REVIEW: Monterey Jack & Garden Tomato SunChips

Marvo 6 Comments

I don’t know why I can’t put down this bag of Monterey Jack & Garden Tomato SunChips. It’s as if my body is telling itself that it’s starving for whole grains, which it totally is, thanks to my diet of everything I eat for this site.

It’s puzzling to me because it’s not as if these chips have a flavor that explodes in my mouth like the gasses in the sun. Yeah, I taste the cheese and tomato, but the seasoning doesn’t pound my taste buds like I’m scraping off the toppings of a cheese pizza with my front teeth. Even after eating almost half the bag, my fingers aren’t even close to being coated in seasoning like they would be if I ate Cheetos, Doritos, or anything labeled Flamin’ Hot.

Basically, if SunChips decided to make a “pizza” flavor, this would be it. But calling it “pizza flavor” probably wouldn’t mesh with SunChips’ healthy whole grain push. Maybe its pizza-like flavor is why I can’t stop shoving my hand into the bag because I love pizza-flavored things that aren’t actual pizza, like pizza-flavored Pringles.

Right now, I’m dangerously close to finishing this bag in one sitting because I’ve started pulling out the small broken chips that settled to the bottom. That also means I’ve probably consumed a meal’s worth of SunChips. Thank goodness this has 30% less fat than potato chips. So eating the whole bag is like eating an entire pint of Halo Top, where it’s okay to eat all of it in one sitting, right?

(Looks at the bag, does math). Nope. Not like Halo Top.

Well, at least I’ll get 133 grams of whole grain.

Purchased Price: $4.99
Size: 7 oz bag
Purchased at: Times Supermarket
Rating: 8 out of 10
Nutrition Facts: (about 14 chips/28 grams) 140 calories, 6 grams of fat, 0.5 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 140 milligrams of sodium, 19 grams of carbohydrates, 2 grams of fiber, 2 grams of sugar (including 2 grams of added sugar), and 2 grams of protein.

SPOTTED (TRADER JOE’S EDITION): 6/5/2023

Marvo 3 Comments

Here are some new Trader Joe’s products found on shelves by your fellow readers. If you’ve tried any of them, share your thoughts in the comments.

Trader Joe’s Mini (Almost) Everything Bagel Sandwich Crackers

(Spotted by Scott R at Trader Joe’s.)

Trader Joe’s Chocolatey Coated Peanut Butter Crispy Rice Bites
Trader Joe’s Trio of Soft Licorice Twists
Trader Joe’s Oat Chocolate Bars with Crispy Rice & Cocoa Nibs
Trader Joe’s Super Sweet Marzanino Whole Tomatoes

(Spotted by Sarah R at Trader Joe’s.)

If you’re out shopping and see new products, snap a picture of them, and send them in via an email ([email protected]) with where you found them and “Spotted” in the subject line. Also, if you want to send in photos and are wondering if we’ve already covered something or if they’re new, don’t worry about it. Let us worry about it.

SPOTTED: Quaker Chewy Granola made with Crispy Clusters Cereal

Marvo 3 Comments

Cap’n Crunch is also made by Quaker. So maybe someday there will be a Quaker Chewy Granola with Cap’n Crunch? Yeah. Horrible idea. (Spotted by Robbie at Walmart Neighborhood Market.)

If you’re out shopping and see new products, snap a picture of them, and send them in via an email ([email protected]) with where you found them and “Spotted” in the subject line. Also, if you want to send in photos and are wondering if we’ve already covered something or if they’re new, don’t worry about it. Let us worry about it.

SPOTTED: Ocean Spray Hershey’s Chocolate Cranberry Bites

Marvo 1 Comment

I know they don’t rhyme, but when I say Ocean Spray and Hershey’s together I make them rhyme. (Spotted by Amanda Y at Walmart.)

If you’re out shopping and see new products, snap a picture of them, and send them in via an email ([email protected]) with where you found them and “Spotted” in the subject line. Also, if you want to send in photos and are wondering if we’ve already covered something or if they’re new, don’t worry about it. Let us worry about it.

REVIEW: Wendy’s Canned Chili

Brandon 17 Comments

Fast food sneaks into the grocery store with varying degrees of success. Taco Bell’s range of products, from shells to sauces, are mostly fine. Arby’s frozen curly fries? Awful. In olden times, before I got sober, it was pretty hard to beat White Castle’s frozen cheeseburgers after a night spent over-imbibing. (The real thing would be the preferable choice, obviously, but we haven’t had them in my market for a couple of decades now.)

I’ve never been a regular consumer of Wendy’s chili. I’ve had it a few times on top of a potato, sure, but it’s never anything I’ve specifically set out to consume. But now that it’s available in canned form, I felt like I needed to have both. And that I should taste them side-by-side. Blindfolded, in fact, to see if I could tell which was which.

Is a blindfolded taste test a little elaborate for a can of chili? No. No, it’s not.

The first one I tried was thick and meaty. There were plenty of beans and a moderate amount of seasoning. It was salty, but not unbearably so. There were no discernible chunks of tomato, but the base was plenty tomato-y with a slight tang. If you’re into heat, this one won’t do much for you; I’ve received kisses from my grandmother that were spicier than this.

The next chili was much thinner than the first. Soupy, even. The meat chunks were few and far between. There were large, acidic pieces of stewed tomato. The base was sweet with just a little hint of heat. Despite nearly everything else being entirely different, the beans were identical to the beans in the first bowl.

So, two very different chilis allow me to say this: if you dislike Wendy’s chili, you might still like the canned version. Conversely, if you love Wendy’s version, don’t necessarily expect to love the canned variety, too. You might, you might not.

But the moment you’re all waiting for — which chili was which? The first chili — the meaty, seasoned one that I enjoyed quite a bit — was the canned version. The runny bland one was the ACTUAL Wendy’s chili.

Is this a shocking revelation? Perhaps not. Handmade chili from a human Wendy’s person is liable to vary in quality; AI chili made by a robot and canned by a machine is bound to be more formulaically standard. But this isn’t a bad thing. I’d definitely buy the canned chili again, but the other one? I feel no such compulsion.

Purchased Price: $4.42
Size: 15 oz can
Rating: 7 out of 10
Nutrition Facts: (per 1 cup) 280 calories, 12 grams of fat, 5 grams of saturated fat, 0.5 grams of trans fat, 65 milligrams of cholesterol, 1040 milligrams of sodium, 26 grams of carbohydrates, 7 grams of fiber, 6 grams of sugar (2 grams of added sugar), and 17 grams of protein.