Boston Market Country Fried Chicken

October 4, 2006 | Reviewer: Guest Reviewers

Veda generally eats vegetarian meals at lunch. Today, she makes a foray into the world of Boston Market, one populated with breading and gravy.

Price: $1.19
Serving: 1 box, 14 oz.
Calories: 540
Fat: 41%, 27g
Sodium: 65%, 1579mg
Protein: 21g
Carbs: 18%, 53g
Fiber: 27%, 7g

Boston Market says: We use tender all white meat chicken dipped in a seasoned batter, breaded, then cooked to a golden brown. It’s served up with country style gravy and our Homestyle Mashed Potatoes along with a side of tasty peas and carrots.

Veda says: Where do I even begin with this one? I suppose I must first try to justify my shameful choice. If you knew me, you’d know that most of my dietary mistakes are preceded by the phrase, “But it was on sale”. So, I’ll begin there. It was on sale for $1.19. The little yellow sign made me do it, I swear. Even then, with such an appealing price staring me in the face, it took several minutes of pacing in the frozen food isle. Dare I sink to such a depth? Well, clearly the answer was yes.

So many things were wrong with this meal, but I’ll start with what could’ve been the redeeming quality and failed. The veggies. Peas and carrots. Granted that they are starchy, but they ARE vegetables and still have some healthful qualities. This was UNTIL Boston Market smothered them in so much salt and butter that I initially thought it was mashed potatoes with one or two carrots stuck in it. I kid you not. Once microwaved, these would be innocent veggies, floated in a sea of buttery shame. I had to drain them before I ate them.

Now onto what’s wrong with the concept of frozen, microwaved, “fried” chicken. I don’t think they lied. This chicken was oily enough to have been fried at some point. It’s just that somewhere along the way, the breading became a soggy, salty mess. How that soggy breading didn’t manage to share it’s moisture with the chicken, I cannot imagine. Thank goodness for the gravy (which I usually hate), because without it, I may have been forced to drink the carrot/pea butter, just to choke the chicken down.

Finally, we come to the mashed potatoes. Lovely, fluffy, favorite side dish of mine… Just not this time. The potatoes (what little there were) were heavy and weighed down with - you guessed it - salt and butter. Now, I am a fan of both, but how much can you consume? Not much. I didn’t even make it half way through this meal before I had to go shell out $5.75 for a palate-clearing salad. I can only conclude that you get what you pay for and apparently $1.19 only buys salt and butter. The next time a little yellow sign, attached to nearly inedible edibles, calls your name… Run, run fast.

comments

5 Responses to “Boston Market Country Fried Chicken”

Colleen on October 5th, 2006

I’ve had a Boston Market meal almost identicle to this one, but the chicken was “rotisserie.” I agree with everything you saud except on the mashed potatoes. I like my mashed taters weighed down with salt and butter. However, I hated the vegitables and the flavorless chicken breast. I’ve had good rotisserie chicken. This was not rotisseried at all. They had simpley taken a dry, flavorless skinless chicken boob and slathered it in oil. The vegitables were the worst tasting vegitables I can ever remember eating. BM should stick to lasagna I guess.
Abi Jones on October 5th, 2006

I agree with plenty of sodium and butter in the mashed potatoes, though I prefer something a little extra…like rosemary or garlic.

I had a Marie Callender roasted chicken meal yesterday and it was pretty darn good. Ok, except that the beans were swimming in buttery sugar water.
April LaMoy on October 10th, 2006

My comment is not meant to be rude. But… two comments on this website are bashing this meal when Real Simple magazine, Food issue, (that’s promoting your website) has it as a runner up of Best Push-Button Dinners, in the Traditional category. The magazine states “a tester” was used. It doesn’t mention anything about the tester being from this website; but I can’t be the only one to assume that the information came from here. Maybe someone should have given the magazine a heads up to use another meal for an example.
Abi Jones on October 10th, 2006

April, no offense taken! I can see how the article in Real Simple can be a little confusing compared to our reviews. They also raved about Kashi’s Lemon Rosemary Chicken while we only gave it 3 stars. We preferred the Sweet and Sour Chicken and the Southwest Chicken.

Real Simple conducted their own reviews in their offices. Apparently, they had someone who already liked Boston Market reviewing the Country Fried Chicken Meal. If Nicole from our office had reviewed the meal, she probably would have had a different opinion than Veda. Nicole loves fried foods and gravy, while Veda generally eats vegetarian items.

I hope that you’ll take some more time to explore our site and get to know the reviewers of HeatEatReview.com.
Nicole on October 11th, 2006

I wouldn’t have liked the vegetables so much. Give me corn or mashed potatoes. Or macaroni and cheese, because apparently that serves as a side rather than vegetables sometimes.