Price: $4.09
Serving: 1 box, 9 oz.
Calories: 380
Fat: 26%, 17g
Cholesterol: 6%, 15mg
Sodium: 24%, 580mg
Protein: 21g
Carbs: 12%, 37g
Fiber: 27%, 7g

Amy’s Kitchen says: Our Tofu Rancheros Breakfast will satisfy the heartiest of eaters. Organic tofu scrambled with vegetables and topped with a mildly spiced ranchero sauce and grated Monterey Jack cheese covers an organic corn tortilla along with sides of black beans and roasted potatoes. This dish is nourishing and delicious, and since it’s fully cooked, only takes a few minutes to prepare. If you prefer a bit more spice, top it with one of Amy’s great tasting bottle salsa. Good for breakfast, lunch or dinner.

Abi says: I planned on eating this meal for breakfast. Unfortunately, I forgot to retrieve it from the microwave before my professor started lecturing and I ended up eating this meal reheated an hour later.

Though the miniature corn tortilla didn’t fare so well (very hard) and the eggs (um, tofu) became rubbery, this meal was so darn tasty and had such variety that I could help but be excited about eating a fresh one in the future.

Forgetting meals in the microwave is a hard lesson in cold tofu-egg edibleness.

4 weeks later Abi manages to eat the meal in a timely manner…

Yes! Amy’s Tofu Rancheros meal is a hearty, filling, and savory breakfast. It will enamour even those of you who do not relish the thought of tofu for breakfast (or any other meal). If it weren’t for the fact that this meal is significantly more expensive than just making a breakfast of eggs, beans, potato, a mini tortilla, and salsa, I would probably eat it more often.

Now that I think about it, you could feed a family of four Huevos Rancheros for the cost of this meal. That is pretty crazy. I suddenly feel like an evil yuppy. It doesn’t help that I’m typing this at a Starbucks while sipping a tall soy chai.

Consumer guilt aside, if I were to reconfigure this meal, I would do away with the mini corn tortilla and instead introduce mini corn tortilla pieces (they do not require a knife). I would also give the consumer more salsa. Seriously, salsa is the ingredient that takes this meal from ‘a bunch of bland healthy things’ to ‘a fiesta in your mouth’.

Yes, the blurb on the box says that I can add more salsa. If I am eating a microwaveable breakfast meal, I probably don’t just have some salsa sitting around. Why not include a little salsa packet for all of us salsa lovers?

Price: $2.50 (sale)
Serving: 1 sandwich, 4.5 oz.
Calories: 480
Fat: 46%, 30g
Sodium: 35%, 830mg
Protein: 13g
Carbohydrates: 9%, 28g
Fiber: 6%, 1g

Jimmy Dean says: We take great tasting Jimmy Dean Sausage, combine it with a fluffy biscuit and other ingredients, to make a sandwich that’s hearty enough to fill you up. Jimmy Dean sandwiches also offer the variety that you’re looking for in your routine.

Abi says: I’d been looking forward to reviewing some non-oatmeal breakfast items for some time. Eventually Jimmy Dean sandwiches went on sale and I hopped on the sauasage train. Wow, that last sentence sounds so, so wrong. The sandwich in that picture was not consumed by me. That was George’s sandwich and he seemed to enjoy it. Before cooking my Jimmy Dean Sausage, Egg and Cheese Biscuit in the microwave, I decided to take out the cheese. For all of the supposed culinary tradition regarding cheese and eggs, they are really only supposed to be combined in the form of quiche. Jimmy Dean does not make quiche. If he did make quiche, I would probably tell you to stay away from that too.

Instead of quiche, Mr. Dean makes sausage-heavy items like this sandwich. While it could do in a pinch, I don’t think that I will ever eat another one in my life. Even on sale, the sandwiches are $1.25 each. If I’m going to splurge (health-wise) on a sausage biscuit sandwich, I might as well get a better one at McDonald’s.

Jimmy Dean’s biscuit was somewhat heavy and chewy, the sausage became rubbery in the microwave, and the egg wasn’t enjoying the party. If you really, really need to consume such a non-healthy breakfast item perhaps you’d be better served by going to McDonald’s.

On a non-nutritional note, Jimmy Dean played millionaire Willard Whyte in the 1971 James Bond movie, Diamonds Are Forever. Thank you Wikipedia!

Also, there is something insanely delicious about pork sausage. George and I try to stay away from pork and beef sausage, generally cooking with the healthier chicken or turkey varieties. But when it comes to breakfast, thanks for not being Jewish, mom.

(It is late and I am writing this after the Capitals’ incredible victory over the Rangers [Olie Kolzig had an amazing night] anyways, please pardon my poor punctuation. - Abi Jones, Ed.)

Price: $3/box, 35 cents/packet
Serving: 1 Packet,5.6 oz (incl. water)
Calories: 180
Fat: 3%
Sodium: 12%
Fiber: 13%

They say: Each 8-packet box of Cinnamon Pecan Quaker Oatmeal Supreme has the rich, delicious flavor of cinnamon and crunchy pecans. Quaker Oatmeal Supreme is simply the ultimate oatmeal taste experience!

Abi says: The ultimate oatmeal taste experience is actually when you get room service at a hotel and they bring you oatmeal and all of the little dishes of brown sugar, craisins, almonds, and cinnamon sugar. Plus, that tiny pitcher of cream. That is the ‘ultimate oatmeal experience.’ Unfortunately, that experience costs $10 plus a tip, whereas this experience is just 35 cents a packet.

Even though this oatmeal has way too much sugar, it is my favorite of the ‘Supremes’. I love the higher-quality oats (not a bunch of oat-dust) and the crunch of the pecan bits is awesome. Yum, pecans. But back to the sugar issue. The first ingredient is oats. The second is ’sugar’. The third is ‘brown sugar’. Better than a doughnut, but not the healthiest way to start your day.