Favorite Frozen Meals: Gardenburger

It’s not just a veggie patty anymore.

The Gardenburger brand has expanded its line significantly beyond the original burger substitute. Not only can you now get a wide variety of patty choices in the freezer case, but now you can also find pretend riblets, wraps, and “chicken” products.

Naturally, some of these make a tasty, convenient lunch.

Gardenburger

Black Bean Chipotle Wrap

The picture of the box here is not the best, admittedly. Neither is the picture of the food on the box. I almost didn’t buy this product, which would have been a shame, as it is delicious. It’s Gardenburger’s yummy black bean patty coated in a spicy and savory sauce, sprinkled with rich cheese, and stuffed into a plenty good whole-wheat tortilla. You get two individually wrapped 240-calorie wraps per box, and they’re tastier and more filling (six grams of fiber!) than Lean Pockets.

Favorite Frozen Meals: Michelina’s Lean Gourmet

Visit Pennies & Pounds for a revised and updated version of this Michelina’s Lean Gourmet article, along with more posts on weight loss and healthy eating on a budget!

Michelina’s may be at the low end of the frozen-food market, but you have to give them credit. That cardboard packaging may sometimes impart a little papery flavor to the food it holds, but it’s a highly efficient design, more likely to biodegrade than all those plastic trays and cellophane wrappers we toss out after our lunch breaks.

My mom used to stock the freezer with several of these (among others) for us kids to heat up on days we didn’t feel like a sandwich for lunch or had to fend for ourselves for dinner. Actually, these really were more likely lunch fare — for dinner, it was usually the stocks of Marie Callendar’s chicken pot pie and frozen entrées that would get tapped.

Marie Callendar’s frozen food takes way too much prep time for lunch (or, frankly, dinner) most of the time, in my opinion. Plus, some have nutritional stats that make you wonder why you’re not just picking up a to-go meal from Olive Garden.

Anyway, onward to the review.

Michelina’s Lean Gourmet

Macaroni & Cheese

I realize the convenience factor is small here, as it’s not so difficult to whip up a box of mac and cheese and stuff it in Tupperware. However, when I was a kid and less familiar with the stove, this was definitely a freezer favorite. I don’t find any of the more expensive frozen mac and cheese dinners to be at all superior to my taste buds, so if I felt a desire to pack myself a plate for lunch, I bought this. The serving is definitely way small, but it’s only 270 calories.

I don’t remember most of the other meals listed on the Lean Gourmet home page — Albertson’s fails me again. Some look promising, such as this Vegetable Rice Pilaf that looks chock-full of colorful veggies, if the picture is to be believed.

Favorite Frozen Meals: Smart Ones

Visit Pennies & Pounds for a revised and updated version of this Smart Ones article, along with more posts on weight loss and healthy eating on a budget!

Weight Watchers endorses a lot of foods in the grocery store, both from its own branded lines and other producers. You can now find Weight Watchers cheeses and snack cakes along with the older Smart Ones frozen products, and Progresso recently introduced a line of Weight Watchers-endorsed light soups.

However, buying the food does not buy you the weight-loss support. I wonder how much they promote all these branded foods at those meetings?

I haven’t tried a lot of the Smart Ones frozen meals. My Albertson’s didn’t carry all that many in the freezer case, so I’m afraid I might have missed out on the tastier selections. Here is what I did try and enjoy.

Weight Watchers Smart Ones

Santa Fe Style Rice & Beans

This rice and beans plate is kind of like enchiladas deconstructed. A pile of mostly rice is doused in a light but creamy sauce and sprinkled with cheese. The sauce is kind of odd — I couldn’t quite figure out what it was made of — but it tasted satisfyingly rich. A good choice, though as always small. It’ll cost you 310 calories, also known as six Weight Watchers points, if you’re counting. There’s a good four grams of fiber, too, as a bonus!

Like I said, though, I never sampled most of this line. I remember a few others, but they were merely satisfactory (or bad). I do hope the new line of Weight Watchers cheeses catches on, though. It can be hard to find reduced-fat shredded cheeses, especially in the Mexican blend (my preference for sprinkling).

New Diet Book Highlights

I’ve gotten the impression from several articles I’ve read online that December and January is the season for new diet tomes. Makes sense, of course, considering that sensible people will be looking to work off the holiday overindulgence and ever-hopeful people will be making New Year’s resolutions to lose weight (again).

This particular article from the Time web site, linked to by CNN Health, gives a round-up of 10 books released recently that claim to be the solution for your weight problem. Unfortunately, the author does not dig into the books too much, giving you little idea of what the diets involve (for example, I’ve read elsewhere that the Hot Chick book recommends eating piles of spinach for its fiber and, thus, laxative effects, but the article from Time gives me no confirmation or denial of that odd recommendation).

It would also be nice to see a little more, well, meanness, I guess, in the evaluation of each book. Some of these are from real crackpots, who have little to back up their claims, and the mostly gentle summaries here are not going to save people from wasting their time and money.

But anyway. It’s a bit informative and includes more books than any other piece I’ve seen so far.

Time.com: 10 Notable Diet Books of 2008

Favorite Frozen Meals: South Beach Living (and More from Kraft)

Thank you for reading my reviews of South Beach Living and other Kraft products. Please keep in mind that these reviews were written quite a while ago, so the products featured may no longer exist. I am not affiliated with Kraft or any grocer, so I don’t know what is still available. I’m sorry, but I can’t help you find products that have vanished from your local supermarket. To find more recent information or to find a product, please visit Kraft’s web site or talk to the manager of your local grocery store. Local managers are the ones who can decide what products to carry in the store, and they value customer input.

Visit Pennies & Pounds for a revised and updated version of this South Beach Living article, along with more posts on weight loss and healthy eating on a budget!

Kraft changed the name just recently for its line of packaged foods that follow the South Beach Diet guidelines, reflecting a growing anti-”diet” trend in America. Weight Watchers (another brand we’ll be visiting in this series) is telling all who’ll listen that they’re not a diet, and Jenny Craig has signed up Queen Latifah to lose a few pounds as part of their new health-improvement advertising message.

So South Beach Living it is. I’m branching out a bit in my favorites today, though. The truth is, the few South Beach frozen meals I tried back in my school-going days were abysmal. Looking at the products listed on Kraft’s site, I’m guessing I wasn’t alone in that opinion, as a lot of the products have changed or been pushed aside by new entrées. I won’t condemn the new ones flavors untasted, but I wouldn’t load up my freezer before testing how weird-tasting the chicken is now.

So, I present my favorite meal in their refrigerated line instead. Don’t take my endorsement of only one as a knock on the others, though — I just was obsessed with this particular one so much that I never really got my teeth into the rest.

South Beach Living

Sesame Chicken Wrap Sandwich Kit

How good is this refrigerated meal kit? I was so obsessed that I actually bought the ingredients separately and started making these wraps myself. I needed to, anyway — the grocery store where I shopped was almost always out of this particular Asian-themed variety. I’d walk up to the cooler case, note the label on the shelf, look into the gaping hole, and (just in case) stick my hand in to see if there might be some goodness hiding in the back. Obviously, these weren’t just popular with me.

These Lunchable-like kits contain two whole-wheat mini tortillas, a packet of cooked chicken pieces, whole-wheat crunchy noodles, and yummy Mandarin orange and sesame dressing to make the wraps, along with a little cup of sugar-free gelatin for dessert. That dressing introduced me to the low-calorie wonders of Asian-flavored vinaigrettes, which I used to make my own knockoff version when, sadly, these were out of stock.

Note that this 220-calorie pack has got to be the smallest of the small when it comes to packaged meals. You get two wraps, true, but they are tiny. Bring an apple, banana, something or you will faint before you leave work. Even when I used to have those cheese-and-cracker Lunchables packed in my bag as a kid, my mom supplemented with other healthy foods.

Other Kraft Refrigerated Meals

Since I don’t have much to write about in the South Beach line, I thought I’d take this opportunity to recommend a few other reasonable refrigerated lunch kits I enjoy.

An advantage to these refrigerated kits is that they don’t require much prep time. Some frozen meals require a third or more of your half-hour lunch bread to heat up, which is killer on days when perhaps you did not run out the door with breakfast in the belly.

Lunchables Maxed Out Chicken Strips

OK, so some kid habits I’ve never quite outgrown. Though I find the packaging has become somewhat obnoxious, the meal offerings in the Lunchables line have evolved in ways both good and bad since I was a kid and your choices were either turkey or ham with your cheese and crackers.

I was surprised by how much I enjoyed cold chicken fingers. You could always pack a few homemade ones, I suppose, but I generally bought these kind of meals for the convenience. The calories are kind of hefty at 480 per box, but if you ditch the sugary Kool-Aid packet they want you to mix into the spring water and the candy, it’s not so bad for you. Again — bring a healthy supplement to ward off hunger pangs.

Lunchables Mini Tacos

You might have let me slide on the cold chicken fingers thing, but now I’m sure you must think I’ve gone off the deep end. Cold beef taco filling?!

Give it a chance, that’s all I can say. The spicy flavor makes up for the weird appearance. And they’re cute!

Kraft labels this box as a “Sensible Solution.” I think it would be more sensible if you pawned the candy off on a little kid to knock off a few of those 450 calories, but it’s not as bad as a Jack in the Box run. But keep in mind, these are mini tacos.

Oscar Mayer Deli Creations Steakhouse Cheddar

I got a coupon in the mail for a free one of these sandwiches, but had the school year not been at a close or nearly so by then, I likely would have bought a few more of these tasty sandwich kits. The size of the meal is a good deal more satisfying than any of the other choices on this page, though you might still want a piece of fruit if you’re a hearty eater and can stand to consume more than 450 calories for lunch.

Well, you could always leave off the mayo to slim it down — trust me, the sandwich doesn’t need it, what with the tangy steak sauce also provided. That sauce makes this sort of like a spicy cheesesteak. It’s good stuff.

Oscar Mayer Beef Fast Franks

Oscar Mayer has somehow figured out how to microwave bread without turning it into a rock, between the Deli Creations and these Fast Franks. These are nothing more or less than a hot dog on a bun, but they’re a hot, convenient, and satisfying meal for only 300 calories. Of course, there’s no need to stop with the hot dog alone — I always top mine with lots of low-cal additions, such as spicy mustard, a dill pickle wedge, and chopped onions. Mmm . . .

Favorite Frozen Meals: Healthy Choice

Visit Pennies & Pounds for a revised and updated version of this Healthy Choice article, along with more posts on weight loss and healthy eating on a budget!

Yesterday I started relaying my top picks from the freezer case for quick, portion-controlled meals that aren’t weight-loss setbacks. Today, the focus moves from Stouffer’s Lean Cuisine to that iconic green box, Healthy Choice.

Talking about the Healthy Choice brand provides me with the opportunity to discuss at least one particular nutrition claim you see in the supermarket — “healthy.” Unlike many of the words slapped onto packaging, “healthy” is actually about as heavily regulated as “organic.”

When a company claims this accolade for its product, it’s declaring that the food is low in fat, cholesterol, and, significantly for processed foods, sodium. “Healthy” foods also must contain certain levels of essential nutrients, according to the FDA.

Healthy Choice meals all have to be relatively low in sodium because of these regulations. For example, Healthy Choice’s mac and cheese (with veggies) has 600 mg of sodium per 9.1-oz serving, which is about 25% of the typical daily limit. On the other hand, Stouffer’s cheesy mac (which claimed on the web site to serve one person before I got to the nutrition facts) has 1,395 mg of sodium for an equivalent portion.

Overall, I like the Healthy Choice line’s creative entrée selections. Like many low-cal brands, Healthy Choice doesn’t stick to the usual fried chicken and Salisbury steak. They’ve also come up with a new method of heating some meals using steam, but I can’t evaluate how well that works as it arrived in stores after I stopped needing to buy the meals. Nonetheless, it’s evidence that this brand tries to innovate, like Lean Cuisine.

Healthy Choice

Country Breaded Chicken

I know I might have knocked fried chicken meals a bit above, but I have to say, this particular meal might well have become my number-one favorite choice for weekday lunches once I discovered it midway through the 06-07 school year. How decadent it feels to be eating two fried chicken breast portions (bigger than tenders, mind you), mashed potatoes, mixed veggies, and a delicious cherry crumble, all in one sitting! The chicken tastes so good you will wonder how on earth this meal could have only 370 calories and nine grams of fat.

Chicken Margherita

I hardly finish saying that I’ve never tried the Café Steamers, yet here I go posting one. As it happens, Healthy Choice has moved several of its past regular-tray offerings into this line, eliminating the old versions. Thus, if you want to try the tangy Chicken Margherita, with its balsamic sauce and sweet tomatoes and garlic, you’ll have to plunge into the brave new world of steaming. This meal has only 340 calories, though it obviously does not come with a built-in sweet treat.

Premium Fudge Bars

I know this doesn’t qualify as a meal, but these 80-calorie fudge bars are a yummy guilt-free dessert! They look satisfyingly huge as you eat, too.

Alas, I can’t pinpoint any other meals as particularly good enough to merit a recommendation. That’s not to say the rest of the meals are terrible; they’re just ordinary (or I haven’t tried them, being that Healthy Choice was usually more expensive than the others). No one’s getting too excited over yet another box of meatloaf.

Next time: South Beach!

Favorite Frozen Meals: Lean Cuisine

Visit Pennies & Pounds for a revised and updated version of this Lean Cuisine article, along with more posts on weight loss and healthy eating on a budget!

Writing about food-provided diet plans the other day got me thinking about frozen meals in general. I have sampled dozens over the past two years, as they were my (and many others) go-to choice for a lunch entrée at school. Sometimes I could pack leftovers, on rare occasion I made the effort to pack something different the night before, and as a last resort I ate what the kids were having (which, at a low-income public school, was never pretty), but most of the time I kept my freezer stocked with heat-and-eat platters.

While I’m going to recommend several on the basis of flavor, I have to warn anyone interested in picking these up that they likely won’t keep you full and satisfied all the way until dinner. I always felt that I’d had enough to eat at the time, but I rarely made it home from school not feeling ravenous. Since that can lead to some serious junk food binges or poor dinner choices (all those drive-thrus!), it’s best to either supplement the meal or plan on packing a healthy, filling snack to consume a few hours later.

For midday, think a ready-to-go, high-fiber fruit such as an apple or banana, a good source of protein such as string cheese or nuts, or even a low-cal meal-replacement bar as an add-on or snack. If I decided to consume one of these meals for dinner, I would always have a big salad on the side.

Lean Cuisine

Probably the first brand that pops to mind when anyone thinks of diet frozen meals. Lean Cuisine meals often feature delicious and unusual flavors for the freezer case, and the brand innovates by introducing new lines such as panini sandwiches and flat-bread pizzas.

Lean Cuisine’s offerings are divided into a number of categories, each of which is bursting with choice. No wonder they take over such a large chunk of space at the supermarket. On the downside, most of the meals are paltry in size and lack a significant amount of vegetables. Don’t expect a huge emphasis on whole grains, either.

On to the best of the bunch!

Asian-Style Pot Stickers

How fun is it to get to eat something that looks like naughty Chinese take-out and yet know that it has minimal waist impact? The sauce gives the cute (and generously sized) dumplings a lip-smacking Asian-food flavor, all for only 260 calories a box. The rice accompaniment isn’t a showstopper, but stir-fry some frozen veggies to add on top and it’s like you’re getting an appetizer and an entrée, making it a full dinner. These pot stickers are part of the “One-Dish Favorites” line, as is the similar Vegetable Eggroll meal. That one, though, comes with only one eggroll and thus seems eminently less satisfying.

Sesame Chicken

Sesame Chicken is my all-time favorite Lean Cuisine frozen meal. I stocked up on it whenever it went on sale, and it was one of the few frozen meals I actually craved enough to eat for dinner. I always wished they would make a bigger-sized portion (like those skillet-meal bags) so I could have it for days. Mostly I liked this meal because of its resemblance to sweet and sour chicken, a takeout favorite of mine. Sure, Lean Cuisine offers another meal dubbed Sweet and Sour Chicken, but it features roasted meat rather than fried and is thus infinitely inferior. The noodles on the side are OK — nothing special — but don’t expect the big pile in the box picture. Sesame Chicken belongs to the “Café Classics” line and contains 33o calories.

Lemongrass Chicken

The “Spa Cuisine” line features the meals that taste the most like “real” food, as in something you might prepare yourself or get at a restaurant. This Lemongrass Chicken bowls you over not with assertive flavors or mouthwatering saltiness but with its subtle yet distinctive taste. How can I describe it? It’s if they actually cooked up this one to nourish and satisfy you rather than merely to addict you to their product. The sauce featured on the chicken is delectable, and there’s actually whole grains and vegetables involved (although everything does come in a tiny portion). The meal weighs in at a spa-worthy 250 calories.

Chicken Club

I would feel that I must be doing something wrong biting into a crispy sandwich stuffed with melty cheese, ranch dressing, and bacon. Yet this sandwich only sets you back 320 calories, which is a perfectly reasonable lunch, maybe with a piece of fruit to fill it out. It somehow feels extra satisfying as a lunch, too, being a sandwich. You might be able to save some calories by discarding the bread topper and eating this open-faced — the frozen and microwave-”grilled” bread isn’t much to write home about anyway. Those grill marks are painted on before the sandwich leaves the factory; the little silver tray you heat these on does not produce them.

This is already getting a bit lengthy, and I’ve only covered one brand! I’ll continue this series later with a look at meals offered by Weight Watchers, Healthy Choice, and other low-cal brands.

Quick Tricks for Healthier Eating

From the folks at Health magazine and CNN come “Sneaky Little Slim-Down Tricks.”

The Most Reliable:

Start smart
Begin lunch and dinner with a veggie-rich salad or broth-based soup, says Pennsylvania State University satiety expert Barbara Rolls, author of “The Volumetrics Eating Plan.” “That lets you fill up first on a big volume of low-calorie food and ends up displacing some of the foods you’ll eat next — the choices that are usually higher in calories.”

Here’s a good salad recipe: Mix 1½ cups of salad greens with ¾ cup of raw veggies like onions, bell peppers, carrots, broccoli, or cucumbers; drizzle with 2 tablespoons of low-cal bottled dressing.

I keep trying to follow this one, but it does conflict with my desire to pare down the grocery budget and with the small size of my fridge. Scott’s great when it comes to this strategy — he always eats his salad first to try to fill up before the main course, even if it makes me worry that his entrée will get unappealingly cold in the meantime.

It would be nice if I could let things stay warm in the oven perhaps while we enjoy a separate salad course upfront to blunt our appetites. Something to consider for when we get back.

The Most Intriguing (It’s New to Me):

Sneak a snack
“Ten minutes before each meal, eat some healthy fat (around 70 calories or fewer): a handful of nuts, a few slices of avocado, or a spoonful of peanut butter, for example. That helps activate ghrelin, a hormone that lets you know you’re full,” says Michael Roizin, MD, co-author with Mehmet Oz, MD, of “You on a Diet: The Owner’s Manual for Waist Management.”

I’ve heard about that fullness hormone before, but always in the context of eating your meals slowly so that you have time for body to tell you it’s satisfied before your belt busts open. This bit of advice sounds pretty good if you’re the sort of person who does most overeating at meals (hmm . . . see the next part for more on that). It’s not going to help you much if you sabotage yourself through unhealthy food choices or caving to those never-hunger-based junk-food cravings.

Maybe this advice could be combined with the Volumetrics idea through getting that healthy fat via some oil, olives, or nuts on the salad?

The Most Disturbing:

Choose your pals
Studies show that most of us base how much we eat on what others around us eat, says University of Toronto psychologist Peter Herman, PhD. So steer clear of the big eaters in your social circle, at least when food is around. Sashay over and make small talk at parties with the folks who aren’t hovering near the food table.

“Marching to your own caloric drummer requires some independent thought and calculation,” Herman says.

Hand in hand with this goes a chronic obstacle to almost any wife’s diet plan. Unless you are significantly taller and far more athletic, your caloric needs are way less than your husband’s! Women pack on the pounds after marriage not only because they ditch the pre-wedding diet but also because they start portioning out the same amount of dinner to themselves that their husbands do.

It’s tough to sit at the same table and watch Scott put away more food (especially when it’s something tasty), but if I ate the same number of calories per meal that he does to lose weight, I would balloon. He’s eight inches taller than me and more muscular, and thus he can consume more calories without gaining weight than I can. It’s just the way it is.

You may not have noticed a change in the amount you consume, but that’s likely because you were brought up comparing portions with someone closer to you in size, such as a sibling. Even my brothers ate small portions at meals in my house growing up because they spread their eating out over the whole day. You ate the same size portion at others at the table then, so it doesn’t seem different to eat the same size portion as your husband, but odds are the portion size has grown in absolute terms.

I have to remind myself at every meal to eat only half or two-thirds as much as Scott, depending on the entrée. I also take time while preparing a meal to think out correct portions for each of us, such as setting out two slices of graham-flour bread for him and one for me. It’s all about planning, right?

Foods to Keep You Full

Assuming you can resist those cravings — though I suppose the point of many of these foods is to keep those cravings from cropping up in the first place.

15 Foods to Help You Lose – Goodhousekeeping.com:

Thirty billion a year — that’s about how much Americans spend on slim-down products, many of which don’t even work. A better way to get real weight-loss results? Go grocery shopping. New research points to more than a dozen foods, from beans to beef, that can help you fight hunger, kick your candy addiction, boost your metabolism — and ultimately shed pounds. And some of these superfoods deliver health bonuses too.

Basically, all of the foods on the list are the sort of nutritious foods you should be eating anyway as part of a healthy diet, with a few appetite-suppressing seasonings thrown in for good measure. Nutritional science can be hit or miss, but a lot of the foods listed on Good Housekeeping’s list (including beans and fruit) have definite nutritional benefits beyond any weight-loss claims.

Given that, it’s possible that the studies are right about how foods affect your blood sugar and digestion. Those foods might make you crave simple carbs less and keep you feeling full longer, so that you don’t binge and you thus don’t take in excess calories. And like I said, plenty of protein and fiber is just plain healthy!
Still, I don’t give much credence to any claims about foods that “boost the metabolism” or whatever, though, as I haven’t seen much non-anecdotal evidence that metabolism is really a factor in how much weight we carry. Plenty of people manage to stay fit as they age because they exercise (far more than I do, that’s for sure).

As we get older, we just get better at staying still and thus not burning calories. It’s easier for jumping-bean kids and constantly walking students to stay thin than for sedentary office workers. Add in the sleeplessness that makes so many adults drag themselves through the day and you get “fading metabolism.”

I certainly felt that last one as a teacher. Even though I should have gotten a good deal of exercise walking the classroom all day, I took every opportunity I could to sit very still and have kids do any grunt work as I was so exhausted. Another contributor to my 25 extra pounds!

So maybe it’s the jitters from the caffeine in tea that gets people losing weight rather than any special chemicals. Of course, we can’t all jump on the Starbucks Diet to take advantage — certainly all the cream and sugar in their drinks would counteract any benefit!

Bound to Shake One’s Resolution

If it’s anything like eating frozen dinners all day, every day, that is.

Prepared Diet Food: The Good, the Bad, and the Unhealthy at Epicurious.com

Losing weight is hard enough, but then factor in counting calories, watching portions, and making the food, and it’s no wonder that more than half of us in the U.S. are overweight. That’s why millions turn to diet-delivery services, which promise tasty, hopefully healthy food in slimming portions, delivered right to your door. The Epicurious editorial team evaluated five of the biggest plans to discover which is the best, both in taste and nutrition. The winner?

I won’t spoil the surprise for you. Visit the site to read about Epicurious’ evaluations of meal services, including big shots such as NutriSystem, Jenny Craig, and ZoneChefs. True, the meals were tested back in March of aught-seven, but I doubt they’ve changed much in the subsequent months if you’re considering signing up for one as part of that New Year’s resolution.

If you’re interested in these plans more for the convenience than the additional services or financially imposed food-choice discipline, Good Housekeeping magazine has several alternative diet plans that revolve around prepared foods. Check out the Fast-Food Diet and other plans.

Another option is to hit up that frozen meal aisle. Stick with the Lean Cuisine, Healthy Choice, Lean Gourmet, Weight Watchers Smart Ones, South Beach, and almost anything from the healthy/organic/vegetarian section (where they keep the Amy’s foods and the veggie burgers), and you’ll be getting a generally balanced meal that is already calorie controlled. That Epicurious article linked above reviews some. Most of the meals do tend to be on the small side, so be prepared to fill out your dinner entreé platter with either a salad (minus the cheese, croutons, and full-fat dressings) or a generous scoop from a bag of frozen veggies.

Keep in mind that any prepared foods-based diet is going to pack in whopping amounts of sodium. In fact, most of the sodium in our diets comes from processed foods, not from our salt shakers. If your resolution is less about dropping pounds and more about eating healthfully in order to reduce cardiovascular risks, you should pass on all these plans and invest some time in stocking your freezer with homemade batch cooking instead.