Lean Cuisine Review: Roasted Honey Chicken

I'm doing it - trying a chicken meal AGAIN. I'm on a roll.

Let's bypass the normal backstory and get right into the review this time... Lean Cuisine's Roasted Honey Chicken.

LC describes this dish as: Roasted white meat chicken (I'll be the judge of that) in a sweet honey sauce with snap peas, yellow beans and whole wheat pilaf.

Chicken: Well there was a lot more of it than what was in my Chicken Mediterranean - and it was better than the chicken in most LC meals that are normally full of gristle. But it wasn't particularly flavorful. So all, in all, average chicken.

Veggies: Can I begin by asking what is a yellow bean?! I'm guessing it's just a green bean that's yellow... but it's not something I've seen before. And since there was only 2 of them in my dish, I can't be a good judge of it's flavor. But I will say that I'm impressed I had FIFTEEN snap peas (yes I counted) --- and I looove snap peas. They were still nice and crunchy, which was good. There were also a lot of carrots in this dish which were good - but I'm confused why they didn't include that in the description, but they did for the two "yellow beans." I guess it just makes it seem more "fancy" but really - is a yellow bean going to light a fire under someone's pants? I don't think so. "Hmmm... what LC should I get to punish myself this week? Oooh this one has YELLOW BEANS... I have to try it!" Next.

Sauce: This sauce really wanted to be something. I could tell that it wanted to be more exciting than it was in real life. I didn't really get any hint of honey... it was just a sweet sauce with a little bit of red pepper flakes, I think. But there was a lot of it to cover all the rice, veggies and chicken - so that's good I guess.

Rice: The rice might be my favorite part of the dish... with actual grains of wheat within the rice pilaf which gave it a nice crunchy texture. I can imagine the rice in this dish is kinda a snob... asking itself "Whyyyy do I have to hang out with this weak sauce and funky chicken? Can't I just be alone!?" The one downside to this rice is they have pieces of what I suppose is sauteed red onion in it... except that it looks like a translucent blue color instead which kinda creeps me out.

Overall: Eeeh... it was okay. Better than a lot of other LC's I've had that I've taken 2 bites out of and thrown away. I might try it again from time to time when I'm bored with other options. I give it two and a half out of five stars. I was originally going to give it three stars, but then noticed I gave Mediterranean Chicken three stars, and even though there wasn't a lot of it, Med Chicken was better than this one.

Lean Cuisine Review: Chicken Mediterranean

Once again, I'm gracing you with a review of a new (to me) Lean Cuisine dish.

This one is Chicken Mediterranean - described as: Grilled white meat chicken, zucchini, tomatoes and whole wheat pasta in a tomato sauce.

This is big for me because, once again, I'm venturing out and trying a frozen chicken dish (which normally give me the creepers). I was amazed by the Thai Style Noddles with Chicken, and am afraid it simply isn't possible for LC to make two decent chicken dishes.

But here goes!

Okay, just pulled back the film cover. First impression: THAT'S IT!?! No wonder this thing is only 4 WW points. It is half of a tiny tray. Three tiny pieces of chicken. Maybe four pieces of zucchini. I spotted two olives. I really think the packaging machine malfunctioned, because there is no way this meal is this small.

Chicken: They have grill marks on them, which makes me laugh. Who are they kidding? But the chicken was pretty good - not scary like other LC chicken dishes. I didn't have to throw any of the pieces away... but that was maybe because this dish was so dang small that I was less picky.

Veggies: Ummm, when I found a piece that was actually big enough, the zucchini was a nice texture... not completely mushy. And my two baby olives were yummy. I heart olives. The picture on the box makes it look like black olives, but I'm pretty sure the ones in my box were kalamata. I know my olives - me and the olive bar at Whole Foods are BFF. They show yellow peppers on the packaging (since I think there is a rule that they must be in every LC meal) - however, I didn't find a single yellow pepper in my meal.

Pasta: This is supposed to be whole wheat pasta - I'll take their word for it since I can't really taste the whole wheatness. The bad thing was the noodles clumped together. But they were okay.

Sauce: The sauce is actually the highlight of the meal. It's very herby - and I like herby sauce. It was robust and plentiful - there was more sauce in this dish than any other ingredient.

Overall: The taste of this meal was actually really good - better than most I've had. If it was just a little bit bigger, I would have scored it higher. I'll buy this lunch again - but make sure to bring a side salad with it. As is, I'm already hungry... and I have awhile until my 3 p.m. rice cake + peanut butter snack. I give it three out of five stars.

Lean Cuisine Review: Thai-Style Noodles with Chicken

So Lean Cuisine has come out with three new frozen entrees:

Thai-Style Noodles with Chicken
Roasted Honey Chicken
Apple Cranberry Chicken

Because I love you, dear reader, I will attempt to review these new offerings to prevent you from wasting the $3-4 yourself if they are no good. Selfless, I know. You can thank me with kisses, rainbows and Nordstrom gift cards.

So today I'm kicking if off with the Thai-Style Noodles with Chicken...

Hereeeeee goes:

The chicken- There is not a lot of chicken in this dish - which is fine with me since I usually pick out all the chicken anyway because it is normally grisly and nasty. However, the chicken in this dish was actually good cuts of white meat chicken, and I only had to toss out one little piece that looked a bit sketchy to me. So all in all, good chicken! But if you want a lot of meat in your LC meal, you might be a little let down.

The sauce- This thai-peanut sauce was actually really good. I know - me saying something in a Lean Cuisine is good... crazy right? But it was. Peppery but with a good peanut taste. Wasn't as spicy as I would have liked, but hey, can't complain too much. And there was plenty of sauce to coat all the noodles.

The noodles- I mean they are not homemade - but they were good! Not soggy, not too firm. Plus the fact that they are whole wheat (aka: more fiber) is nice since it will hopefully keep me full longer than most LC meals do.

The veggies- They are actually bright and plentiful. Usually the box covers make it look like there are tons of veggies - when they are only two or three. This guy actually had a pretty decent vegetable showing with carrots, red pepper and green beans... that were still crispy! Holla. I love me a vegetable.

Overall- I can't believe I'm saying this, but this might have been one of the best Lean Cuisine meals I've ever had. I would give it a four out of five stars. (note: The only thing that could make a LC five stars is for it to no longer be a LC.)

So buy Thai-Style Noodles with Chicken with confidence. It has MPLT's stamp of approval.