I really don’t like to buy frozen meals. They’re not fresh, not healthy (very high in sodium), never taste as good as homemade, and the portions are small. But, a girl’s got to eat. I’m imagining we all get desperate at times and turn to frozen dinners for various reasons. Lack of time, money, or desire to be in the kitchen – whatever your reason, Miss Yunks reviews two common brands of fettucine alfredo for your benefit.

First up is Smart Ones. I’ve had other Smart Ones meals and desserts, but never the fettucine alfredo. The photo on the box looks good enough, and it comes with broccoli. The whole meal is only 4 Weight Watchers points. If you are familiar with the Weight Watchers program, you’ll know 4 is not a lot of points for a meal. Immediately I am prepared to not be full after this.

It even looks okay. But after one bite I decided this does not taste like alfredo sauce! The sauce tastes very fake and the noodles don’t add anything. Only real plus here is the broccoli. Hard to mess up frozen broccoli. And with only 4 points, I was hungry 20 minutes after finishing.

Smart Ones Score (on 1-10 scale)
Flavor: 5
Healthiness: 7.5
Fullness: 3

Next up:
In my personal experience, Lean Cuisine tastes better than Smart Ones. It’s also more points on the Weight Watchers scale. This meal is 6 points so I expected to stay full longer.

The noodles are exactly the same as the Smart Ones. But this sauce is much better. Actually resembles real alfredo sauce. It’s cheesy, creamy, and has a little spice to it. It doesn’t come with any broccoli, but there’s enough sauce that you could add your own veggies and still be covered. Rocco’s Healthy Alfredo is much much tastier and filling, but if you need a quick meal and don’t want to cook, Lean Cuisine will do.

Lean Cuisine Score
Flavor: 8
Healthiness: 7
Fullness: 7

Well Lean Cuisine is the clear winner here. But I have a secret. My favorite “instant” fettucine alfredo isn’t in the freezer section. It’s in the regular pasta aisle.

Easy-Mac Alfredo is really good! If you enjoy Kraft Easy-Mac Original, you will love the Alfredo variety. It’s the same comforting cheesy taste with a grown-up style. The noodles are soft ribbons and the alfredo sauce is delicious and delicate. It’s great taste is surprising to find in a cup.

Easy-Mac Alfredo Score
Flavor: 9
Healthiness: 7 (it’s also 6 WW points for 1 cup)
Fullness: 8 (it’s surprisingly filling!)

I highly recommend storing a cup or two of Easy-Mac in your cabinet at work – or at home – for days when you forget a lunch, need a quick snack, or want that familiar mac & cheese taste without waiting for a pot of water to boil.

The secret is out – Miss Yunks isn’t cooking and she likes Easy-Mac! If you have any quick meal ideas – please share them!

*Disclaimer. Miss Yunks does not follow a WW diet, she just knows a lot about it from family and friends.

www.cabotcheese.coop

The Horseradish Cheddar was DELICIOUS. Just the right amount of bite, and tasty on its own, with crackers (though I’d love some ideas on some new recipes using this cheese – send your emails our way, we love it!) Surprisingly, it’s articifically flavored (ingredient label says “natural and artificial horseradish flavors”) Seems impossible to come up with artificial horseradish?! But hey – all the power to ya, Cabot. I love it and all its fakeness anyway!

Next up: I am on the hunt for the Chipotle Cheddar, difficult to find!

Congrats Michelle!!
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In honor of reaching 500 Twitter followers, the Foodies have a special giveaway for our biggest fans. Keep reading to learn how to enter!

A-Tooch and Miss Yunks were the very fortunate recipients of two shiny new Sodastream machines and starter kits. The beauty of these machines (one of the latest trends in household products) is that they turn your average tap water into a carbonated beverage of your choosing!

Seltzer is tasty in itself, but we also sampled about 10 different types of flavored syrups offered by Sodastream. My favorite was the Orange Mango – delicious (also a good vodka mixer…) Miss Yunks liked Pink Grapefruit and Lemon-Lime.

SodaStream is easy to use and requires minimal assembly. We each received a CO2 bottle that snaps right into the SodaStream system. Admittedly, receiving a tank of gas is a little intimidating, but we were told it’s not dangerous…

We also received 2 bottles that screw into the front of the machine. Fill the bottle with cold water, screw into place, and tap the top button 3 times to turn your ordinary tap water into carbonated water. Miss Yunks tried the Diet Lemon-Lime first. The instructions say to first carbonate the water, then add the flavored syrup. I added a little of the lemon-lime mix and a splash of the Lemon-Lime My Flavor Essence. We each received the variety 3 pack featured online.

Just a drop of the Flavor Essence adds the same amount of flavor as a cap full of soda mix. The mixture really tastes like Sprite!
Miss Yunks also tried the Diet Pink Grapefruit and loved it.

She was tempted to try the Energy flavor – which SodaStream compares to Red Bull – but decided to save it for another time. A-Tooch opted for the Root Beer in round two – tastes just like the “real thing!”

Having our own SodaStreams means we no longer need to buy soda at a store and no longer need to throw out or recycle empty cans and bottles. Each bottle of soda mix makes the equivalent of 33 cans of soda. How efficient! New Yorkers without a car: tired of lugging heavy liquids all around Manhattan for that Friday night party? Voila – Sodastream!

After you’ve finished your CO2, SodaStream outlines different ways to get more on their website. They will send you more gas or you can bring your can to a local store and have it refilled.

SodaStream homemade soda tastes delicious, is good for the environment, and fun to make at home! Regular flavors have 35 calories per serving (pretty awesome, considering how calorie-packed store-bought colas/non-colas can be) and diet flavors have 0 calories. All flavors are made with Splenda.

You can take our word for it – but you don’t have to. SodaStream is offering a special deal for all of our readers! Through June 30, enter the promo code FOODIES to received $10 off your order of $50 or more.

And that’s not all – 1 lucky reader will win his or her own SodaStream starter kit.

Here’s how to enter:

For 1 entry:
Leave a comment below telling us your favorite SodaStream flavor

Do each of the following for additional entries and leave a separate comment for each:
1. Follow us on Twitter @foodiesatwork and follow @SodaStreamUSA
2. Tweet a creative tweet about this giveaway – be sure to mention @foodiesatwork and @SodaStreamUSA
3. Write about this giveaway on your blog and link back to this post

That’s 4 total possible entries

One winner will be chosen at random on Monday June 7 at 3 pm! Good Luck!

Well, the mood came and off we went to Five Guys. I checked the menu before we left and saw they have grilled cheese and two kinds of fries – the vegetarian was all set. Why are grilled cheese and french fries such comfort food? Perhaps it’s because my summer camp served grilled cheese and french fries for lunch every Monday. Perhaps because the combo is just so good. Whatever the reason, Five Guys grilled cheese and french fries beyond satisfied my appetite.

They use orange cheese – just the way I like it – and the sandwich is grilled, pressed, and surprisingly not too greasy.

I had to let co-worker Dan be the judge of the hamburgers. When asked to describe it in three words or less, he answered, “juicy, delicious, and I want another!”

The burger looks good even to me…

I wanted to try both kinds of fries, Five Guys style and Cajun, so I asked to fill half my small fry order with each kind. Instead, the generous Five Guys guys game me two whole orders of fries. And I ate the whole thing. Thanks a lot, Five Guys.

Regular – left; Cajun – right

The regular fries are pretty perfect. They’re very long, crisped to perfection, and again not too oily or greasy and still taste like a potato. The Cajun fries are really tasty but really spicy. Too spicy. Next time I will only order the regular fries. Yes, I’m already planning on a next time. Both fries are sturdy enough to hold a sufficient amount of ketchup, which only somewhat helped relieve the intense spice of the Cajun fry.

As our mouths were on fire, we realized what’s missing from the Five Guys menu: milkshakes. A milkshake would’ve been the perfect ending to the meal. Five Guys’ menu is similar to Johnny Rockets, minus the milkshakes. However, the ingredients at Five Guys are fresher, tastier, and the service is much faster. I enjoyed the Five Guys grilled cheese and fries more than at Johnny Rockets.

Since there was no ice cream at Five Guys, we were forced to go to Dairy Queen for an emergency dose of ice cream. Dairy is the best cure for spicy foods. After eating the grilled cheese, two orders of fries, and an ice cream, I was so uncomfortably full I didn’t eat again for 19 hours. It reminded me of when I won the ‘who can eat the most’ contest at Pizza Huts’ all-you-can-eat lunch buffet in London. Ah, that was a proud victory, as I surprised everyone by how much I could eat.

Anyways, Five Guys lived up to its fabulous reputation and I’m declaring it the number one burger and fry spot around.

Miss Yunks says: It’s okay to play with your food.

Miss Yunks loves a quick, easy and nutritious meal. This week she made a simple stir-fry.

I had a completely different idea for dinner when I entered the grocery store, but then I saw these Nasoya Japanese noodles and changed my mind – stir fry it is! I decided to buy a bag of frozen veggies instead of buying fresh veggies. Frozen are cheaper and easier. I added scrambled eggs too for some protein.

I started by scrambling 4 eggs in a large skillet. Once the eggs were scrambled enough, I transferred them to a plate and prepped the skillet to heat up the veggies. I poured about a tablespoon of oil in the pan and emptied the bag of veggies. The directions on the bag say to microwave or steam/boil and drain the veggies, but this worked fine. I poured some teriyaki sauce and rice vinegar over the veggies and added the egg once the veggies were hot. The noodles only take 3 minutes to cook. I added the cooked noodles to the skillet and tossed everything around to equally distribute the sauce.

Total prep time was about 15 minutes and the finished result was delicious.

I got about 3 meals out of it and the leftovers make great work lunches!

I had half a package left of Pillsbury’s Moist Supreme Classic White Cake mix and was prepared to mix oreo, well Target brand oreo, pieces into the mix and make 12 cupcakes. But then I lost focus. I added the whole amount of the water and oil printed on the box, even though I only had half of the cake mix. I only realized because my batter was way too soupy. Hmm how to remedy this cupcake batter…time to experiment! I got out the typical cake ingredients and added random amounts. Two heaping spoonfuls of flour…1 heaping spoonful sugar, a pinch of salt, a dash of baking soda, a smidgen of baking powder, and a drop of vanilla extract. I mixed it all together and the batter looked more like regular cake batter should.

Mixing random amounts of random ingredients reminded me of the episode of Full House when Becky and Michelle are trying to make meatloaf but don’t know how to cook. Michelle asks Becky, “how much is a smidgen?” “About the size of a small pigeon,” Becky answers uncertainly. I know at least one of my blog readers knows what I’m talking about!

So back to my cupcakes – I broke up oreo pieces with my bare hands and mixed them into the batter.

I poured the batter over the oreo halves in each cup and baked. Now, because I wanted 12 cupcakes but ended up with batter that could have made 24 cupcakes, I decided to make really big cupcakes.

They were like bakery cupcake size; not my typical small cupcake size. I say when it comes to cupcakes, size matters. It all tastes the same but I fully support a bigger cupcake.

I mixed up some vanilla frosting quickly (half a stick of margarine, 1 cup confectioners sugar, teaspoon vanilla) and frosted my cupcake before it cooled.

The oreo on the bottom looks so cool and is a great surprise for unsuspecting eaters.

And frosting tastes good no matter how melty it is!

And then came the taste test. They smelled so good Roomie was up for the challenge. One bite and she said, “these are the best cupcakes you’ve ever made.” Thanks, Roomie!

The oreo changes texture while baking and becomes soft, but still adds a different texture to the cupcake. The oreo cream adds a special flavor to the cupcake too. And the lesson learned here is: no mistake in the kitchen can’t be turned into a delicious treat.