Price: $4.99
Serving: 1/7th of a bag of fries, 6.666oz.
Servings per package: 7
Calories: 180 per serving
Fat: 9%, 6g
Cholesterol: 0%, 0mg
Sodium: 15%, 350mg
Protein: 2g
Carbohydrates: 6%, 18g
Fiber: 11%, 3g
Sugar: 0g
Weight Watchers Points: 3 Points

Mr. G says: Revolutionize your fries! Mr. G’s Original Garlic Flavored Fries are a great compliment to hamburgers, hot dogs, steaks or any time you have the urge for a truly outrageous snack.

Abi says: I considered going to the Gilroy Garlic Festival a couple of weeks ago, but realized that I didn’t really feel like hanging out in enormous crowds of people who’d been chowing down all day on garlic ice cream, garlic shrimp scampi and garlic and chocolate peanut butter cups. It is one thing to eat a garlicky meal with your partner and then cozy up in front of ‘Becoming Jane’ (the most depressing movie in existence - also, Valley of the Dolls is always checked out- is it worth a rental? I’m turning into that girl who’s always coming into the video store trying to get a title that will never ever be there.). It is quite another (er, back to the Garlic Festival) to endure sweltering heat with 100,000 other garlic stuffed human beings.

So I bought these frozen fries instead.

The G in Mr. G stands for Ghiringhelli and the company that makes these fries is located just north of San Francisco. If you live in the Bay Area and are a locavore of loose morals you could probably qualify this as a local food item. I will just say that the fries themselves contain a lot of weird things (yellow cornmeal, baking soda and guar gum?) but the actual garlic sauce is extremely basic: chopped garlic, canola oil, olive oil, parsley, salt and spices.

These are not all natural fries, but they are very easy to prepare and consume:

1. Preheat oven
2. Place cookie sheet of fries in oven for 20 minutes (no flipping)
3. Put sauce packet in small bowl of warm water
4. Take fries out of oven, toss fries with defrosted garlic sauce, eat.

I thought that these fries would require multiple sessions of flipping, but maybe that’s what the baking soda is for: no fry flipping.

For all of the ease in preparation, these fries come out of the oven perfectly crisp. This probably has something to do with them being pre-cooked and full of extaneous ingredients. Rice flour, anyone?

The garlic sauce is pungent and abundant, easily coating every fry with a greasy jacket of parsley-flecked oil. Half of the sauce would have been plenty, so if you’re making these at home restraint is your friend. Unless you’re trying to sabotage someone’s diet. Then restraint is your enemy.

The ‘7 servings per package’ concept is utter crap. More accurately there are 3-4 servings in here, which means you’ll need to double all of the nutritional information above.

Now to the promises made in the package. Are these fries revolutionary? Not if you live anywhere near a Gordon Biersch Brewery: they’ve been making garlic fries for 20 years. Do garlic fries pair well with assorted barbecue meats? I imagine so, thought I had mine with macaroni and cheese (carbtacular!). Are the fries outrageous? Only if you’re a vampire.

[Note: Not reviewed here or available at my local store are the other truly outrageous varieties of these fries. If you see them please, please purchase and review them. Please. Other fries:

• Cheddar Bacon
• Pepperoni Pizza
• Smokin’ BBQ Ranch
• Cheddar Cheese

Pepperoni Pizza French Fries! OMG!]

Price: $3.99
Serving: 3 oz.
Calories: 150 per serving
Fat: 9%, 6g
Cholesterol: 0%, 0mg
Sodium: 6%, 140mg
Protein: 2g
Carbohydrates: 8%, 24g
Fiber: 12%, 3g
Sugar: 4g
Weight Watchers Points: 3 per serving

Alexia: The wonderful flavor of Sweet Potatoes together with low sodium content make this Alexia favorite a wonderful and healthy alternative to the everyday fry.

Natalie says: Sweet potato fries are my new obsession. They have the same shape as regular french fry, but are made with the “healthier” sweet potato instead. Finding Alexia Sweet Potato Fries in the frozen aisle at the grocery store made me beyond excited. I picked up the package, thinking they were going to be bad for me but I was in for a surprise. They’re only 150 calories per serving and they are low in sodium.

When I got home, I read the back of the bag in more detail. A “serving” is 12 pieces. Twelve pieces of these seemed small (the size and length is slightly larger than a McDonalds French fry), so I spread out a couple more servings on the cookie sheet. I put a batch in the oven and couldn’t wait to try them. After 16 minutes and turning them over a couple times in the oven to make sure all the sides get nice and crispy, they were ready for me. They came out great, crispy on the outside and soft on the inside. They have very light seasoning and the flavor of the sweet potato really comes through. I’ve always had a hard time making homemade sweet potato fries crispy, so I’ll be using these when I’m in the mood for fries. If you’re a sweet potato fry freak like me, you’ll love these!

[If you’re an Alexia fan, check out the coupons section on their website. Register there and get a 50¢ off coupon on ANY Alexia product, good until 12/31/2008. Sometimes grocery stores double manufacturer’s coupons, so you could get $1.00 off these fries. Also, the registration system doesn’t require a real email address. - Ed.]

Price: $2.00 on sale
Serving: 2/3 cup, 3.5oz.
Servings per package 2
Calories per serving: 50
Fat: 5%, 3g
Cholesterol: 0%, 0mg
Sodium: 5%, 115mg
Protein: 1g
Carbohydrates: 2%, 7g
Fiber: 9%, 2g
Sugar: 3g
Weight Watchers Points: 1 Point per serving

Green Giant says: Broccoli Florets, Julienne Carrots and Red & Yellow Sweet Pepper Strips in a Garlic-Herb Infused Extra Virgin Olive Oil Seasoning

Abi says: These Green Giant nutriceuticals are the dietary equivalent of the “For Dummies” book line. Instead of “Dungeons and Dragons for Dummies” or “Heartburn and Reflux for Dummies” we’re being marketed to with “Immunity for Dummies” and “Weight Control for Dummies.” Granted, I still buy this stuff but that’s because it is easy and can sit in my freezer for weeks before being cooked. You can’t say the latter about fresh vegetables.

This vegetable combo steams up significantly better than the zucchini-focused Healthy Vision item, keeping the broccoli tender-yet-toothy and the potentially mushy red and yellow peppers to a minimum. The carrots are in cube/matchstick form, making them less stabbable than other carrot incarnations. This lack of fork-friendliness makes me think that these vegetables are better used as an integrated element in a pasta dish (or with some couscous) than as a stand-alone side.

In other Green Giant products the butter flavorings have always been so overpowering that I haven’t been willing to use the vegetables as an ingredient. In the case of the Immunity Boost pack, the “garlic-herb infused extra virgin olive oil” was negligible. This is bad if you want a lot of flavor, but great if you’re looking to combine your vegetables with other ingredients.

If you’re looking for an easy, healthy way to bulk up those Lean Cuisines, I highly recommend picking up a few packages of Green Giant vegetables when they go on sale. Your eyes and mouth will both enjoy this vibrantly hued, subtly-flavored vegetable mix. And you can leave them in your freezer for weeks without worry.

Price: $4.19
Serving: 1 pouch, 3.25oz.
Calories: 70
Fat: 0%, 0g
Cholesterol: 0%, 0mg
Sodium: 0%, 0mg
Protein: 5g
Carbohydrates: 4%, 13g
Fiber: 16%, 4g
Sugar: 4g
Weight Watchers Points: 1 Point

Birds Eye says: The bags inside this package are special. Simply place one in your microwave and watch it inflate as it perfectly steams your vegetables right in the bag! Your vegetables retain their natural goodness, crisp texture and fresh taste. Steaming with Birds Eye has never been easier.

Abi says: I bought these peas because I thought it’d be good to branch out from Green Giant’s vegetable monopoly on Heat Eat Review. Also, I was curious as to whether these peas would be better than the 99¢ bags of peas that I usually use. Would I really notice that steaming was better than boiling or microwaving in a bit of water?

Uh, no. These peas are no better than the cheap ones from the bag. They taste just like every other frozen pea product I’ve ever had in my life. Really, this product is just the 100-Calorie Portion version of vegetables. Except that plain vegetables are low calorie in the first place. Have you ever heard of anyone getting fat off of plain sweet peas? Probably not.

Sure, these peas were fine, but they weren’t worth four times the price of regular peas. Also, they didn’t do anything to speed up my couscous-making process. Usually I throw in the peas just before the water boils, giving them time to heat and steam along with the couscous, a process faster than heating the peas separately in the microwave.

“But Abi,” you’re saying “won’t these peas be great for me as a person who work in an office? I can just steam a few at a time!” and to that I say “Get yourself one of those Green Giant vegetable packages. They contain two servings and involve vegetables that you can actually stab with a fork.”