Food In Real Life

Bertolli Chicken Parmigiana & Penne

Looks: The chicken and tomato bits blend into the sauce much more than the package shows, and there was no melted cheese to be seen (although you could taste it). The sauce is thicker and coats the noodles more than expected, but the noodles themselves appeared as advertised. 3.5 out of 5

Taste: My wife claims this is her favorite of all the Bertolli meals, but I’m just not feeling it. (The Chicken Alfredo & Fettuccine and Chicken Florentine & Farfalle are both superior.) The noodles are fine, but I found the chicken a tad too soggy, and the sauce was underwhelming: it doesn’t taste much different than jarred Ragu. Definitely less than I’ve come to expect from Bertolli. 3 out of 5

McDonald’s Bacon and Cheese Angus Third-Pounder

Looks: I apologize for the unflattering angle of this picture; I know I took several better ones, but somehow, they got lost in the shuffle of having a full memory card and wanting to take pictures of babies in Halloween costumes. Anyhow, the burger that I was served look as if they took the burger from the ad and let it sit out for a few days. The patty was dark and dry, nowhere near as thick as the advertised patty. (On the inside, it was so dry it was almost white and reminded me more of an overcooked porkchop than ground beef.) I only got one piece of cheese, and the vegetable toppings were scant, to say the least. 2 out of 5

Taste: The bun was the only ok thing about this burger. The meat was dry: on a scale from 1 to 10, it was a desert. The bacon tasted fake, and there weren’t enough vegetables or cheese to add moisture to the piece of cardboard masquerading as a ground beef patty. 1 out of 5

Has anyone tried the other Angus burgers? Do they fare any better than this one?

Birds Eye Steamfresh Shrimp Alfredo

Looks: It was hard to get a good picture of this due to the reflectiveness of the sauce (any photographers out there have tips for me?), but besides the prominence of the shrimp, it looked very much the same in real life as it did on the package. 4.5 out of 5

Taste: Anyone who has visited this site for a while knows how much I love meals from Bertolli like the Chicken Florentine or Fettucini Alfredo. They’re great frozen pasta meals that you just toss in a skillet for 10 minutes. This meal is like the poor man’s Bertolli. You don’t have to use a skillet (just microwave the entire bag), and the quality is about 75% of that of a comparable Bertolli meal – the noodles are a little softer, the sauce isn’t as rich, and the peas just get in the way, but it’s still a very good meal for how easy it is to prepare. 4 out of 5

Taco Bell Blackjack Taco

Looks: It has about 50% of the meat it should, and the same goes for the sauce. (Sorry that the picture doesn’t show this, but it was Halloween night and there were trick-or-treaters at the door. And yes, I did get this taco for free.) The lettuce and cheese are true to form. The shell is indeed black. AMAZING! 4 out of 5

Taste: It tastes really black. Wait, no it doesn’t, because black isn’t a flavor – it tastes like the regular Taco Bell taco, with a tiny bit more spice from the sauce. (I don’t know how they get the shell black, but it’s not by use of any spices or flavorings.) It was kind of cool to eat though, because besides olives, how many black foods are there? 4 out of 5