Author: Ace

Tyson Any’tizers Cheddar & Jalapeno Chicken Bites

Ace 20 Comments

Tyson likes to tout themselves as a family brand that gives the family a good source of protein so that the family can come together as a family during family time. Basically, they like to cram the word “family” as much as they can into every commercial while throwing in the occasional “wholesome” and “nutritious.” How, then, can they justify selling this?

This, of course, is their new Any’tizers line of products which feature such strange treats as bacon/cheddar chicken bites and Burger King-style chicken fries. Tyson says that this line is necessary in the world of frozen food because “snacking has become the fourth meal in today’s busy households.” However, we all know that Taco Bell is in fact Fourthmeal (Yes, that’s how they spell it), so I’m not sure who they’re trying to fool.

I decided to try it out anyways and went for their cheddar jalapeno chicken bites. These are three ingredients that I love on their own, but I was certainly skeptical of their ability to be tasty in deep fried ball form. I don’t believe that I’ve ever had processed chicken mixed with cheese, but I figured that I love Oscar Meyer cheese dogs, so it couldn’t be all that bad.

I was mostly right. The image of melted cheddar oozing out of the chicken is undeniably strange, but the flavor is suitably mild. I actually enjoyed the jalapeno in the bite as it was spicy without being overbearing. I tested it on various dipping sauces, from ranch to ketchup, even digging through my fridge for some salsa con queso as seen on the box. I found that it tasted best on its own, as sauces masked its flavors.

These won’t replace regular chicken nuggets for me, but it’s a tasty treat for kids and those gross people who enjoy mixing their food together as they eat.

(Nutritional Facts – 4 pieces – 200 calories, 100 calories from fat, 11 grams of fat, 3.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 35 mg of cholesterol, 450mg sodium, 13 grams of carbs, 3 grams of dietary fiber, 0 grams of sugar, 13 grams of protein, 0% Vitamin A, 0% Vitamin C, 8% Calcium, and 4% Iron)

Item: Tyson Any’tizers Cheddar & Jalapeno Chicken Bites
Price: $3.79
Purchased at: Albertsons
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Real jalapenos give it a spicy kick. Cheddar cheese flavor is mild. Pretty tasty without need for dipping sauce.
Cons: Processed chicken means that the bites won’t please more adult palates. Some would find the combination of flavors off-putting. Pricier than regular chicken nuggets. Tyson trying to steal Fourthmeal from Taco Bell.

California Pizza Kitchen For One Sicilian Pizza

Ace 12 Comments

Pizza is a food that is typically shared, whether it be with your family while watching Brink reruns on the Disney Channel or with your friends watching Billy Madison after vaporizing a half pound of weed. It’s cheap, filling, and one of the few foods that you have to eat with your hands in order to not look like a douchebag. The folks at the Kraft Foods company, however, have turned eating pizza into a more fanciful singles affair.

They recently launched their “For One” pizzas for their DiGiorno and California Pizza Kitchen lines, individual-sized pies made for your hectic lifestyle. According to their PR release, “consumers now have a reason to look forward to eating alone.”

Seriously − what the fuck? Now, I don’t really think that the people at CPK want to turn Americans into a group of misanthropic zombies eating alone in a giant auditorium like some strange existentialist painting from soviet Russia, but you have to admit that it sounds a bit creepy.

I was thinking that if this pizza is good enough to make me not want to eat with my loved ones, it must taste like some divine combination of ambrosia and the first fifteen seconds of Fruit Stripe gum. The box certainly looks promising − with interesting ingredients such as fontina cheese and spicy ham. At a mere 5.5 ounces, however, I was worried that it would be the pizza equivalent of a cock-tease.

My fears were alleviated upon consumption. While it is on the small side, it is adequate for a substantial lunch if you have a side salad to go along with it. The crust is super thin and crispy, perfect for piling on the meat toppings that actually taste like quality Italian sausages. It shouldn’t be surprising that a meat product actually tastes like it’s supposed to, but my mind has been ruined by 19 years of emulsified chicken. The Italian herb and cheese seasoning is a tad bit strong, but separates the flavor from other boring pizzas.

The box says it’s microwaveable, but believe me: no pizza, no matter how many gray discs and grid-lined cartons they cram in the package, is anything other than crap from the microwave. Stick with a toaster oven and your patience will be rewarded.

At $3.29, it is a bit on the pricey side, but it is a nice treat for yourself after all of those years stocking up on Celeste and Jeno’s every time they go on sale for $.89. You know what I’m talking about. So if you enjoy a quality frozen pizza, go ahead and give this a try and look forward to eating alone for the rest of your life!

(Nutritional Facts – 1 pizza – 450 calories, 200 calories from fat, 22 grams of fat, 8 grams of saturated fat, 1 gram of trans fat, 35 mg of cholesterol, 820mg sodium, 42 grams of carbs, 2 grams of dietary fiber, 4 grams of sugar, 21 grams of protein, 10% Vitamin A, 0% Vitamin C, 30% Calcium, and 8% Iron)

Item: California Pizza Kitchen For One Sicilian Pizza
Price: FREE (retails for $3.29)
Purchased at: From the nice CPK PR peeps
Rating: 8 out of 10
Pros: Good quality meats compared to what you usually get in frozen pizzas. Thin crust is very crispy. Comes out perfectly after a few minutes in the toaster oven. You get to look forward to eating alone.
Cons: Pretty small, even for an individual pizza. Herb seasoning is a bit strong. Pricey for a frozen pizza. No pizza is ever microwaveable. Reruns of movies such as Brink and Smart House on the Disney Channel.

Sunkist Float

Ace 21 Comments

Americans love a lot of things: pornography, violence, and worshipping false idols. But most of all we love food. Not just good, classic food, but superfluous and extravagant treats that go far beyond the realm of reasonable. We’re the country that balked at Britain’s attempt at a deep fried Mars bar and invented deep fried pizza. It’s only fitting that one of our classic desserts consists of taking a giant scoop of vanilla ice cream and dumping it into a carbonated beverage that somehow contains more sugar than actual sugar.

Yes, the ice cream float has always had a mysterious hold over the imaginations of everyone who’s ever eaten at a diner. Whether it’s the furious bubbling of the concoction or the smooth consistency of ice cream mixed with your favorite soda, it’s hard to resist what basically boils down to an ice cream sauce that you drink. The people at the Dr. Pepper Snapple Group (sounds like an awesome law firm) have taken this idea and released “floats” in Sunkist and A&W root beer flavors, selling them at the premium price of $4.99 for a box of four bottles.

I chose the Sunkist version because I have a Keenan and Kel-like affinity towards orange soda which has been the source of much ridicule in the past. It’s made with real skim milk, making it a low-fat option for those craving an ice cream float. The sugar content, however, is still disturbing. I’m writing this right now as I’m slipping in and out of a diabetic coma because this stuff has 63 grams of sugar in an 11.5 ounce bottle, which is nearly twice as much as regular soda. How they managed to do this is head-explodingly troubling.

The float is absolutely awful when it’s lukewarm, which is to be expected, but is pleasant and refreshing when well-chilled. It tastes very similar to a lot of orange cream sodas that are already on the market, except it is a bit milkier. Also of note is that it has no carbonation at all, which I found odd because a little bit would have made it more interesting on the palate.

You won’t feel great about yourself while you’re drinking this because you can taste every single gram of sugar in each sip. There’s a lot of advertising these days about guilt-free snacks, but this isn’t one of them. At the end of the day, this stuff is way too sweet to be drunk on a regular basis. Of course, I thought the same thing about Lindsay Lohan as well and it didn’t stop her from being a big success. We’ll have to wait and see with the Sunkist Float.

(Nutritional Facts – 1 bottle – 260 calories, 15 calories from fat, 1.5 grams of fat, 0 grams of saturated fat, 5 mg of cholesterol, 20mg sodium, 64 grams of carbs, 0 grams of dietary fiber, 63 grams of sugar, 1 gram of protein, and 4% Calcium)

Item: Sunkist Float
Price: $4.99 (box of 4)
Purchased at: Target
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Tastes pretty good when it’s ultra-chilled. Low on fat while still having a milky flavor. Ice cream sauce that you drink. Deep fried pizza.
Cons: Extremely sweet and horrible for you. No carbonation. A little pricey for what you’re getting.

Casa Fiesta Beef Tamales

Ace 24 Comments

My doctor told me last week that I wasn’t getting enough of my fat intake from canned foods.

Actually, he told me that I was lucky to make it to his office from my car, but this is what I would buy if the previous sentence were true. It’s Casa Fiesta’s Beef Tamales in a can. It boasts that it needs no preservatives, which sounds healthy until you realize that it’s packed in its own grease.

The whole idea of tamales in a can would be enough to give some purists a heart attack — and not just from the cholesterol. Real tamales are lovingly made by hand by an Mexican woman and steamed over several hours with obnoxious mariachi music playing in the background.

They are wrapped in either corn husks or banana leaves, both of which are usurped here by the practical-yet-bland parchment paper. All six tamales are individually wrapped and ready for consumption.

For who?

I’m not certain, but I think I fit right into their self-loathing bachelor demographic. Low standards here are important because they’re not what I’d call pretty. In fact, the process of canning and shipping has left these tamales looking a little bit like spent condoms. I’ll let you use your imagination for the chili sauce.

Fortunately, it does not taste awful. I would never dare serve these to other people, but they are good when you are too lazy to cook and want some spicy food out of a can. The masa dough on the outside is passable even though it kind of blends in with the beef. The beef paste has no real discernible texture; it is comparable to a dryer version of Chef Boyardee’s mystery beef.

If it weren’t for the color, I wouldn’t be able to tell where one ended and the other one began. After drenching it in hot sauce and sour cream, however, you will cease caring and begin enjoying this bastardized Mexican classic.

(Nutritional Facts – 2 tamales – 220 calories, 15 grams of fat, 6 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 25 mg of cholesterol, 680 mg sodium, 14 grams of carbs, less than 1 gram of dietary fiber, 1 gram of sugar, 5 grams of protein, 8% Vitamin A, 2% Vitamin C, 2% Calcium, and 4% Iron)

Item: Casa Fiesta Beef Tamales
Price: $1.39
Purchased at: Target
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Tastes pretty good once you throw a bunch of stuff on it. Convenient and good to have on hand. No preservatives.
Cons: Very greasy if you don’t scoop out the excess. Lacks any discernible texture. Obnoxious mariachi music. Kind of look like spent condoms.

REVIEW: Flamin’ Hot Funyuns

Ace 24 Comments

If you’ve ever attended elementary school, you probably remember the one boy that really enjoyed his food. He would eat a hamburger as if he was making out with it and smother spaghetti sauce along his face as if it were a velvety smooth shaving cream. For that kid, eating was not just simple consumption; it was a sensual ritual rivaled only by the raunchiest of all sex acts. Of course, none of us really knew the dynamics of intercourse at the time, so that kid indulged in the closest thing there was. It was absolutely disgusting — and I wanted in.

Sure, the kids made fun of him, but who was the joke on? While the rest of us were worried about tripping at recess or pissing our pants, he was doing exactly what he wanted. We should all learn a lesson from that boy. It’s time to forget about looking cool with chai-flavored biscotti and time to stop giving a damn. That’s why I picked up a giant bag of Flamin’ Hot Funyuns.

Introduced in 1994, these messy rings of pungency were mysteriously taken off the market soon after they hit stores. It was probably due to the fact that kids were coming to class with eye-burning red fingers and the strong smell of onion powder, effectively destroying any will that the barely motivated teachers already had. This potent combination somehow manages to make junk food even less sexy.

Fortunately, I made it a point not to care about those things any more. Now that these fiery rings of onion-flavored corn are back, I can finally enjoy their addictive messy flavor. Unlike Flamin’ Hot Cheetos, where the cheese flavoring is essentially masked, the pleasant onion taste of the Funyuns is a nice contrast to the heat.

If you’ve ever had other Flamin’ Hot products, you’ll pretty much know what to expect. It’s a slow burn of red peppers followed by that weird hissing sound you make when you don’t want to wussy out and drink water. These chips are a perfect addictive snack for any social occasion − as long as it’s with people you’re not trying to impress.

(Nutritional Facts – 1 oz., around 13 chips – 130 calories, 7 grams of fat, 1 gram of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 0 mg of cholesterol, 300mg sodium, 16 grams of carbs, 1 gram of dietary fiber, 1 gram of sugar, 2 grams of protein, 2% Vitamin A, 0% Vitamin C, 2% Calcium, and 4% Iron)

Item: Flamin’ Hot Funyuns
Price: $2.99
Purchased at: Albertsons
Rating: 8 out of 10
Pros: Very addictive. Heat doesn’t overpower the Funyun goodness. Not worrying about being cool when snacking. Hamburger make-out, depending on how you feel about that sort of thing.
Cons: You’ll probably look and smell like a woodland creature while you’re eating these. Accidentally wiping your eyes with the red powder on your fingers. Hamburger make-out, depending on how you feel about that sort of thing.