Here’s the winner of last month’s prize drawing for a Starbucks gift card:
Congratulations, Nicki!
Sounds like someone is going to get caffeinated. Aw yeah!
Thanks to everyone who participated and be on the lookout for a new prize drawing later this month.
Here are the microwave instructions for the Weight Watchers Smart Ones Smart Beginnings Turkey Sausage English Muffin Sandwich:
1. Remove sandwich from carton and plastic wrapper.
2. Wrap sandwich in paper towel and microwave on high for 1 minute and 15 seconds.
3. Let sandwich stand in microwave for 30 seconds.
4. Flip sandwich over and cook on high for an additional 30 seconds.
5. Let stand 1 minute. Enjoy!
Maybe it’s just me, but if someone is trying to get ready for work or school in the morning, these instructions are bothersome. Who has time to stand by the microwave and flip their sandwich when there’s either a mustache to trim, mascara to put on, or morning quicky to squeeze in? I just want something I can stick in the microwave and walk away from so that I have time to stick something into something else — a trimmer up my nose to mow down long nose hairs.
Besides the microwave instructions, which is the only way to prepare the breakfast sandwich, I did not enjoy how much effort I had to put into tearing away a piece of the sandwich, thanks to the English muffins. Now I know how lions feel when the sinew gets in the way of ripping a gazelle’s flesh off its bones.
Normal English muffins can get tough and microwaving frozen bread can make it tough, so putting an English muffin in the microwave sounds like it could be the equivalent of wrapping leather around beef jerky.
Okay, it wasn’t that bad, but if I was old and had dentures, I’d double-check my Super Poligrip adhesive or curse this newfangled food technology and then cut the sandwich up with a fork and knife.
If you look at the parts of the Weight Watchers Smart Ones Smart Beginnings Turkey Sausage English Muffin Sandwich — English muffin with a perfectly round egg white patty that’s yellow, a perfectly round turkey sausage patty, and a slice of American cheese that’s not perfectly square — it sounds like Weight Watchers Smart Ones is trying to make a much healthier McDonald’s Sausage McMuffin with Egg.
Is it healthier? As you can see in the table below, which I created using HTML I learned in 1993, forgot in 1994, and just relearned seconds ago, the Smart Ones breakfast sandwich has significantly less fat, sodium, and calories than a Sausage McMuffin with Egg. So mission accomplished, if that was Smart Ones’ goal.
| Smart Ones Sandwich | Sausage McMuffin with Egg |
|---|---|
| 230 calories | 450 calories |
| 3 grams of saturated fat | 10 grams of saturated fat |
| 8 grams of fat | 27 grams of fat |
| 490 milligrams of sodium | 920 milligrams of sodium |
However, the Smart Ones breakfast sandwich is significantly less tasty than a McDonald’s Sausage McMuffin with Egg, but you probably already knew that. The egg patty has a slightly buttery flavor and the turkey sausage is mildly spicy, but, when combined with the English muffin and American cheese, it’s a mediocre breakfast sandwich. The sausage gets lost in the flavors of the egg and English muffin, which is sad since the turkey sausage should be the most flavorful ingredient of the sandwich. But it’s understandable since the sausage patty is thin and is dwarfed by the egg patty.
Overall, if you woke up on the wrong side of the bed, the Weight Watchers Smart Ones Smart Beginnings Turkey Sausage English Muffin Sandwich isn’t going to change your disposition. Its needy instructions will give you less time to pluck your eyebrows in the morning and its flavor will make you scoff at the “Smart Beginnings” part of the product’s name.
(Nutrition Facts – 1 sandwich – 230 calories, 70 calories from fat, 8 grams of fat, 3 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 2 grams of polyunsaturated fat, 2 grams of monounsaturated fat, 30 milligrams of cholesterol, 490 milligrams of sodium, 26 grams of carbohydrates, 2 grams of fiber, 1 gram of sugar, 14 grams of protein, 4% vitamin A, 10% calcium, and 10% iron. 6 PointsPlus.)
Item: Weight Watchers Smart Ones Smart Beginnings Turkey Sausage English Muffin Sandwich
Price: $2.28 (on sale)
Size: 2 pack
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 5 out of 10
Pros: Comes in a 2-pack. Less fat, sodium, and calories than a Sausage McMuffin with Egg. Showing off my HTML skills by building a simple 2-column table.
Cons: Mediocre flavor. Thin and small sausage patty. Damn long name. Tough English muffin. Needy instructions. Can only be prepared in the microwave. Flavor of the sausage gets lost within the English muffin and egg.
New products are released all the time and here are some we found on our most recent shopping trips. We may or may not review them, but we’d like to let you know what new items are popping up on store shelves.
V8 continues to try and get us to consume fruits and vegetables in liquid form with their new V8 V-Fusion Sparking beverage. The lightly carbonated fruit juice comes in packs of four and in three flavors: Tangerine Raspberry, Black Cherry Pomegranate, and Strawberry Lemonade. One can has 60 calories, 0 fat, and provide one combined serving of vegetables and fruit. Drink What reviewed the Tangerine Raspberry and Black Cherry Pomegranate flavors.
First, it was Lean Cuisine. Then, Weight Watcher Smart Ones. Now, Kashi is throwing their hat into into microwaveable bagged meal ring with their Steam Meals line. There are four varieties: Chicken Fettuccine, Roasted Garlic Chicken Farfalle, Sesame Chicken, and Spinach & Artichoke Pasta. The bagged entrees don’t contain any artificial ingredients, but do contain Kashi’s obligatory 7 Whole Grains.
Tostitos has expanded their Artisan Recipes tortilla chip line with a new flavor — Baked Three Cheese Queso. The three cheeses are Cheddar, Swiss, and Monterey Jack. The chips are made with 100 percent natural ingredients and are made using a 9 grain blend (take that Kashi and your 7 grains!). I didn’t see them during my trip to the store, but according to the Frito-Lay website, there’s another new Tostitos Artisan Recipes flavor — Toasted Southwestern Spices.
Finally, I saw these Egg-Land’s Best Hard-Cooked Peeled Eggs and thought to myself that these are perfect for those who don’t know how to boil water. But not only are they already hard-boiled, they’re also pre-peeled. This product has to be the easiest and cleanest way to eat an egg. Time to celebrate lazy egg eaters!
If you’re out shopping and see a new product on the shelf, snap a picture of it, email it to us at [email protected], and you might see it in our next What’s New post.
Thank goodness for the creative minds in Japan who come up with their limited time only fast food menu items, and thank goodness for the creative minds at Google who came up with Google Translate so I can read about the latest fast food items in Japan.
Here’s how Google translated the descriptions for the 2012 lineup of McDonald’s Japan’s Big America Burgers.
Distinctive “Grand Canyon Burger” is filling beef and steak Patti overlap. Vans and the image of a three-stage rock of Grand Canyon World Heritage Sites in the western United States, strata, cheese, two types of color difference (cheddar cheese and mozzarella cheese), eggs, beef towering Patti, is a dish of punch marks. Decisive source of steak taste, feel and flavor combination of onion ingredients, soy sauce, smoke flavor, and the Japanese steak favorite flavor was finished.
“Las Vegas Burger” was expressed by a rich combination of beef slices and beef Patty, the glittering city of the United States gorgeous, a luxury. To 1/4 pound Beef Patty McDonald’s beef is 100% proud, put the beef and onion in spicy seasoned, was entwined luxuriously rich cream cheese sauce. Reminiscent of a fine dinner in Las Vegas, is the taste of rich flavor.
“Broadway Burger” with bacon and impressive about protrude, exciting harmony of cream cheese sauce. Colorful vegetables, including color, a combination of cream cheese and a rich source of sticking to pastrami bacon, mustard sauce that complements the unique material, I expressed the streets of musical talent from all over the world gather various.
“Beverly Hills Burger” enjoy meeting and cheerful avocado, rich source of Caesar. We have developed the concept of California there is a Beverly Hills home of the “Caesar Salad”. Fresh lettuce and onion taste favor, and is characterized by succulent beef. Avocado and McDonald’s as a product source you want to use for the first time, is expressed in the Caesar salad dish a rich source, the image of an exclusive residential district of longing class celebrities.
The first 2012 Big America Burger released was the Grand Canyon Burger on January 4th. Next was the Las Vegas Burger on January 27th. The Broadway Burger was released on February 17th. As for the Beverly Hills Burger, it will be released sometime this month.
The only nutritional information I could find was for the Broadway Burger, which has 585 kilocalories, 31.5 grams of protein, 36.8 grams of fat, 32.1 grams of carbs, and a whopping 3 grams of salt (3,000 milligrams).
But the Big America Burgers aren’t the only new burgers on McDonald’s Japan’s menu. Today, the company introduced their Lettuce & Pepper Burger. The Google translated description is below:
“Lettuce & Pepper Burger” is 100% Beef Patty-producing New Zealand from Australia juicy was baked Kobashiku, is a dish to enjoy harmony exquisite by Caesar source of sticking to the secret ingredient of pepper is heard and lettuce, crunchy.
The Big America and Lettuce & Pepper Burgers are available for a limited time at McDonald’s Japan locations.
[via Foodbeast]
Since Kellogg’s new Simply Original Eggo Waffles boast they have no preservatives, artificial flavors, or artificial colors, I shall brag about how this review has no semicolons, onomatopoeias, or eponymous puns involving Jeremy Lin.
Now here’s the part where I bore all of you with ingredients and chemical compounds. Well, maybe not those of you who are into chemical compounds, like chemists and meth makers.
Here are the ingredients for Original Simply Eggo Waffles: Enriched flour (wheat flour, niacin, reduced iron, thiamine mononitrate [vitamin B1], riboflavin [vitamin B2], folic acid), water, vegetable oil (soybean, palm, and/or canola oil), eggs, sugar, leavening (sodium acid pyrophosphate, baking soda), salt, buttermilk, and soy lecithin.
And, here are the ingredients for regular Homestyle Eggo Waffles: Enriched flour (wheat flour, niacin, reduced iron, thiamine mononitrate [vitamin B1], riboflavin [vitamin B2], folic acid), water, vegetable oil (soybean and palm oil), eggs, leavening (baking soda, sodium aluminum phosphate, monocalcium phosphate), sugar, calcium carbonate, salt, whey, soy lecithin, yellow #5, and yellow #6.
For those of you who skimmed over or bypassed the previous two paragraphs, and I wouldn’t blame you because they’re like visual Ambien, the Simple Eggo Waffles lack calcium carbonate, which is a food preservative, and the food dyes, yellow #5 and yellow #6.
If you’re a regular reader of this semipopular product review blog, you might be thinking the photo above is from our review of Kellogg’s Eggo Low Fat Homestyle Waffles. And you would be absosmurfly correct. To be honest, I reused the picture because toasted Simple Eggo Waffles look exactly like the waffles in the photo above. Also, I reused it out of pure laziness.
As for Simply Eggo’s flavor, it’s missing what makes Eggo Waffles taste like Eggo Waffles, which I’m guessing is the artificial flavor it brags it doesn’t have. Because of it, Simply Eggo Waffles were a little blander than regular Eggo Waffles, which was kind of surprising since I thought the buttermilk added would help with the flavor. But, topping it with butter and drowning it in syrup helped cover up the flavor difference.
In terms of flavor, Kellogg’s Simply Eggo Waffles are simply unimpressive. However, if you’re one of those people who really care about things like preservatives, food dyes, and artificial flavors, Kellogg’s Simply Eggo Waffles are simply uncomplicated.
(Nutrition Facts – 2 waffles – 210 calories, 70 calories from fat, 8 grams of fat, 2 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 20 milligrams of cholesterol, 450 milligrams of sodium, 55 milligrams of potassium, 30 grams of carbohydrates, less than 1 gram of fiber, 4 grams of sugar, 4 grams of protein, and a bunch of vitamins and minerals.)
Item: Kellogg’s Original Simply Eggo Waffles
Price: $3.00 (on sale)
Size: 12.3 ounces/10 waffles
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Looks like regular Eggo. Toasts like regular Eggo. No preservatives, No artificial flavors or colors. Fortified with vitamins and minerals.
Cons: Blander than regular Eggo Waffles. More calories, fat, sodium, and sugar than regular Eggo Waffles. Without calcium carbonate, Simple Eggo Waffles provide no calcium.