Price: $2.00
Serving: 1 meal, 10.3oz.
Calories: 260
Fat: 9%, 6g
Cholesterol: 12%, 35mg
Sodium: 25%, 600mg
Protein: 22g
Carbs: 9%, 27g
Fiber: 16%, 4g
WW Points: 5 Points

Healthy Choice says: Savory white meat chicken is covered with a tangy roasted red pepper alfredo sauce and served over tender linguini pasta with a side of fresh broccoli florets.

Adina says: Disclaimer: I might have eaten my body weight in sugar this morning, so there is a very good chance this review will be highly delirious and/or incoherent. I’m sorry.

I would like to start off this review by just shouting the word chicken over and over again, partially to release some of this excess sugar energy and partially because I think the best way to celebrate good food is by shouting. CHICKEN CHICKEN CHICKEN YUM YUM YUM. I have a pretty loyal dislike for white chicken and also for pepper. White chicken because it is always dry and chewy, and pepper because it is just so . . . peppery. This chicken was peppery but in a really good way – all zingy and zesty and party-ish in my mouth. Like pop rocks, but with less pop and more rock. Plus, it was so tender and non-chewy and just melt in your mouth-y.¹

The broccoli florets were crispy and quickly consumed, which should be counted as a huge moral victory for any food maker since I liken vegetables to cute little green bundles of death.

For those not already in the Adina know, I only buy microwave meals that feature noodles. This is because I try to have at least one type of noodle product during both lunch and dinner. It’s true – on any given day, I will eat cottage cheese and noodles for dinner, with a side of ramen and kraft macaroni and cheese (with a hot dog mixed in, if I am having protein cravings).

Sadly, I found the noodle part of this meal the most disappointing. Not so much because they were not good (it is fairly hard to mess up microwave meal noodles unless you are Chef Boyardee) but because the sauce was so…Healthy Choice-y. It is an art form, really, how Healthy Choice continues to make bland sauce. They must get loads of letters that read: “YER SAUCE SUX” and “your mama has more flavor than your sauce” or equally profound notes, and yet they continue to mass produce horribly bland sauce. Why is that? Are they trying to kill us à la pure food boredom? I had so much hope for this sauce, after my pleasant encounter with the Chicken Tuscany Café Steamer, but was sadly let down.

So I am giving this meal a 4 overall, although I would rate the chicken a 700. CHICKEN CHICKEN CHICKEN. Sigh so good.

¹ I am trying to end as many words in this review with “y”. I have no idea why but at least I have a realistic goal, versus my unattainable goal of taking a multivitamin with breakfast every morning. Ha!

Price: $2.00 on sale
Serving: 1 cup, 8.6oz.
Calories: 200 per serving
Fat: 3%, 2g
Cholesterol: 1%, 5mg
Sodium: 20%, 470mg
Protein: 7g
Carbohydrates: 13%, 40g
Fiber: 21%, 5g
Sugar: 9g
Weight Watchers Points: 3 Points

Healthy Choice says: Made with tender penne pasta and hearty cuts of carrots, celery, green beans and potatoes in a sweet & savory tomato base

Jess says: There is a really strange stomach bug going around right now. It’s super contagious. In fact you probably just caught it from me through the web of inter-tubes. Sorry, my bad. The thing about this bug is, while you only feel actually sick for a very short period time, you feel generally not so right for a long time after. For a while I tried curing myself on a diet of vodka and French Toast. As it turns out, that is not the best medicine. Now, I’ve switched to a diet of oatmeal and soup and that seems to be working much much better. Lately, I have become a bit of a soup-noisseur and I have to say that Healthy Choice Minestrone definitely gets it right. Here’s why:

1. It’s Healthy Choice - so it’s probably healthy? And thus I feel somewhat better about what I’m eating. Some of the other brands throw a lot of salt in or are cream-based and too heavy (though more and more low-cal soups are available). I always feel like kind of a nutjob when I am observed analyzing and comparing labels in the market. I liked that just by looking at this label I felt I was, well, making a healthy choice.
2. Lots and lots of veggies – I mean damn! Each spoonful was overloaded with vegetable goodness and at least one noodle, usually more. With a lot of other brands, (Campbell for instance) there are a lot of sad looking brothly spoonfuls with just a veggie fleck. I like broth and the broth of this minestrone is pretty hearty, tomatoey and basilriffic. But when 50% of your diet is soup, something with more substance is really appreciated. The veggies were plump, fresh-tasting (somehow) and flavorful. The beans were especially soft and delicious.
3. Flip top – perfect for eating at work where there is definitely not a can opener. Why are there still cans that aren’t flip top? Why do some companies resist the temptation to evolve and embrace technology? And is it inevitable that you will splatter soup all over you when removing that last connection of flip top to the can? I think so.
4. Bowl packaging - No need to steal other people’s Tupperware. Yay!
5. Filling and delicious – I am on the road to wellness now. I can feel it! In fact, I would even have this soup when I’m not sick! It was that good. And no refrigeration necessary! Bonus points.

Buon appetito!

Price: $2.99
Serving: 1 meal, 10.6 oz.
Calories: 300
Fat: 12%, 8g
Cholesterol: 8%, 25mg
Sodium: 23%, 560mg
Protein: 21g
Carbs: 11%, 34g
Fiber: 20%, 5g
WW Points: 6 Points

Healthy Choice says: We broil lean chicken tenderloin chunks, combine them with a colorful medley of zucchini, spinach and sun dried tomatoes and serve over linguini pasta tossed in a flavorful Parmesan sauce.

Adina says: I am not someone who likes my food steamed. I like it breaded, deep fried, saturated in fat, glazed, covered in gravy, chocolate sauce, bits of bacon, etc. I accept that some food must be boiled (noodles) in order to be married to less healthy mediums (alfredo sauce) to create one, harmonious meal. Rarely will you find me saying “Ohh, let’s steam dinner tonight” or “I’ll take the healthy steamed option please, with a side of broccoli.” And when I say rarely, I mean you can just go ahead and shoot me when that day comes because my life will so be over.

But (and this is possibly the hugest “but” since Baby Got Back hit record stores in 1992), this meal was sort of definitely a delightful dining experience. Dare I say that Healthy Choice finally did something right? God, that feels so wrong to say and yet . . . my mouth doesn’t lie. This meal, it was unbelievably tasty.

The zucchini was perfectly steamed. It tasted much like how I would imagine zucchini would taste if I ever steamed it and then ate it. It was tender on the inside and faintly crisp on the outside. It looked so green and fresh that I actually ate it first. Before the noodles. I KNOW. To me, eating vegetables before noodles is sort of akin to choosing a Brazilian bikini wax over napping. It is just plum crazy. And yet, it was my reality this afternoon as I pushed the noodles to the side to find that last bite of zucchini yumminess.

Not to say the noodles weren’t good. Oh they were good. Especially considering that the sauce was FedExed from HEAVEN. Seriously, the taste is so zesty and unexpected.

It was flavorful and bitey and the picture on the container actually doesn’t do the spices justice. Has that ever happened before? Where the food was actually BETTER than how it looked in the picture? WHO ARE YOU PEOPLE AND WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO MY HEALTHY CHOICE?

The chicken was a little dry, but it tasted like dry REAL chicken. As far as white meat goes, this was probably better than any piece of white meat I can cook. I truly believe white meat has like a 2 second window of tenderness and then BAM it’s dry. Anyway, it didn’t matter if it was a tad dry because it just complimented the texture of the melt-in-your-mouth veggies.

So yes, I am giving this Healthy Choice meal 5 full stars. I back this meal with my life. Steaming your food separate from the sauce is brilliant. The steaming locks in the individual flavors, and the sauce accentuates rather than overpowers the meal. Congratulations, Healthy Choice. You have moved from “sucks so bad” to “edible and sort of delightful”. Be proud, be very proud.

Price: $2.50
Serving: 1 Meal, 10.8oz.
Calories: 430
Fat: 14%, 9g
Cholesterol: 5%, 15mg
Sodium: 25%, 600mg
Protein: 17g
Carbs: 22%, 6g
Fiber: 20%, 5g
Weight Watchers Points: 9 Points

Healthy Choice says: Tempura battered chicken breast with rice & Vegetables in spicy brown sauce

Abi says: What is the opposite of mojo? Ojom? Juju? Nado? Whatever it is, I’ve got just that when it comes to Healthy Choice meals.

I figured that the new Cafe Steamers could break me out of my Healthy Choice slump. The steaming technology would ensure perfectly cooked chunks of chicken, beautifully fluffy rice, and vegetables with a hint of crunch.

Despite the potentially enormous messiness factor involved in heating and assembling a Cafe Steamer, my predictions regarding the rice and vegetables were right on: steaming is the ideal cooking method. I was greeted by a little steam basket of fluffy white rice, ten adorable peas and carrots, and six slightly smaller than a ping pong ball chunks of tempura battered chicken.

Victory was mine! Until the nado kicked in and I learned from one half-eaten bite of tempura after another that there wasn’t any chicken in the chicken. I wonder if the folks at Healthy Choice got sick of me complaining about the low quality of their processed and reformed chicken chunks that they said “Oh, she doesn’t like our chicken? Well then she’ll just have to go without it and see how she likes that!”