Heat Eat Review

• Home
• about
• archives
• the editrix
• contribute
• contact

Many's the long night I've dreamed of cheese - toasted, mostly. ~Robert Lewis Stevenson

Get reviews sent to your Email or via RSS

Kashi Chicken Florentine

January 4, 2007 | Reviewer: Jess

Price: Free to us, $5,00
Serving: 1 package, 10oz.
Calories: 300
Fat: 14%, 9g
Cholesterol: 15%, 45mg
Sodium: 26%, 620mg
Protein: 19g
Carbohydrates: 10%, 29g
Fiber: 20%, 5g
Weight Watchers Points: 6 Points

for taste
for chastity

Kashi says: Grilled chicken breast with spinach, sweet red peppers and baby portobello mushrooms. Kashi 7 whole grains and sesame with orzo pilaf. Garlic Wine sauce topped with shredded parmesan cheese.

Jess says: Do you sense the oncoming trouble of a budding office romance? Does someone get a little too close in the Xerox line? Is this someone being a little too generous with emoticons in email exchanges? Does this someone tell you when the coffee has been brewed so you get a fresh cup? Abort! Abort! This spells nothing but trouble. Animals don’t masticate where they defecate, you shouldn’t grind at the grind. So get thee this meal (once it’s for sale, which I don’t think it is yet). Essentially this is an oral chastity belt. Eating this meal is like drinking a garlic milkshake with garlic powder garnish. No one is making out with you after you’ve eaten this. It is three days later and I’m still not sure I’m fit for the bars. Abi claimed, upon receiving a taste, that it burned her mouth.

This is not to say that the meal is bad. Au contrare mon frere! Garlic adds a punch of taste to any food concoction. And as other Kashi meals have proven, that mix of fiberrific grains is recipe for microwave magic. The cream sauce is kind of nasty pre-microwave, sitting all globularly condensed in the center. But once you mix it in mid-heating cycle, it looks more than edible and that’s when you get the first whiff and start to realize, crapola!, I’m about to set off a garlic firecracker in the office kitchen! The portion is smaller in this meal than the other meals, but the spinach abounds. We all know spinach=power (or E. coli). Most also know that spinach and cream sauce are a great pair (like Popeye and Olive Oyl). Also, Kashi gives you some quality chicken strips in their meals. No fatty cubes here. Thanks, Kashi. That extra effort is almost worth the $3 extra I’ll have to spend on your meals (except not really - for $6 I can get a chicken sandwich, from, like, a real grill). In conclusion, this is great treat if your goal is to stop office temptations and it’s surely tasty, but this is not Kashi’s best production.

Kashi Pesto Pasta Primavera

January 3, 2007 | Reviewer: Rebecca

SRP: $4-5.00
Serving: 1 tray, 10 oz.
Calories: 330
Fat: 17%, 11g
Cholesterol: 2%, 5mg
Sodium: 33%, 790mg
Protein: 12g
Carbs: 31%, 93g
Fiber: 28%, 7g
Weight Watchers Points: 7 Points

Kashi says: Yellow carrots, sweet red peppers and peas, multigrain penne pasta, basil pesto sauce with shredded parmesan cheese

Rebecca says: There are three things I always enjoy: (1) Pasta (2) Pesto and (3) Free food. When Abi offered me the opportunity to review Kashi’s new Pesto Pasta Primavera, I quickly agreed.

The most important part of pesto pasta is the pesto sauce itself-here, the sauce was a bright friendly green and had decently mellow pesto flavor. I usually enjoy my pesto with a more of a fresh garlic kick and a burst of basil; this version was a bit less flavorful than I would have liked. The garlic and basil were identifiable, but not particularly distinctive. With most pesto sauces, I just want to slather it on everything (crackers, pita, veggies, pasta, etc.) but I wasn’t so hooked on this one that I wanted to keep eating it with a variety of starches.

When I first removed the tray from the microwave, the Kashi’s pesto seemed a bit soupy. However, more thorough mixing distributed the sauce to the pasta as a whole and decreased the soupiness. As a result of soaking in soupy sauce, the pasta was quite soggy. Kashi’s pasta is a special multigrain penne, but I could not taste the extra multigrain-ness (not that I really missed it). Maybe the multigrain taste was missing because the pasta was just a bit overcooked—more like regular American-style we-don’t-know-what-al-dente-means pasta than hearty, chewy multigrain pasta.

By far, my favorite part was the vegetables (a.k.a. primavera). The peppers and peas were bright, nicely cooked, firm and actually tasted (and resembled) real peppers and peas. Plus, there were enough vegetable bits to have some veggie in every bit. I was surprised that the vegetables were perfectly cooked because the pasta was a little overdone. By overdone I mean mushy.

If you like a mellow pesto sauce and your pasta ‘well done’, then you should try this meal for the tasty vegetables too. If you like pesto with sharper flavors and pasta al dente, you might want to find that combo somewhere else. Just remember to add some vegetables, they were so delicious.

Kashi Lemongrass Coconut Chicken

January 2, 2007 | Reviewer: Nicole

Our Price: Free!
MSRP: $5.00
Serving: 1 tray, 10 oz.
Calories: 320
Fat: 14%, 9g
Cholesterol: 3%, 10mg
Sodium: 29%, 700mg
Protein: 18g
Carbs: 15%, 44g
Fiber: 28%, 7g
Weight Watchers Points: 6 Points

Kashi says: Chicken breast with broccoli florets, carrots and sugar snap peas, Kashi 7 whole grains and sesame with red quinoa pilaf, lemongrass & coconut sauce topped with coconut flakes

Nicole says: As usual, the grain mixture in Kashi’s entree is a great break from the plain white rice, basmati rice, and various noodles that accompany not only the frozen meals I generally eat but also the non-frozen meals I sometimes get to have thanks to delivery restaurants or boyfriend-who-can-cook. This one also includes red quinoa, which adds visual appeal

The broccoli, carrots, and snap peas in this meal are striking in color - they look so fresh and bright. They bear out that first impression in retaining some firmness and crispness, and some nice flavor, especially from the carrots. The chicken was flavorful and firm, and served in a generous portion. I think it was 9 or 10 small and medium sized peices, easily enough for a piece per bite.

Sadly, the sauce was a disappointment. I know you guys think I’m the connoiseur of trashy, salty frozen food, but I was soo excited to try the lemongrass coconut healthy entree. The coconut flavor was there, but subtle. The lemongrass I detected a hint of, but I’m pretty sure it was psychosomatic. This is also exactly the kind of sauce I was thinking Kashi should be pairing with their shirmp entree, so finding it accompanying with the chicken… why can’t you take my advice? So, no big flavor here, but it allows the chicken and veggies shine through.

I would definitely eat this meal again, as it is subtly tasty and well-textured. It also filled me up well for a lunch. And I assume, even though I didn’t read the nutritional info, that it’s pretty darn healthy.

Get Healthy with HeatEatReview.com

January 1, 2007 | Reviewer: Abi Jones

Here at HeatEatReview.com HQ, we’ve definitely enjoyed a few too many glasses of egg nog. In that spirit we’re featuring an entire month of healthy meals and snacks. We’re going to give you the best and the worst of Lean Cuisine, Healthy Choice, and Smart Ones meals. We’ll also delve into the world of ‘All Natural’ and ‘Organic’ foods. Don’t worry, we have hippies on hand especially for those experiments. This celebration (or is it punishment?) kicks off with the inside scoop on three yet-to-be released Kashi meals.

That’s right, you’ll know whether or not these guys are good before they’re even in stores:

Tuesday: Kashi Lemongrass Coconut Chicken
Wednesday: Kashi Pesto Pasta Primavera
Thursday: Kashi Chicken Florentine

Worried that our ‘healthy’ reviews won’t have the same zip or zing as regular ones? You must not be familiar with Healthy Choice’s Dill Salmon meal. Stick with HeatEatReview.com for a January filled with healthy meals, edible or not.