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Dining is and always was a great artistic opportunity. ~Frank Lloyd Wright

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Trader Joe's Chunky Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough

November 23, 2007 | Reviewer: Abi

Price: $3.50
Serving: 1 cookie, 1oz.
Servings Per Container: 16
Calories: 120
Fat: 9%, 6g
Cholesterol: 16, 20mg
Sodium: 2%, 60mg
Protein: 1g
Carbohydrates: 6%, 17g
Sugar: 8g
Fiber: 0%, 0g
Weight Watchers Points: 3 Points

Trader Joe says: No Preservatives, no artificial colors, no artificial flavors

Abi says: I adore Consumer Reports Magazine. Not because they tell me the best car, vacuum cleaner or microwave to purchase. Or because they let me know when it makes the most sense to pay extra for organic foods, but because they completely agree with me when I state that the Trader Joe’s Chunky Chocolate Chip Cookie dough makes the best pre-made (mixed?) cookies in existence.

No, they still aren’t real homemade cookies, but you’d be hard-pressed to find someone that could tell the difference between these and a batch made with the recipe off the back of a package of Toll House Chocolate Chips. Well, I guess the difference would be that these all cook up to a uniform size and degree of doneness while homemade cookies have a greater element of individuality.

By using normal, non-industrial ingredients, Trader Joe’s manages to skirt all of the strange not-quite-made-with-butter pre-made cookie shortfalls. Check out this list of ingredient simplicity:

• Flour
• Chocolate
• Sweet Butter
• Sugar
• Brown Sugar
• Eggs
• Molasses
• Vanilla
• Salt
• Baking Soda

It is no coincidence that those are the exact same ingredients I use when I make chocolate chip cookies from scratch. Of course, now you’re probably thinking “If these are so simple, couldn’t I just make some regular cookies at home? From my own ingredients?” Well, you could. But then you’d be left with a pile of dirty dishes when you should be enjoying fresh from the oven caramel brown buttery chocolate chunk studded mounds of deliciousness.

And that would be a shame.

McCann's Maple and Brown Sugar Instant Irish Oatmeal

November 22, 2007 | Reviewer: Abi

Price: $2.99, 10 packets (cheap!)
Serving: 1 packet, 3oz.
I make mine with half a cup of skim milk, this is reflected in the nutrition information below
Calories: 200 per serving
Fat: 3%, 2g
Cholesterol: 0%, 0mg
Sodium: 13%, 312mg
Protein: 11g
Carbohydrates: 13%, 38g
Fiber: 12%, 3g
Sugar: 13g
Weight Watchers Points: 4 Points

McCann says: Made with All Natural Flavors

Abi says: The best microwave oatmeal ever. Ever. I buy this stuff at Trader Joe’s and fall into a deep depression whenever a cold morning rolls around and I have neither McCann’s instant oatmeal nor coffee. You don’t want to see me on mornings like that. You should feel sorry for George on mornings like that.

This oatmeal is sweet, but does not taste ultra-sugary even though it contains exactly the same amount of sugar as just about every other oatmeal on the market. Seriously, it is about 1/4 sugar, which is why I’ve knocked it down to four stars. Yeah, the deliciously perfect for oatmeal flavors of Maple and Brown Sugar translate to sugar and sugar, but don’t think about that too much and you’ll be okay.

Another reason why this is not a five star item? The milk requirement. I suppose that I probably could make this oatmeal with water, but contrary to the front of the box, the back of the package (where the cooking instructions reside) recommends making it with milk. So I make it with milk. This keeps the oatmeal firmly in ‘at home’ territory. Milk is not office friendly, not just because you shouldn’t be using a half cup of the milk expressly for coffee for your oatmeal, but because there’s something a little sketchy about community milk. It just hangs out in the fridge all day collecting off flavors from coworkers’ leftovers. And who knows how long that pad thai’s been sitting on the shelf.

Weight Watchers Smart Ones Chocolate Chocolate Chip Muffins

November 21, 2007 | Reviewer: Abi

Price: $2.59
Serving: 1 muffin, 2.5oz.
Calories: 190
Fat: 3%, 2g
Sodium: 13%, 320mg
Protein: 4g
Carbs: 13%, 39g
Sugar: 21g
Fiber: 8%, 2g
Weight Watchers Points: 4 Points

Smart Ones says: Never skip breakfast again with a rich chocolate muffin, made even more decadent with melted chocolate chips inside.

Abi says: There’s a Krispy Kreme doughnut place on the south side of DC’s Dupont Circle, a location approximately a block north of of my former workplace. They don’t make doughnuts there, they just glaze and fill them. The glaze appears to be a constantly recycled vat of Elmer’s glue. Don’t think about this too much, it is sort of gross.

So, heeding my health and reader requests for more Smart Ones reviews, I picked up a two-pack of Smart Ones chocolate muffins. I also bought a couple of desserts (Key Lime Pie and some S’mores looking thing, but I’m sort of scared to try those).

First impressions of the frozen muffin were promising. Unable to wait an entire hour for the defrosting period to elapse, I opted for the microwave thaw option. This also meant that I’d have melty chocolate chips and if there’s one thing I adore in the morning, it is melty chocolate chips. Too bad this 4 point muffin got my hopes so high.

Smart Ones Chocolate Chip Muffins aren’t a smart substitute for doughnuts. Just like a doughnut, one of these muffins left me feeling empty and yearning for just a bit more breakfast. Sure, they’re chocolatey, but they’re full of a whole lot of nothing.

They’re so full of nothing that they’ll completely fall apart in your hands as you desperately try to keep muffin bits from falling all over your cubicle. And then, because little bits of chocolatey fake muffin are deadly to computers, you’ll have to go get out the Windex and really, who wants to smell Windex at 9am?

If you’re looking to eat something chocolatey, buy a bag of mini chocolate chips, some brown sugar and a box of trustworthy oatmeal. I prefer McCann’s, but you may have some other favorite brand. Make the oatmeal in the microwave (yes, Instant Irish Oatmeal), toss in a spoonful of brown sugar and a half-handful of mini chocolate chips. Now you’ve got a chocolatey breakfast that won’t leave your stomach begging for satiety.

FYI, if you’re doing a Google Image search for “Brown Sugar”, I highly recommend turning on the ‘SafeSearch’ option. Also, the title of this product is not a typo, it really does say “Chocolate Chocolate” on the box.

Target Tex-Mex Style Appetizer Rolls

November 20, 2007 | Reviewer: Guest Reviewers

Price: $2.69
Serving: 3oz., 3 rolls
Servings Per Container: 2.5
Calories: 210 per serving
Fat: 12%, 8g
Cholesterol: 3%, 10mg
Sodium: 20%, 490mg
Protein: 6g
Carbohydrates: 9%, 28g
Fiber: 6%, 1g
Sugar: 3g
Weight Watchers Points: 5 Points

Target says: Vegetables, black beans & white meat chicken wrapped in a crispy shell.

Kelly says: I love Target. I adore Target. I was weaned on Target. Well, not really because that would be sort of gross, but I think you get the point. You would not believe how distraught I became when I first realized that the Target nearest my suburban post-college southern home did not have a freezer section.

Sure, it has a freezer. A smaller freezer than the one found at my local 7-11. The first time I went to the Target I thought there wasn’t a freezer section at all. Then I learned that it was just a single case. I’m not sure which instance made me more disappointed.

Fortunately, I found a different Target in the opposite direction from the first Target and only a total of five more driving miles. The more awesome, glorious Target has oodles of frozen food cases. Watch out folks, I have found the mother land and it consists of frozen food!

While I usually stick to known brand name products offered at low, low prices (see poorly chosen South Beach Diet Lunchable), I’m occasionally inclined to sample a Target brand item. My experience with these appetizers is much like my experience with Target purses: tasty, short-lived, adorable, and doomed to an unsatisfying end via shoddy construction and low-quality materials.

Mostly, I was bummed to realize that these appetizers are half air. That and the pastry wrapper tastes sort of strange, as though it was produced not just in a factory, but actually made out of a factory rather than normal ingredients like flour and lard. Also I had a lot of trouble finding the chicken inside this pastry. Was it disguised as corn? Plus, the filling was more watery than cheesy. After all of that complaining you think that I’d be really happy that half of each pastry-encased item was filled with air. But no, even if something is bad I don’t want to feel gypped.

The more I think about these appetizers the more I understand why I ate a few and then they just hung out in my freezer for a few months until I did my quarterly fridge and freezer clean-out and decided that maybe I should try these things because I am a poor, poor social worker. Too bad I’d forgotten that they were a waste of the energy it took to heat them in the oven.