Tag: Frozen Food

REVIEW: Hungry-Man Angus Beef Charbroil XXL Sandwich

Marvo 40 Comments

Hungry-Man Angus Beef Charbroil XXL Sandwich

How does Hungry-Man stay in business?

It’s one of those questions that no one knows the answer to, like why don’t the paparazzi’s cameras break after taking pictures of Paris Hilton’s vagina as she slides out of a car? There’s so much saturated fat and sodium in their foods that I wonder how they still have customers who are alive. Hungry-Man is the only brand that makes fast food restaurants say, “Ugh…you’re going to eat that shit?”

The numbers found in the nutrition facts of a Hungry-Man product read more like test scores than anything else. 81 percent saturated fat? That’s a B- in Heart Disease. You’re on your way to college. Oh wait, I read that wrong. I meant to say “collapse.” You scored a 1040 on your SAT test. Woo hoo! Oh wait, it’s 1040 milligrams on your SALT. The new Hungry-Man Angus Beef Charbroil XXL Sandwich continues the long tradition of Hungry-Man products by providing people with microwaveable meals that are full of saturated fat, sodium and regret.

I know what you’re thinking when you’re looking at the picture above. You think I should get that looked at by a physician, because it doesn’t look healthy. But that is not a growth, that is the Hungry-Man Angus Beef Charbroil XXL Sandwich. Stare at it. Let all of that disgustingness sink in. Let it haunt your nightmares.

Despite how horribly unhealthy Hungry Man products are, they also, I hate to admit, tend to be somewhat tasty, and that was the case with this big slab of ground Angus beef with cheese and a sesame seed bun. By fat…I mean, by far, this burger comes nowhere near the quality, no matter how crappy it is, of a fast food burger, but against other frozen burgers I’ve had, it’s good. The burger’s size is quite hefty and makes the Whopper seems a little small. As you can see in the disgusting picture above that will haunt you while you sleep, the Angus patty is thick and significantly bigger than the sesame seed bun.

The patty had a nice meaty flavor that was seasoned nicely and the cheese seemed like it was just there for decoration because it didn’t add any flavor. As for the bun, it was hard and chewy in most places, but for a microwaveable burger that is par for the course. All of this equate to a burger that provides 700 calories, 81 percent of your daily recommended allowance for saturated fat and 1040 milligrams of sodium.

Again, you can get a much better tasting burger at a fast food place, and maybe slightly healthier too. With some drive-thru windows open 24 hours, there’s really no excuse to purchase the Hungry-Man Angus Beef Charbroil XXL Sandwich, unless you really want to keep Hungry-Man in business.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 sandwich – 700 calories, 41 grams of fat, 16 grams of saturated fat, 1.5 grams of trans fat, 75 milligrams of cholesterol, 1040 milligrams of sodium, 55 grams of carbohydrates, 2 grams of fiber, 8 grams of sugar, 29 grams of protein, 4% vitamin A, 6% vitamin C, 20% calcium and 20% iron.)

Item: Hungry-Man Angus Beef Charbroil XXL Sandwich
Price: $3.00 (on sale)
Size: 8 ounces
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 5 out of 10
Pros: Big ass patty. Decent tasting. One of the better frozen burgers I’ve had. 1/2 a pound of food. Great source of protein.
Cons: Bun was hard and chewy. 1/2 of your arteries will be clogged. 81% of your daily allowance of saturated fat. Useless addition of cheese. 1.5 grams of trans fat. You can get significantly better burgers at a fast food joint. The picture of it will haunt you in your sleep.

REVIEW: Hot Pockets Supreme Pizza Deep Dish Pizzeria

Marvo 25 Comments

Hot Pockets Supreme Pizza Deep Dish Pizzeria

Have you looked at a Hot Pocket, then looked at the nutritional facts and then thought to yourself, “Hey, there’s not enough calories and saturated fat in it, but I don’t want to eat two of them”?

If so, you’re in luck because the Hot Pockets Supreme Pizza Deep Dish Pizzeria is heavier than a regular Hot Pocket, but lighter than two. In order make this possible, they didn’t just make a regular Hot Pocket bigger, they made it round so it looks like the Hot Pockets version of a pot pie.

However, instead of being filled with turkey, peas, carrots and gravy, it’s filled with all of the goodness you would find on top of a supreme pizza: pepperoni, sausage, green and red peppers, olives, onions, mushrooms and reduced fat cheese. All of that filling makes it a little thicker than a regular Hot Pocket and its weight about one and three-fourths heavier.

On the front of this product’s box, it brags about how it’s a good source of calcium and contains seven essential vitamins and minerals, but as I mentioned at the beginning, it’s also a great source of saturated fat and sodium. So you’ll beat osteoporosis, but lose to hypertension and heart disease.

If you’ve had a pizza Hot Pocket before, and I’m sure almost all of you have whether you want to admit it or not, you’ll have an idea of what the Hot Pockets Supreme Pizza Deep Dish Pizzeria tastes like, because it just basically a Hot Pocket that’s round. The crust tasted the same and the filling had that familiar pizza flavor. I could pick out the flavors of the pepperoni, sausage, peppers and olives, but not so much with the onions and mushrooms.

As for the cheese, there was a lot of it, but it disappointed me because some of it was reduced fat mozzarella and some of it was imitation mozzarella, which means the Hot Pockets Supreme Pizza Deep Dish Pizzeria didn’t reach its potential with saturated fat and sodium.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 piece – 540 calories, 25 grams of fat, 8 grams of saturated fat, 25 milligrams of cholesterol, 840 milligrams of sodium, 60 grams of carbohydrates, 4 grams of fiber, 10 grams of sugar, 16 grams of protein and a bunch of vitamins and minerals.)

Item: Hot Pockets Supreme Pizza Deep Dish Pizzeria
Price: $2.00
Size: 7.5 ounces
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: It’s good, if you like Hot Pockets. Heavier than a regular Hot Pocket. Round shape means you can roll it around, if you desire. If you love sodium and saturated fat, you’ll like it. 4 grams of fiber. Vitamins and minerals.
Cons: Nothing special, it’s just a bigger, round Hot Pocket. Uses reduced fat mozzarella and imitation mozzarella. If you hate sodium and saturated fat, you’ll hate it. Using the phrase “Deep Dish” may make Chicagoans upset.

REVIEW: Sara Lee Original Cheesecake Bites

Marvo 26 Comments

Cheesecake is one of those special desserts that one would only buy to celebrate an important occasion or because they’re at a Cheesecake Factory. I don’t know of anyone who eats cheesecake on a regular basis, and why would anyone? Despite how delicious they are, cheesecake is also packed with calories and saturated fat, so much so that it makes ice cream blush. Just one slice can makes someone feel like they’ve eaten an entire meal. But it seems Sara Lee (who I just found out is not Asian) wants people to eat more cheesecake with her Sara Lee Original Cheesecake Bites.

Each container has 40 ready-to-eat pieces, which means after you eat the first one, you have 39 opportunities to stop eating it. Where you stop depends on your body’s will power. Forty pieces may sound like it’s a lot, but when you see those 40 pieces in its container, it doesn’t look like very much and it’s quite easy to eat half of them, which would be bad, because I imagine death by cheesecake is not how anyone would like to go. Each square bite, which measures at three-fourths of an inch wide and a half of an inch tall, has 20 calories. Through the power of addition, you can get an idea of when to stop. If you were to eat only five of them, you would have consumed 100 calories. If you eat ten of them, that’s 200 calories. If you eat 20 of them in one sitting, you do not care about your body.

Unfortunately, the folks at Sara Lee don’t know how to add. According to the nutrition facts on the back of the packaging, a serving size of 24 bites has 440 calories. I don’t know if they forgot to carry over a number, put a decimal point in the wrong place or had a blindfolded monkey poke at a calculator, but according to my calculations, which I double and triple checked without a blindfold, if one bite has 20 calories, then 24 bites should have 480 calories.

The cheesecake itself tastes like 24 bites should have 480 calories because it’s somewhat rich, although not overly rich. It also had a slight tangy flavor like some cheesecakes do, but the crust was hardly noticeable. Besides the nutritional content, another item that bothered me was the formation of ice crystals on the bites after I first opened, which can be a bad thing with frozen foods because it’s a sign of possible freezer burn. Fortunately, it didn’t taste like there was any freezer burn.

Overall, it wasn’t the best cheesecake I’ve had and that’s what I expected. But it’s not bad for something that’s frozen, cut up into pieces and served in a tub container.  If Sara Lee is trying to push for more cheesecake consumption, I think she might be able to do so with the Sara Lee Original Cheesecake Bites, if people don’t mind mediocre cheesecake.

(Nutrition Facts – 24 cheesecake bites – 440 calories, 27 grams of fat, 14 grams of saturated fat, 0.5 grams of trans fat, 90 milligrams of cholesterol, 340 milligrams of sodium, 43 grams of carbohydrates, 1 gram of fiber, 25 grams of sugar and 7 grams of protein.)

Item: Sara Lee Original Cheesecake Bites
Price: $5.99
Size: 40 bites
Purchased at: 7-Eleven
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Decent tangy flavor. Not bad for something that’s frozen, cut up into pieces and served in a tub container. Bites make it easier to portion control, unless you have no control.
Cons: Mediocre cheesecake. Crust was hardly noticeable. 40 bites doesn’t look like much. Sara Lee doesn’t know how to add. Ice crystals. Nutrition facts appear to be inaccurate. Just as decadent as regular cheesecake. Sara Lee is not Asian.

REVIEW: Kellogg’s Nutri-Grain Strawberry Filled Eggo Waffles

Marvo 19 Comments

I’ve decided what I want to be when I grow up. Screw being a quasi-product review blogger editor. I want to be the one who comes up with new frozen waffle variations because it sounds like it’s the frickin’ easiest job in the world.

If I were in charge of developing new frozen waffle varieties, it would probably go something like this:

Frantic people will come running into my large corner office. They think consumers have grown tired of the dozens of other waffle varieties I’ve come up with, so they need me to come up with something new. As I sit in my big, comfy leather office chair, I’ll put my elbows on the armrests and bring my hands together in front of my face, forming a dome, with only my fingertips touching each other. I’ll close my eyes and pretend I’m in deep thought. While concentrating, I’ll slightly nod my head a few times and then follow that with slight shakes of my head. Then I’ll hum, “uh huh” and then inhale deeply, indicating that I’ve come up with greatness. I’ll raise my head while exhaling and opening my eyes. Then I’ll pan across the room filled with eager looks. I’ll pause for dramatic effect and then say in a confident tone, “Bacon. Filled. Waffles.”

People will yell, “brilliant.” Others will say, “Why didn’t I think of that?” Some of them will fall to their knees and cry because my ingenuity is at a level that they’ll never achieve, but they’re happy they were able to witness it first-hand. When the praise gets to be a little too much, I’ll just raise my hands, quietly shoo them away with hand gestures and once they leave my office, I’ll go back to admiring my own awesomeness in the mirror behind my desk until they need me again.

I think I need to make this happen soon because whoever came up with the Kellogg’s Nutri-Grain Strawberry Filled Eggo Waffles needs to get replaced.

These strawberry-filled frozen waffles are noticeably thicker than regular Eggo Waffles, which means they could only fit six to a box, instead of the usual eight. The strawberry filling can easily be seen in the waffle if you put it in front of a light, like you’re a mailbox thief looking for checks. The filling isn’t spread out from edge to edge, instead it fills up about two-thirds of the circumference.

Unfortunately, just like a juiced up baseball player with bad hand-eye coordination, it maybe thicker, but it isn’t very good. Because it’s a Nutri-Grain product, it doesn’t taste like regular Eggo Waffles and is made with six grams of whole grain. The strawberry filling, made from real fruit, has little to no flavor. The only purpose it seems to have is to possibly burn my mouth when I bite into it. I was hoping the filling would have some flavor so that I wouldn’t need to dump enough sugarrific syrup on it to turn me into a one man mosh pit.

This mediocre frozen waffle wouldn’t have happen if I were the one who came up with new varieties. Never mind the Kellogg’s Nutri-Grain Strawberry Filled Eggo Waffles. It would be all about the Kellogg’s Hungry Man Bacon & Egg Filled Eggo Waffles and they would be so thick that there can only be four in a box.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 waffle – 130 calories, 3.5 grams of fat, 1 gram of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 300 milligrams of sodium, 75 milligrams of potassium, 25 grams of carbohydrates, 3 grams of fiber, 8 grams of sugar, 15 grams of other carbohydrates, 3 grams of protein and a bunch of vitamins and minerals.)

Item: Kellogg’s Nutri-Grain Strawberry Filled Eggo Waffles
Price: $3.50 (on sale)
Size: 6 waffles
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 4 out of 10
Pros: Syrup makes it better. Healthier than regular Eggo Waffles. Made with 6 grams of whole grains. 3 grams of dietary fiber. If I came up with frozen waffle varieties.
Cons: Strawberry filling has no flavor. Bland without syrup. Less waffles per box than regular Eggo waffles. Contains high fructose corn syrup. Being a douchebag by admiring my awesomeness in the mirror.

REVIEW: DiGiorno Tuscan Style Chicken Crispy Flatbread Pizza

Marvo 24 Comments

If you don’t skip past the commercials in your DVR recordings, you probably know DiGiorno’s (or if you’re Canadian, Delissio’s) slogan is, “It’s not delivery. It’s DiGiorno.”

I’ve had many DiGiorno frozen pizzas over the years and pizza from either Pizza Hut, Domino’s, Papa John’s and I’ll just throw in Little Caesars for the hell of it, and I’m pretty sure no one will confuse a DiGiorno pizza with one of those other restaurant pizzas. I’m sure with one look, most people can easily tell the difference.

Besides, why would they want to be confused with a delivery pizza because there are way too many negative connotations with being a delivery pizza.

For example, delivered pizzas have a tendency to be greasier than a Wall Street financial analyst and can provide enough oil to power a biofuel car. Do they really want stigma of being confused with delivery pizza and all the porn references that go along with it? Those references involve pizza being delivered by a strapping young lad to a house that contains either a sexy cougar, teen babysitter, sorority girls, horny housewife or, in certain European countries, sheep.

Not even the new DiGiorno Tuscan Style Chicken Crispy Flatbread Pizza could be confused with a pizza delivered by someone with an insulated pizza case.

This flatbread pizza is made with grilled white meat chicken, spinach, oven-roasted tomatoes, garlic and a creamy red sauce. It smells nice, but the pizza is 11 inches in diameter, which is kind of small. The flatbread turned out crispy, but thankfully not like a cracker. Its flavor is bland and it tastes like diet Cheez-Its, which is surprising because I’ve enjoyed all of the DiGiorno pizzas I’ve tried in the past. Also, it seems like there isn’t much sauce on the pizza. I guess the saying “pizza is like sex, because it’s never bad” isn’t true because eating this pizza is like having drunk sex with a sheep — you thought it would be fun at the time, but later you’ll regret it.

If that’s not considered bad, I don’t know what is.

The only positive item I found with the DiGiorno Tuscan Style Chicken Crispy Flatbread Pizza wasn’t the pizza itself, but the plastic wrapping around it, which is extremely easy to open. Just grab the tab and pull it apart. The folks who work on the plastic packaging at DiGiorno really need to focus their attention on women’s bras.

(Nutrition Facts – 1/3 pizza – 14 grams of fat, 6 grams of saturated fat, 1 grams of trans fat, 35 milligrams of cholesterol, 680 milligrams of sodium, 25 grams of carbohydrates, 2 grams of fiber, 2 grams of sugar, 14 grams of protein, 10% vitamin A, 25% calcium and 6% iron.)

Item: DiGiorno Tuscan Style Chicken Crispy Flatbread Pizza
Price: $6.49 (on sale)
Size: 14 ounces
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 3 out of 10
Pros: Plastic wrapping is super easy to open. Flatbread was crispy. Pizza porn. DVRs. Being able to skip through commercials.
Cons: Bland tasting. It’s like a diet Cheez-Its. At 11 inches, it doesn’t seem too big. European sheep pizza porn. Unhooking bras in the dark. Drunk sheep sex.