Kraft South Beach Chicken Monterey Wrap

April 4, 2007 | Reviewer: Andrew

South Beach Chicken Monterey Wrap

Price: $2.99 for two wraps
Serving: 1 wrap, 4.16oz.
Servings per Container: 1.5
Calories: 220
Fat: 11%, 7g
Cholesterol: 7%, 20mg
Sodium: 19%, 460mg
Protein: 25g
Carbs: 9%, 26g
Fiber: 24%, 6g
Weight Watchers Points: 4 per wrap

Kraft says: Each South Beach Diet Wrap provides a hot, delicious lunch or dinner at home or on-the-go. Enjoy with a small mixed green salad and your favorite South Beach Diet Dressing!

Andrew says: I’ve had good luck with South Beach Diet frozen dinners lately. I’m not on the South Beach Diet, but Kraft has a decent-looking lineup of gourmet-ish diet meals and, for the most part, they’ve been satisfying and tasty.

Still, I should have heeded the alarm bells going off in my head when I decided to buy two boxes of South Beach Diet wraps. How often does a frozen tortilla come out right in the microwave? I think mankind is still waiting. How often does a frozen mish-mash of cheese, meat and veggies reconstitute into anything other than a barfy paste? (I’m looking at you too, Hot Pockets!)

So I brought the Chicken Monterey wraps to work after a disappointing experience earlier in the week with the Denver Omlette-style breakfast wraps (somehow flavorless save for a disgusting onion aftertaste) and hoped for the best. The smell emanating from the microwave wasn’t entirely terrible, so I thought at least I’d get some flavor out of this one.

I guess my first warning sign should have been that the wrap stuck to the paper plate I’d deposited it onto. More accurately, paper plate material stuck to the wrap. Gross. The first bite of the wrap was entirely made up of the whole-wheat tortilla, which had hardened into something resembling card stock. The next bite included some soggier tortilla as well as some melty but flavorless cheese, a bit of completely flavorless chicken, a “red pepper”, and some way-too-mustard-y dijon sauce. There was supposed to be Monterey Jack cheese in there but all I experienced was this awful dijon sauce, filling every taste bud with a sense of nauseous dread.

I ate it all, and I survived. So did the terrible sour dijon aftertaste, unfortunately. But then I thought, “you know, maybe I overcooked it or something. I have one more wrap in the box, I’m going to try it later.” Yes, I am THAT DEDICATED TO FOOD REVIEWING. I adjusted the cooking time down slightly, took one bite and promptly deposited it into the trash. It wasn’t just me: This was pretty awful. I’ll still get other South Beach stuff, but the wraps are by far the worst frozen food I’ve had in months.

comments

15 Responses to “Kraft South Beach Chicken Monterey Wrap”

Emily on April 4th, 2007

I haven’t tried the wraps in the microwave, but I really enjoy the chicken caesar South Beach wraps that you eat straight out of the fridge. I did add a little chopped lettuce from my fridge to the meal, so that might have helped make it a bit more filling and appetizing. I hate that “hardened on the ends, soggy in the middle” tortilla taste that’s all too well known from some microwave meals though, so I probably won’t be trying any of the other SB wrap varieties!

Thanks!
megan on April 4th, 2007

I do the same as Emily and I too have enjoyed the chicken caesar. I only bought it once and it wasn’t enough to make me buy them again!
Andrew on April 4th, 2007

I saw the refrigerated wraps the other day at the store and I thought “those couldn’t be as bad as the frozen ones … could they?!” But yeah, all things considered, I don’t think I need wrapped-up South Beach fare in my life that badly.
Abi Jones on April 5th, 2007

I think that the refrigerated ones are just alright, nothing special. Plus, if I have lettuce or spinach in my house, then it is 95% likely that I also have a tortilla, lunchmeat, and salad dressing. And that means that I don’t need to buy the wraps.

Actually, I think there’s pretty much a 95% chance there are tortillas in my house no matter whether or not I have spinach around.
jay on April 17th, 2007

i tried the southwestern one and i liked it. i open the tortilla package a little and warm it for 30 seconds. they come out soft. if i am at home and not in a hurry,i make them like pizza’s and put them in my toaster oven. the thing i remember, when trying sb wraps or any other diet food, is that if i knew how to eat in the first place i wouldnt have to worry about buying pre portioned foods to keep myself in line. if you read the directions they were not ment to be warmed up, but since we like things hot and fast. we get soggy and over cooked foods
Paige on April 30th, 2007

Just for those who might want to actually give these wraps a try, if you want them to be edible, and not a nasty mix of paper plate and hard-as-cardboard tortilla, you should follow the heating instructions - meaning open the plastic wrapper they come in, but LEAVE THE WRAP IN THE PLASTIC. Then just heat for the amount of time it calls for ( I can’t remember how long…a minute I think) and allow it to sit for a minute before you dig in. These wraps aren’t exactly gourmet, but they are at least edible if you heat them properly.
Washington City Paper: News & Features: Blogs on May 21st, 2007

[…] received the dreaded Zero Stars from Abi and her raters: Lean Cuisine Shrimp and Angel Hair Pasta, Kraft South Beach Chicken Monterey Wrap, Trader Joe’s Lentil Rice Biryani, Gardenburger Margherita Pizza Style Veggie Wrap, and […]
South Beach Diet Garlic Parmesan Chicken with Penne | HeatEatReview.com on August 15th, 2007

[…] to eat. In any case, I felt kind of bad that I had to go and drop that zero star rating on the South Beach wraps a while back, so I got a couple other meals of theirs that I expected to be more […]
Dolphins Lady on September 25th, 2007

Sorry, SBD messed up this time. I like their cookies, bars, etc., but these were pathetic. I don’t even see how they can say they contain chicken when I barely saw a teaspoon of it. I mainly saw onions and peppers, and a little cheese. Luckily they were BOGO so I didn’t spend a lot on them. I tried one and the other is in the trash, uncooked.
Top 10 Posts of 2007 | HeatEatReview.com on January 3rd, 2008

[…] South Beach Chicken Monterey Wrap - Andrew suffers for his art. Check out his personal blog, Andrew Taylor Recommends, he just reviewed some crazy new gin. Why didn’t I think to create a gin-reviewing blog? […]
msluv99 on March 13th, 2008

I tried the turkey and bacon wraps yesterday and was pleasantly suprised. I thought they would be bad since I didn’t read the packaging stating NOT to freeze; and THEN, the expiration on my package was 2007 (i forgot the month) and here it’s march 2008! So I really thought this was going to be a waste of preparation time just to be tossed in the trash. I warmed all the different packagings separately at times I knew would work with my microwave and once I put everything together, WHALAH! I actually enjoyed it to the point of getting my non-believing husband to try it and after a lot of prodding, he took a bite and was also suprised to the point of going to the box to read more on the meal. Maybe because mines was FROZEN or OUT-OF-DATE that made it taste so good (LOL!) but I would definitely buy at least this one again!
msluv99 on March 13th, 2008

Oh, and by the way, I didn’t use the kraft mayo provided; i used miracle whip (light, of course). Very enjoyable to me.
Andrew on March 13th, 2008

msluv99: I’ve heard that the refrigerated ones are pretty edible, but I haven’t actually tried them. Just stay away from the ones you actually HAVE to freeze!
Jen on March 27th, 2008

I have tried all the frozen varieties and they were all horrible and every one left a terrible taste in my mouth. Im thinking it was the wheat wrap and now I’m turned off to them forever.
karrie Palomares on June 22nd, 2008

I have been looking all over for these burritos bought them one time and then after that they stopeed comingg where else can I get them or prder them I woeld be freatly appreciatedl