiorno 200 Calorie Portions

Looks: They didn’t add enough cheese for it to melt all the way to the edges, the tomato sauce more closely resembles a thin sheet of red paint, and the green peppers by far outnumber the chicken bits. (It’s called “Chicken with Peppers”, not “Peppers with Chicken.”) 3.5 out of 5

Taste: The crust is chewy right out of the microwave, but it becomes crackery if you let it cool. The chicken, cheese, and sauce were all passable (on the high end for microwave pizza), but I definitely would have appreciated more of them. (Although then I suppose they’d have trouble calling it a “200 calorie portion.”

One word of warning: don’t take the “recommended cooking instructions” at face value. There are two 200-calorie portions in each box, and for the first one, I cooked it exactly how long the box recommended I cook it based on my microwave’s wattage (2 minutes). For the second portion, I left it in the microwave for only 1:20. Can you guess which is which?

Digiorno 200 Calorie Portions - Comparison

So if you cook it under close supervision and stop the microwave when the cheese melts, you’ll be ok. 3.5 out of 5