Author: Karen

REVIEW: Wendy’s Updated Taco Salad (2024)

Karen 3 Comments

There was a time when I ate a lot of Wendy’s chili. Everybody else would have their huge Bacon Cheese Whatever monstrosities, large fries, buckets of nuggets, and mega Frosties, and I would sit there, primly eating my fiber-rich, beany soup. My will was strong.

But I’ve weakened in my morals since then and have started experimenting with other Wendy’s fare, even burgers. But I still consider myself a Wendy’s Chili enthusiast, so I had to try the latest incarnation of its Taco Salad. This new incarnation of the classic entrée boasts new crispy chili lime tortilla strips, fire-roasted corn, and a “creamy zesty salsa” dressing, in addition to the standard ingredients: lettuce, tomato, shredded cheese, and, of course, chili.

When you open the plastic clamshell, it looks like a normal fast-food salad with a few tablespoons of corn kernels dropped on it; some of the corn had some visible char on it, but most did not. The other special ingredients—the seasoned tortilla strips, the creamy salsa dressing, and, of course, the chili–came separately. Considering the fact that my default portion was pretty close to filling the whole container before any of the add-ins went on, clearly construction of my bespoke salad would be a careful process.

If you eat Wendy’s chili regularly, then you know that sometimes it’s more watery than others. This time, it was pretty watery, so instead of dumping a bunch of it onto my salad and giving it a bath, I went in with a spoon and teased out the solid components, effectively straining out the water. I only got through about a third of the chili before I had enough for my plate, and I didn’t use all of the dressing because it seemed like too much of a good thing. If you want to eat this with all of the chili and all of the dressing, you are braver than I, and hopefully wearing clothes that don’t need to be dry-cleaned.

There is a lot going on in this salad, to put it mildly. I know saying, “It was like a party in my mouth” is totally played out, but my mouth was definitely experiencing some kind of festive event. I mostly enjoyed all the different flavors and textures, although the temperature fluctuation was a little strange; when I went from a forkful of pipping-hot chili to a cold clump of lettuce, it felt a little like something had gone wrong with my meal, but that’s just part of the experience.

Every component I can point to was good (although the “creamy salsa” dressing was basically just a less-tangy Ranch to my palate), yet I found trying to arrange perfect bites and get a little bit of everything in one mouthful was kind of…stressful. Next time I have it, and am confident I will have it again, I need to chillax and remember that I’m not being judged by the Wendy’s Police.

After all that, I’m pretty happy with this incarnation of the Taco Salad. Just be aware that assembling and eating the darned thing is more of a project than you might have been anticipating.

Purchased Price: $5.99
Rating: 8 out of 10
Nutrition Facts: (Salad w/dressing) 640 calories, 39 grams of fat, 13 grams of saturated fat, 1 gram of trans fat, 70 milligrams of cholesterol, 1550 milligrams of sodium, 47 grams of carbohydrates, 11 grams of fiber, 13 grams of sugar, and 27 grams of protein.

REVIEW: Subway Spicy Nacho Chicken Sub

Karen 5 Comments

In our house, Subway plays the role of the last line of defense before the tofu is deployed. When I’m all ready to make my famous (in my own mind) tofu and veggies stir fry for dinner, my husband will often say, with forced casualness, “Dear, you’ve had a long day. If you don’t feel like cooking tonight, you know, I could always just run over to Subway…”

Now, I should tell him that he will eat his gosh-darned tofu, and he will like it, but sometimes I give in to the lazy out he’s giving me. Then I watch as my family consumes subs heaping with cheese and deli meat that probably have more saturated fat than the entire Cheesecake Factory menu put together. I might be a bad homemaker.

Fortunately, Subway’s offerings are a little more extensive than just Italian Double Meat BMTs. It’s got some new offerings this summer, including the Spicy Nacho Chicken Sub. This fairly ambitious sandwich is made with rotisserie-style chicken, green peppers, red onions, jalapenos, cheddar cheese sauce, creamy sriracha, and “SubKrunch.” SubKrunch is a new option at Subway, little fried crunchy bits that add a nice bit of texture.

I was surprised by how much the SubKrunch added to the experience. They were generous with these little things, kind of like French fried onions, and the constant-yet-not-annoying crunch level was fun. You can supposedly add SubKrunch to any existing sub, and I’m curious to see what my favorite tuna sub tastes like with a bunch of crunch added.

Even though there are jalapenos and sriracha, the heat level never gets that high. I felt the heat from the jalapenos on the tip of my tongue as I ate them, but the spiciness didn’t seem to spread through my mouth that much. The cheddar cheese provides a nice contrast, but you don’t get it with every bite; it’s nice when it shows up. I found the chicken really savory and juicy, which was surprising because I haven’t been enamored of Subway’s chicken products in the past. The bread was, well, bread…it didn’t add much flavor, but the sandwich is so packed full of flavor it doesn’t matter. I’m curious if trying it with one of Subway’s other breads would make much of a difference. The veggies just add a bit of texture, I didn’t really taste them, but they added some vitamins, so yaaay?

On the whole, this is a really tasty sandwich. I don’t know if I’d switch out my classic Tuna Sub with veggies for this new guy, but I’d definitely at least consider it—which is saying something if you know just how many Subway Tuna Subs I’ve eaten in my life. But this is all irrelevant because I’m clearly going to start making vegan, home-cooked meals for my family all the time and not give in to the siren song of Subway take-out anymore…except for possibly Thursdays.

Purchased Price: $11.79
Size: Footlong
Rating: 9 out of 10
Nutrition Facts: 890 calories. (No other nutritional numbers for the whole sandwich are available on Subway’s website.)

REVIEW: Burger King Fiery Bacon Royal Crispy Chicken Sandwich

Karen 2 Comments

Genius that I am, I volunteered to take on the Fiery Bacon Royal Crispy Chicken Sandwich before reading the press release from Burger King. If I had done so, I would have known its summer “Fiery” menu has a tiered heat list, with the chicken sandwich sitting at the maximum Spice Level Five. I can handle some spice, but I don’t like having my throat annihilated by jalapeños; visions of people having seizures and hallucinations after eating Nashville Hot Chicken plagued me. What had I signed up for?

Of course, it was Burger King, so it’s fine. It turns out that even maximum Burger King spiciness is not that spicy compared to other spicy foods. It’s not even as spicy as BK’s original release of the Spicy Chicken Fries, which I loved. I worried myself into a tizzy for nothing.

This ambitious sandwich features white meat chicken with a coat of fiery glaze, fiery-seasoned bacon, pepper jack cheese, tomatoes, lettuce, and “Fiery sauce.” The sauce tastes like slightly cheesy mayonnaise with a small amount of heat added to it; everything else is fairly self-explanatory.

I had this twice, and neither time did I get much pepper jack cheese. To be fair, I don’t think it was needed.

When I first bit into the breaded, coated chicken breast before eating any of the toppings with it, I knew it tasted familiar, but I couldn’t place it. It’s a sweet heat, and I couldn’t get past the déjà vu sensation as I continued to shovel the thing into my mouth. Eventually, I realized what I was reminded of: General Tso’s Chicken. It’s definitely not an exact match, but the texture of the breading and the sweet and spice level put it into the ballpark of that Chinese takeout staple. I happen to really like General Tso’s Chicken, so this was a good thing for me.

But if you were having General Tso’s, would you want it slathered in mayonnaise? Probably not, but somehow, it works. Even though the fiery sauce has some spice, it still works as a cooling element compared to the spicing of the chicken patty, with the lettuce and tomato also working as you’d expect to moderate the heat level. I did get the sensation of heat in the back of my throat a few times, but it wasn’t unpleasant, just noticeable.

Besides not getting much cheese, my main complaint is that there wasn’t enough bacon. The spiced bacon adds another welcome layer of flavor and texture, but I wasn’t given much of it. It probably changes a lot between individual orders, so you may get more bacon on your sandwich than I did, but I doubt BK is heaping it on there. This is kind of a shame because if this thing was loaded up with that perfectly spiced bacon, we’d be talking about a 10 out of 10 experience here. As it stands, it’s merely very good.

I don’t know what it is, but whenever Burger King releases a spicy product, it really seems to work for me. I’m looking forward to trying the other items on the Fiery menu before the end of summer, and hey, maybe I’ll even try Nashville Hot Chicken someday; I bet my hallucinations would be awesome and might even include unicorns.

Purchased Price: $6.59
Rating: 9 out of 10
Nutrition Facts: 700 calories, 42 grams of fat, 7 grams of saturated fat, 65 milligrams of cholesterol, 1140 milligrams of sodium, 57 grams of total carbohydrates, 3 grams of dietary fiber, 8 grams of sugar, and 25 grams of protein.

REVIEW: DiGiorno Deadpool & Wolverine Spicy Wolvie Pie Pizza

Karen 11 Comments

As a lifelong X-Men fan, I have a bone (claw?) to pick with DiGiorno. Over his fifty-some-odd-year publication history, Wolverine has been many things, but “spicy” isn’t one of them. Now, if they were to release a Spicy Gambit Pie with Cajun seasoning, that would be thematically appropriate and fairly innovative for a frozen pizza. Why not opt to do this? The concept was right there!

“But Karen,” you say, “The movie being promoted is called Deadpool & Wolverine. Gambit is probably not even in it.” Oh, you think you’re so smart. Did you know that Gambit was in Wolverine: Origins back in the day with both Wolverine AND Deadpool? Did we get any pizzas for that movie? I think, after sitting through that, a Gambit-themed pizza is the least Marvel can do for me.

Nevertheless, the Wolvie Pie is the one we were given, thus the one I will review. If you’re interested in these Deadpool & Wolverine DiGiorno tie-ins, there are actually four to choose from: The Wade Special (pineapple and black olives), Gimmi Chimi (spicy cumin sauce, beef topping, jalapeno and cheddar and mozzarella), Maximum Pep (lots of sliced and diced pepperoni), and the Spicy Wolvie Pie (pepperoni, chorizo and bacon.) The idea behind the Wolvie pizza is that Wolverine likes eating meat, so you should too. Clearly, Wolverine also likes sodium.

All varieties come with a Deadpool mask except the Spicy Wolvie. Why wasn’t a Wolverine mask included? That’s just lazy.

I was a little confused about the toppings. It’s obvious what the pepperoni is, of course, but which of the tiny little bits of meat were the bacon and which were the chorizo? The taste of the chorizo was dominant, so if you’d told me all the little bits were chorizo, I would have believed you. Not a lot of bacon flavor here.

The chorizo gave the pizza a nice level of heat. It was more than a “subtle” level, but definitely not as spicy as something like Wendy’s Spicy Nuggets. I kept trying to decide whether or not this pie was spicy enough; sure, there’s some spice there, but “Spicy” is literally in the title. I think it should have been pushed a little further.

That said, it’s still an enjoyable meal. If you’ve had any DiGiorno pizza before, you’ll know exactly what to expect here, but the funny branding adds a little bit of joy to the proceedings. If you find you enjoy role-playing Wolvie and mirroring his eating habits is not enough, you could always go out and hit on a few redheads, although I doubt DiGiorno would take responsibility for that.

Hey, that makes me think about what a Jean Grey pizza would be like. Maybe a strawberry dessert pizza to honor her color scheme? Or a much more spicy Ghost Pepper pie to allude to the universe-scorching heat of the Phoenix Force? DiGiorno, when the MCU finally starts churning out X-Men movies by the dozens, you really have no excuse not to go down this road. Just get on making that Spicy Gambit pizza, and maybe I’ll give you my ideas for the perfect pizza incarnations of all twelve million X-Men characters.

Purchased Price: $6.49
Purchased at: Shop Rite
Rating: 7 out of 10
Nutrition Facts: (1/4 pizza) 350 calories, 17 grams of fat, 7 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 35 milligrams of cholesterol, 810 milligrams of sodium, 34 grams of carbohydrates, 4 grams of sugar, 2 grams of fiber, and 16 grams of protein.

REVIEW: Pizza Hut Chicago Tavern Style Pizza

Karen 9 Comments

As a born and bred New Yorker, just hearing “Chicago-style pizza” puts me in a fighting mood. Deep-dish pizza is not pizza! It’s a casserole! How many times do we need to have this debate? How long will it take for everyone to accept the plain, unvarnished truth?

Then I read that Pizza Hut has released a Chicago Tavern-style pizza, which has a thin crust, not unlike a certain other type of pizza that gets enthusiastically consumed in my house on a nearly weekly basis. Ah well, I guess I need to put away the boxing gloves and nunchaku and give this thing a fair shot. You have a choice of Double Pepperoni, Pesto Margherita, Spicy Chicken Sausage, or Ultimate. I went with the Double Pepperoni since I didn’t want the different toppings to complicate the eating experience.

My first thought was that the crust was actually not as thin as I was expecting; I think Domino’s has had thin crust pizza with thinner crust than this. Aside from being a little thinner and cut differently, the Tavern-style pizza is actually very similar to another Pizza Hut product, The Big New Yorker; it has the same parmesan-forward taste. The main differences are that the thinner crust on the Tavern pizza makes for a cheesier bite (although it’s a fairly subtle difference), and the whole thing is a fair bit less greasy.

And yes, I have ordered The Big New Yorker several times, despite being located in NY and having access to actual, authentic NY pizzerias. I can only attribute this to some kind of sophisticated mind control programming on Pizza Hut’s part. I always start dialing the number to Johnny D’s Authentic New York Pizza, then slam the phone down, muttering, “But you can’t Out-Pizza the Hut….”

Ahem, anyway, due to the nonstandard cut, some pieces of the Tavern-style pizza have toppings that go all the way to the edge, while some have a more traditional crusted end. I found the exposed crust, pleasantly studded with air bubbles, was the most fun part of the pizza to eat. It’s just really satisfying on a texture level, almost like eating a cannoli and feeling the crust flake apart under your teeth. That said, it was kind of a bummer that many of the slices in the box were missing this feature.

Also, don’t make the mistake of thinking this is lighter fare because it’s thinner: I ate three pieces, which, while much smaller than three slices of traditional pizza, made me feel like I just ate enough fat and salt for the rest of the week. However, it was not to be the extent of my salt and fat intake for the week because I had some again…the next day. Microwaved.

I know, I know, microwaving pizza—especially thin-crust pizza—is usually a bad idea. I can only argue that I was extremely hungry and impatient and was easily swayed to the dark side. Surprisingly, this pizza holds up pretty well to microwaving. Some of the crust became limp, but the crunchy end pieces were still delightfully crunchy.

On the whole, Pizza Hut’s Chicago Tavern Style Pizza was enjoyable enough to make this New Yorker consider the possibility that maybe good pizza can come from other states. Just don’t try to get me to compliment Detroit-style pizza. I have my limits.

Purchased Price: $12.00
Rating: 8 out of 10
Nutrition Facts: (Double Pepperoni)120 calories, 6 grams of fat, 3 grams of saturated fat, 15 mg of cholesterol, 290 milligrams of sodium, 11 grams of carbohydrates, and 6 grams of protein.