REVIEW: Wanchai Ferry Cashew Chicken Chinese Dinner Kit

/ / Reviews / 26 Comments

When I want Chinese food, I don’t go to Paul Fleming Chang’s China Bistro.

When I’m jonesin’ for Chinese food, I want to be able to pick something from a bilingual menu and give my order to an angry Chinese woman who yells it to the cooks in the back of the restaurant, one of which is her husband. When my food arrives, I want to use extremely long plastic chopsticks with a slippery glossy coating that makes it difficult to pick up anything and brings me to the point of sheepishly asking for a fork. I also want to enjoy it with a small cup of green tea served by the restaurant owner’s high school-aged daughter who would rather hang out with her friends, instead of working at her parent’s restaurant on a Friday evening.

If I’m not able to get Chinese food the way I want it, I would settle for the Wanchai Ferry Cashew Chicken Chinese Dinner Kit, which is distributed by General Mills.

The kit is made up of individual packets of jasmine rice, cashew sauce, seasoned cornstarch, and roasted cashews. As for the chicken, just like the USB cable for your new inkjet printer, it is sold separately.

I thought preparing the dish was going to be as difficult as the paparazzi trying to get all of Kim Kardashian’s ass in a photo using a telephoto lens, but it was easy to make. All I had to do was take a pound of chicken, cut it up into one-inch pieces, coat them in the seasoned cornstarch, then brown the coated pieces in a frying pan, and then mix in the cashew sauce and roasted cashews. While I had that going, I also had to cook the jasmine rice in a pot for about 20 minutes. It made enough for three decent-sized servings. Once everything was done, I plated it and enjoyed.

To be honest, I didn’t expect much from this meal in a box but it was very good. The jasmine rice came out perfect; the cashew sauce, which seemed to be made up of mostly hoisin sauce, had a nice garlic taste with a little bit of citrus; and the cashews themselves added a nice nutty flavor and gave the dish a crunchiness. But the seasoned cornstarch on the chicken didn’t seem to add too much to the taste of the dish.

While I don’t get to pick it from a bilingual menu or hear a vexed Chinese woman yell “cashew chicken” in Chinese to a bunch of men in the kitchen with the Wanchai Ferry Cashew Chicken Chinese Dinner Kit, it’s good to know that I get to eat it in the comfort of my home and with a fork that I didn’t have to ask for with the face of shame.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 cup – 300 calories, 10 grams of fat, 1.5 grams of saturated fat, 45 milligrams of cholesterol, 490 milligrams of sodium, 39 grams of carbohydrates, less than 1 gram of fiber, 8 grams of sugar, 21 grams of protein, 2% Vitamin C, and 10% Iron.)

Item: Wanchai Ferry Cashew Chicken Chinese Dinner Kit
Price: $6.59
Size: 13.4 ounces
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 8 out of 10
Pros: Tasty. Rice came out perfect. Good sauce. Easy to make. Makes three decent-sized servings. Real Chinese restaurants.
Cons: You have to add your own chicken. Can’t microwave it. Damn slippery plastic Chinese chopsticks. Asking for a fork at a Chinese restaurant. Printers that don’t come with a USB cable. P.F. Chang’s.

REVIEW: Red Bull Cola

/ / Reviews / 16 Comments

If Red Bull claims the original version of their product is supposed to gives you wings, I wonder what their Red Bull Cola is supposed to give you. I’ve consumed four cans and the only things they’ve given me was gas and the ability to burp the first six letters of the alphabet. I was hoping to get either a halo above my head, x-ray vision, or the patience to solve a Rubik’s Cube.

For years, there were only two types of Red Bull — original and sugar-free. But last year they decided to get a little kinky and introduced a cola version of their product. Besides probably being a good mixer, what’s interesting about Red Bull Cola is that it’s all-natural. It doesn’t contain artificial flavors, colors, and phosphoric acid like the mainstream colas — Coke and Pepsi.

If it doesn’t have artificial flavors, how does it get its flavor? It does it with an ingredients list that reads like the McCormick spices section at your local supermarket. Along with caramel, sugar, and lemon juice concentrate, Red Bull Cola also contains vanilla, mustard seed, lime, kola nut, cacao, licorice, cinnamon, lemon, ginger, coca leaf, orange, corn mint, pine, cardamom, mace, and clove.

Just like having sex for the first time, the first sip from the can is a little weird, but it gets better after that. Its flavor reminded me of a less sweet RC Cola with a bit of a citrus taste. It’s not bad, but I honestly prefer the taste of Coke or Pepsi, even with the high fructose corn syrup in them.

The most disappointing thing about Red Bull Cola was that it had only 45 milligrams of caffeine per can, which is more than Coke or Pepsi, but nowhere close to the 80 milligrams found in a regular Red Bull. If you’re a caffeine addict, you probably won’t notice the 45 milligrams, unless you count having a headache or becoming very cranky due to the lack of caffeine it provides as something noticeable.

If you’re not a regular caffeine consumer because you think your body is a temple and the caffeine might disrupt the inner peace of that temple, it will probably give you a nice boost to go along with the disruption of your temple. The coffee beans included in the beverage not only provided the caffeine, but they also seemed to be the source of some sediment in the Red Bull Cola, which I like to think of as the worm at the bottom of the tequila bottle.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 can – 130 calories, 0 grams of fat, 10 milligrams of sodium, 31 grams of carbohydrates, 31 grams of sugar, and 0 grams of protein.)

Item: Red Bull Cola
Price: $1.69
Size: 12 ounces
Purchased at: 7-Eleven
Rating: 6 out of 10
Pros: Reminds me of RC Cola with a citrus twist. Easy to drink. Natural ingredients. No artificial flavors. Uses real sugar and not High Fructose Corn Syrup.
Cons: Sadly, I think Coke and Pepsi taste better. Not as much caffeine as regular Red Bull. Possible sediment from coffee beans. Might be hard to find.

NEWS: Ziploc Is One Step Closer To Its Goal of Sticking The Earth In One Of Its Bags

/ / Spotted on Shelves / 12 Comments

Are you having trouble keeping the skeletons in your closet neatly arranged? If so, the Ziploc Flexible Totes might just be for you. A couple years ago, Ziploc introduced their Big Bags in three sizes, the largest of which was about 2 feet wide and 3 feet tall. They were big enough to hold closet skeletons, but they couldn’t stack on top of each other very well. That changes with these cube-shaped bags that can hold closet skeletons in all shapes and sizes. Affairs, illegitimate children, that night of drunken experimentation, those years in the porn industry, that time you spent in prison, and so much more can fit in these Ziploc Flexible Totes. The flexible, heavy-duty plastic and easy-close zippers ensure that your skeletons stay where they’re supposed to. They come in two sizes: a 10-gallon XL bag and for you extreme sinners a 22-gallon XXL bag.

REVIEW: Kettle Chips Death Valley Chipotle Potato Chips

/ / Reviews / 20 Comments

Oh my God! The Kettle Chips Death Valley Chipotle feels like someone is pouring liquid chlamydia into my mouth! It burns! It burns! It burns!

Okay, it’s not really that hot to me, but others might feel that way.

The winner of last year’s Kettle Peoples’ Choice contest is quite possibly the spiciest potato chip I’ve ever had, although I might’ve in the past had a potato chip that was so spicy that it traumatized me and caused me to lose any memory of it. Eating something so disturbing and losing my memory of it has happened before.

The Kettle Chips Death Valley Chipotle contains the Five Peppers of the Hotpocalypse: chili, chipotle, cayenne, habanero, and jalapeno. Thanks to those spices, each chip looks like it’s burnt rather than golden brown and they also look like scabs. The heat from the Five Peppers of the Hotpocalypse does not instantly hit you, like walking out of a Las Vegas casino on a hot summer day after 24 hours straight of debauchery, instead it’s a slow burn that builds up to a medium heat that sticks with you for a while.

While it may contain a spectrum of hot spices, the chipotle is the pepper that stands out the most and also provides a nice smoky flavor, which fortunately isn’t overwhelmed by the heat of the other peppers. Its smokiness combined with its spiciness makes for one delicious chip, although its heat will probably agitate some peoples’ palates. I’m not surprised I enjoyed them because I like spicy and I also believe Kettle Chips makes some of the best tasting potato chips on the planet.

So if you like spicy, I’d definitely recommend the crunchy Kettle Chips Death Valley Chipotle potato chips. But if you don’t like spicy, I’d definitely recommend staying away from these chips because it really will feel like someone is pouring liquid chlamydia into your mouth.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 ounce – 150 calories, 9 grams of fat, 1 grams of saturated fat, 0 grams of trans fat, 1 gram of polyunsaturated fat, 7 grams of monounsaturated fat, 0 milligrams of cholesterol, 170 milligrams of sodium, 410 milligrams of potassium, 16 grams of carbs, 2 grams of fiber, 0 grams of sugar, 2 grams of protein, 2% Vitamin A, 20% Vitamin C, and 4% Iron.)

Item: Kettle Chips Death Valley Chipotle Potato Chips
Price: $3.29
Size: 5 ounces
Purchased at: Foodland
Rating: 7 out of 10
Pros: Nice smoky, spicy flavor. Crunchy. Lots of spices. No trans fat. Spices don’t overwhelm the chip’s flavor. Me likey the spicy. Winner of the last year’s Kettle Peoples’ Choice contest
Cons: Its dark color makes them look like scabs. If you don’t like spicy, it will feel like someone is pouring liquid chlamydia into your mouth. Might not be a permanent addition to Kettle Chips lineup. Eating something so traumatic that you forgot you ate it.

REVIEW: Jimmy Dean Sausage and Cheese On A Croissant Breakfast Entrees

/ / Reviews / 14 Comments

I am not a morning person.

I wish I could tell you that I wake up at the crack of dawn, quickly jump out of bed, and sing the praises of being the early bird that gets the worm, but I don’t. Instead, I get up when my alarm clock tells me to. But even when it tells me to, I violently hit its snooze button 3-5 times before slowly rolling out of bed. And there aren’t any praises in the morning, just slightly loud cursing and threats at the inanimate object that wakes me up every morning.

There are things I would wake up early for, like Saturday morning cartoons, Macy’s sales, and the opportunity to stick it to senior citizens by getting up before they do, being the first in line when McDonald’s opens their doors, and buying all the coffee. But something I would not get up early for is the Jimmy Dean Sausage and Cheese on a Croissant Breakfast Entree.

Look at that picture above. Would you want to get up for that? If I woke up next to that, I would roll onto my side, fall back asleep, and hog all of the blankets, letting it get cold.

The sausage and cheese croissant, which makes the Burger King Croissanwich look like filet mignon, is in the tray’s main compartment, seasoned hash browns are in the upper right, and diced apples are in the lower right. I felt the need to point out where the hash browns and diced apples are because they could easily be confused, like Gary Busey, Nick Nolte, and zombies.

Jimmy Dean is known for his sausage and in this entree his sausage was tasty, albeit small, but EVERYTHING else didn’t come close to the quality of Jimmy Dean’s sausage. The croissant, which are usually crispy and flaky, was tough, chewy, and nowhere near flaky; the apples tasted like apples and they had a slight crunch to them, but they weren’t sweet, which made them quite bland; and the hash browns were lightly seasoned, but not seasoned enough to make you forget how soggy they were.

If you thought all of that was disappointing, I shall continue the dismay by saying the Jimmy Dean Sausage and Cheese On A Croissant Breakfast Entree has 50% of your daily recommended allowance of saturated fat, 1050 milligrams of sodium, and three grams of trans fat. The amount of trans fat is the most disheartening because if KFC, whose middle name is Fried, can go trans fat free, why can’t Jimmy Dean?

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m going to roll onto my side, fall asleep, and hog all of the blankets.

(Nutrition Facts – 1 entree – 560 calories, 30 grams of fat, 10 grams of saturated fat, 3 grams of trans fat, 35 milligrams of cholesterol, 1050 milligrams of sodium, 62 grams of carbs, 4 grams of dietary fiber, 21 grams of sugar, 11 grams of protein, 6% Vitamin A, 10% Calcium, and 15% Iron.)

Item: Jimmy Dean Sausage and Cheese On A Croissant Breakfast Entrees
Price: $4.79
Size: 7.6 ounces
Purchased at: Safeway
Rating: 3 out of 10
Pros: Sausage was tasty, but as for the rest of it not so much. It makes a Burger King Croissanwich look good. Contains all four major food groups.
Cons: Sausage was small. 3 grams of trans fat. Croissant was chewy and not flaky. High in sodium and saturated fat. Hash browns were soggy. Apples were bland. Gary Busey, Nick Nolte, and zombies

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