REVIEW: Subway Club Salad

Marvo 37 Comments

Subway Club Salad

(Editor’s Note: Welcome to Day Four of Salad Week here at The Impulsive Buy. Thank goodness the week is almost done, because my body has been acting strange with all of these vegetables. I actually had green poop yesterday. Anyway, here’s today’s review. Enjoy.)

Subway is known for making their sandwiches fresh, turning Jared Fogle into a celebrity, and giving adolescent boys another opportunity to snicker when they hear the words “foot long.”

They are also known for their Sandwich Artists, which we all know is just a nice term for “the person behind the counter.” Armed with fresh baked bread, fresh ingredients, disposable gloves, a bread knife, and possibly, tender loving care, Sandwich Artists will create your sandwich they way you like it.

However, I wasn’t in Subway for a sandwich, I was there for a salad.

I ordered a Subway Club Salad, which according to the Subway website, was supposed to contain roast beef, turkey breast, ham, chopped iceberg lettuce, baby spinach, red onions, tomatoes, cucumber slices, green pepper strips, black olive slices, and carrots.

However, the Subway Sandwich Artist apparently was also a Subway Salad Artist and instead of automatically putting in the ingredients listed on the website, she asked me what kind of vegetables I wanted. At first, I was surprised by this, but I eventually began to go down the list: Lettuce, tomatoes, onions, olives, etc.

The same vegetables they use in the sandwiches are the same ones used in the salad. Unfortunately, they didn’t have baby spinach. As for the roast beef, turkey, and ham, the slices were just slapped on top of the vegetables.

Now I don’t know if my Subway Salad Artist was going for an abstract look with my salad, but it did have it with the round tomato slices and the oblong slices of meat. I wondered if she was trying to create a harmonious arrangement of colors representing life with the salad, or if she was trying to say, “I hate my job as a Subway Sandwich/Salad Artist.”

After my Subway Salad Artist was done, I quickly realized I had just ordered a six-inch Subway sandwich without a bun, or “Atkins style” for you low-carb folks. Oh yeah, speaking of Atkins, I ended getting the Atkins Honey Mustard Dressing to put on top of my salad.

So basically, this salad was a six-inch Subway sandwich, without the bun, and it was the same price as a foot long sandwich. Heh, heh, heh…Foot long.

I felt ripped off.

Eating the salad made me feel even worse. There was way too much iceberg lettuce, which again, has even less nutritional value than David Blaine has magical powers. Also, the salad dressing had that typical Atkins taste, and I use the term “taste” loosely.

I think I’ll just stick to Subway sandwiches from now on.

Item: Subway Club Salad
Purchase Price: $5.89
Rating: 2 out of 5
Pros: Made fresh. Made your way.
Cons: Very pricey. Too much iceberg lettuce. High-sodium. Atkins Honey Mustard Dressing was weak.

Burger King Tendercrisp Garden Salad

Marvo 25 Comments

Burger King Tendercrisp Garden Salad

How many of you remember the McDLT?

For those of you who weren’t born yet, too young to remember, or have been boycotting McDonald’s because of their globalization efforts, the McDLT was a burger in a treehugger-gasping styrofoam container with two compartments.

This special container kept the “hot side hot” and the “cool side cool,” which is the same way I like to separate my underwear. The “hot” thongs and silk French-cut briefs go in one drawer and the “cool” boxers, boxer briefs, Underoos, and elephant trunk crotch briefs go in another drawer.

I don’t know why McDonald’s got rid of McDLT.

Oh wait, I do know. It was a retarded idea.

Anyway, Burger King seemed to have jumped on the “hot side hot, cool side cool” bandwagon about two decades late with their Tendercrisp Garden Salad. The cool side comes in the standard plastic bowl with a clear cover, while the hot side comes in a white plastic pouch.

Burger King calls this white plastic pouch, “The Pouch,” which is the most unoriginal name since “The Big Bulge,” which was the name I gave my elephant trunk crotch briefs.

The Tendercrisp Garden Salad contains hot chunks of breaded Tendercrisp chicken, which you pour from “The Pouch” on top of iceberg, Romaine, and spring lettuce, grape tomatoes, red onions, cucumbers, Parmesan cheese shavings, and garlic Parmesan toast (croutons). Then to top off all of that is a Garden Ranch dressing.

When I received my order, the salad came in a clear plastic bag specifically made for Burger King salads. It sort of made me feel special. Although I have to admit, clear plastic bags are great for fast food salads, but for privacy reason, bad for the dozens of boxes of condoms purchased for your neighborhood orgy.

After taking my first bite of the Tendercrisp Garden Salad, I realized I forgot an important lesson about ranch dressing and Burger King food.

Just like the lessons of love and good style, I have yet to learn the lesson of avoiding any Burger King item that uses ranch dressing, because it isn’t very good. I’ve reviewed the Tendercrisp Bacon Cheddar Ranch and the Angus Bacon Cheddar Ranch and in both reviews I found that the ranch dressing didn’t have much taste.

The same can be said about the Garden Ranch dressing that came with the Tendercrisp Garden Salad.

Not even the plastic Burger King fork liked the salad. One of its prongs broke on one of the pieces of garlic Parmesan toast, which was probably the fork’s way of avoiding the salad.

Okay. Okay. The fork breaking was my fault, not the salad’s.

Anyway, maybe the salad might have tasted better with another dressing, but with the Garden Ranch dressing, it wasn’t very good.

Item: Burger King Tendercrisp Garden Salad
Purchase Price: $5.49
Rating: 2.5 out of 5
Pros: Wide variety of vegetables. Colorful. Separate pouch for chicken. Special clear plastic bag made for Burger King salads.
Cons: The garlic Parmesan toast broke my plastic fork. Cool Garden Ranch dressing wasn’t very cool or very ranch-y. High sodium. High fat. The name “The Pouch.” The name “The Big Bulge.”

REVIEW: Wendy’s Mediterranean Chicken Salad

Marvo 44 Comments

Wendy's Mediterranean Chicken Salad

When I think of classy things, I think of fine wine, Gwyneth Paltrow, and feta cheese.

Feta is one of those “special” cheeses not found with the trailer trash cheeses like American, cheddar, swiss, mozzarella, and, of course, Velveeta, which is as classy as shiny, spinning hubcaps.

Feta cheese is usually located in the deli area near other cheeses with funny names, like asiago, gorgonzola, taleggio, limburger, and smelofarts.

Now I record a lot of shows on Food Network because I need to add more material to my never ending loop of Rachael Ray shows playing at my Rachael Ray shrine.

While fast forwarding through all the parts that don’t have Rachael Ray, I noticed that a lot of the chefs on the Food Network use feta cheese on a lot of things, like salads, pizzas, and pastas. Those chefs really like feta cheese and are very liberal with it, like strippers are with cocoa butter lotion.

Well it seems the chefs in the Wendy’s kitchen also have been watching a lot of the Food Network because they put a nice crumbled heaping of feta cheese on their new Mediterranean Chicken Salad.

Besides the feta cheese, the Mediterranean Chicken Salad comes with herb-seasoned chicken chunks, iceberg lettuce, Romaine lettuce, red leaf lettuce, grape tomatoes, cucumber slices, red onion rings, and a package of red wine vinaigrette dressing.

Putting all of that together made for a pretty good tasting and decent sized salad. The feta cheese and the vinaigrette dressing gave the salad a nice tangy kick. The vegetables for the most part looked fresh, although I was disappointed that there was a lot of iceberg lettuce, which has as little redeeming value as the new Britney Spears reality show, “Britney and Kevin: Chaotic.”

Despite the goodness that I discovered in the Wendy’s Mediterranean Chicken Salad, there were a few things I wish Wendy’s had done to it. For example, I think it would’ve been nice if the herb-seasoned chicken chunks were warmed up, because I’m slightly afraid of cold chicken.

However, my biggest problem was having to toss my salad, which is a pretty hard thing to do because I’m kind of uncoordinated and not very flexible.

If you look at the picture above, you’ll notice that all the feta cheese is on one side of the bowl, all the chicken is in the center of the bowl, and the cucumbers, onions, and tomatoes are all in their own respective cliques.

It’s like the feta cheese are the preppy kids, the pieces of chicken are the jocks, the cucumbers are the band geeks, the onions are the nerds, and the tomatoes are the goth kids. This kind of separation may work well in high school, but it doesn’t work well with a salad.

It would’ve been nice if the salad was pre-tossed, so I wouldn’t have to go through the trouble, pain, and mess of tossing my salad.

Item: Wendy’s Mediterranean Chicken Salad
Purchase Price: $4.99
Rating: 8 out of 10
Pros: Tasty. Decent sized. High in Vitamin A & C. Feta cheese makes me feel classy.
Cons: High in sodium. Chicken was cold. Lots of iceberg lettuce. Forced to toss my salad.

REVIEW: McDonald’s Fruit & Walnut Salad

Marvo 48 Comments

McDonald's Fruit & Walnut Salad

Where are your balls, McDonald’s?

Hardee’s comes out with the Monster Thickburger, Burger King releases the Enormous Omelet Sandwich, and you introduce the Fruit & Walnut Salad?

It’s like Cadillac introducing a bigger, eight-door Escalade with spinning wheels, Hummer selling a heavier, boxier H3 with tank tracks, and Ford coming out with another Pinto.

The combination of apple slices, red grapes, candied walnuts, and low-fat yogurt dipping sauce was pretty decent, but where’s the gluttony?

I know you’re trying to be more healthy, but couldn’t you have tried to make it overly healthy?

You could’ve made it the Xtreme Fruit & Walnut Mammoth Salad, which would contain insane amounts of things that are good for you, like dietary fiber, vitamins, and minerals.

I’m not talking about one sliced apple, a handful of grapes, a small airplane snack-sized bag of candied walnuts, and a small cup of fat-free yogurt that I got with the regular Fruit & Walnut Salad.

I’m talking about a whole bushel of apples, enough yogurt to dip your head into, enough red grapes to make your own bottle of wine, and enough nuts to prevent the lemmings from jumping into the ocean.

All of that in a deep, gigantic bowl that just barely fits through the drive-thru window and makes your automobile tip over like the slab of dinosaur ribs does during the ending credits of the Flintstones.

All of that has to contain enough dietary fiber to make my bowel movements so irregular that I might need adult diapers, enough calcium to make my bones stronger than adamantium, and enough antioxidants to make me feel like I could survive a few years of living a hardcore rockstar lifestyle with excessive booze, drugs, and women.

Also, why are there only two types of fruit in the Fruit & Walnut Salad? If a Monster Thickburger can have several slices of cheese, why can’t the Fruit & Walnut Salad have several types of fruit? Maybe some mangoes, lychee, pears, cantaloupes, and strawberries.

Anyway, despite the McDonald’s Fruit & Walnut Salad not being gluttonous enough, it was a decent meal. The candied walnuts are what really makes this salad tasty, so if you’re allergic to nuts, I’d suggest you pass on the Fruit & Walnut Salad, unless you’re feeling dangerous.

(Editor’s Note: If you’re allergic to nuts and are feeling dangerous, The Impulsive Buy will not be responsible for any allergic reaction caused by you feeling dangerous.)

Item: McDonald’s Fruit & Walnut Salad
Purchase Price: $3.29
Rating: 7 out of 10
Pros: Decent taste. Healthy. Good source of dietary fiber. Low sodium. Better tasting and looking than a Ford Pinto.
Cons: Tastes better with walnuts, which is bad for those who are allergic to them. Weak variety of fruits. Not enormous, monster, or gluttonous enough. Not overly healthy.

REVIEW: Star Wars Twisted Cheetos

Marvo 32 Comments

Star Wars Twisted Cheetos

I’m disappointed with these Star Wars Twisted Cheetos.

Not because of the taste, because they taste great just like regular Cheetos. Also, not because they make my fingers a cheesy mess, because I like to clean my fingers by sucking on them after eating Cheetos.

I’m disappointed because I was hoping the Star Wars Twisted Cheetos would tell me that I belong on the Dark Side of the Force. Instead they told me I’m on the good side of the Force.

So how did the Star Wars Twisted Cheetos tell me I belong on the good side of the Force?

When you eat a bag of Star Wars Twisted Cheetos, which look like normal Cheetos, they will either turn your tongue Yoda Green (good side) or Darth Vader Dark (Dark Side). I bought two bags of it and both of them turned my tongue green, meaning I’m a good guy.

Some of you maybe thinking that this is a good thing, but I REALLY wanted to be on the Dark Side of the Force, because women love bad boys.

Look at Colin Farrell and Russell Crowe. Both bad boys and both loved by women all over the world.

So I guess it’s true that nice guys do finish last. Well I’m tired of being a nice guy and I’ve decided to be a bad boy so I can get all the women to like me.

First, I’m going to get myself a tattoo and get a couple body parts pierced. Maybe I’ll get a tattoo of a dragon on my back and a Prince Albert (Warning: Link not safe for work.) because those things would really make me a bad boy.

Then I’m going to get me a motorcycle, because women love bad boys on motorcycles, no matter how ugly the guy is. Either a nice Harley-Davidson or maybe a street bike. Also, I’m not going to buy a helmet, because I’m a bad boy and I live my life on the edge, baby!

Ooh, I also have to get drunk at a bar, get into a fight, and get arrested by the police. When they arrest me, I have to be dragged because a bad boy would disrespect authority. If the cops beat me, I’ll just tell them, “Naw, that didn’t hurt. Do it again!” That’s what a bad boy would say.

Oh wait. I forgot.

I can’t get a tattoo or a body piercing because I HATE needles and I have a very low threshold for pain. I can’t get a motorcycle because apparently they don’t come with training wheels. I can’t get drunk because I’m usually the designated driver. I can’t get into a fight because I’m such a wuss that I’ll probably get knocked out by a midget.

I wonder what else I could do to be a bad boy?

(Editor’s Note: Thanks to MSNBC blogger and occasional Impulsive Buy reader Gael Cooper for introducing me to Star Wars Twisted Cheetos.)
Item: Star Wars Twisted Cheetos
Purchase Price: 99 cents
Rating: 7 out of 10
Pros: Delicious just like Cheetos. Licking my cheesy fingers. Makes your tongue temporarily change color.
Cons: I don’t belong to the Dark Side of the Force. I’ll never become a bad boy. The pain from a Prince Albert.