Around $3.50
420 calories
180 calories from fat
340 grams
About 8 minutes cooking time

Stouffer’s has apparently caught wind of what other frozen meals have been doing lately regarding marketing. You can see on the front of the box they’re selling this frozen ‘delight’ as a healthy choice (note their billing of: 1.‘No Preservatives.’ 2. Olive Oil and Sea Salt. 3. A fresh Carrot on the box! My response: 1. It’s frozen. 2. Rachel Ray bandwagon. 3. That carrot looks nothing like what I got in my frozen meal.). While I laud making a healthier frozen meal, I think they’re going a little overboard with the “Farmers’ Harvest” tag. If you make something that’s good you don’t need hyperbolic packaging.

The chicken is pretty good despite not resembling what’s advertised on the box. No cartilage thus far (none of the chicken wound up with that Chicken McNugget “suprise” where you take a bite of what looks like normal chicken and you get a fist-sized chunk of gristle or cartilage. Definitely one of the most unappetizing aspects of reconstituted chicken, you know, aside from the whole process of reconstituting chicken parts into the proverbial ‘chicken boot’ [of course I couldn't find a picture of the proverbial McNugget boot shape, but suffice it to say that McNuggets are shaped like little boots. Next time you have one, look for it.]), and it’s kind of moist. Their blend of herbs and spices, primarily parsley and sea salt, are satisfactory. You won’t be calling your mother telling her about your amazingly flavored frozen meal, but I have had far worse. The bowtie pasta is alright, nothing stands out positively or negatively. The vegetables (green beans, carrots, and red pepper) are actually some of the best I’ve had from a frozen meal. The veggies taste fairly fresh (considering their circumstances), retaining a bit of crispness and they’re a little bit buttery (I’d hazard to guess that’s the vegetable oil that the box lauds).

I tasted each component seperately for the purposes of this review, but as you can see above I like to get all of the pieces together in a war of textures and flavors. You can certainly eat this meal without adding anything to it, but I’m a fiend for hotsauce so after my initial impressions I added a little bit of Louisiana Hot Sauce on top. Considering this is a frozen meal, and not freshly prepared I would recommend this for anyone that needs an easy meal they can heat up in the microwave.

Stouffer’s you get a Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars for this one (based on quality of components, flavors, and cost). Neither great nor bad, but totally edible.

-Matt in Tampa

IMPORTANT UPDATE! Here are the boot nuggets:http://www.flickr.com/photos/kingpowercinema/89053032/

Google Map of location

Semi-late start to the day and we’re driving through Lexington trying to decide whether or not to go on the Bourbon Trail.  Although the Bourbon trail was nixed in favor of a more expeditious trip, I spotted this little gem on the way to find some Bourbon bonbons.  I was a little skeptical at first, mainly because I hadn’t seen many Asian-themed eateries in Kentucky.  The inside is fairly stark, it was a nice comfortable little spot.  Plenty of seating, clean floors and tables.

Since my phone was dead, I took this from some realtor's blog

Their Pho is supposed to be the bee’s knees, but I wasn’t feeling soup.  They didn’t have much (or any?) vegetarian food, so I decided to try out a Shrimp Po’ Boy sandwich.   Lemme tell ya, fried shrimp on a hoagie bun with tomato, lettuce, onions, and mayo?  Delicious.   You get the choice of fries or a side salad.  I opted for the fries, which were standard fare.. but good.  I mean, unless they’re hand cut it’s probably sysco or some other food distributer’s frozen potato goods.  Anyways, the sandwich was pretty decent and didn’t set me back too much.  Unfortunately the whole debacle with my phone kept me from taking pictures, fortunately I have a picture of their avocado shake.  You can get it with tapiaco bubble things like bubble tea.  I thought it was mainly a novelty drink, but it’s kinda hard for me to get over the thick, fatty, semi-salty and sweet, cold avocado drink.  It’s good if you’re really into that sort of thing, but good god.. I like my avocado on tacos, or on tortillas.  Anyways here’s a picture of the avocado shake tea whatever they called it.

Sarah sampling the shake/tea/avocado concotion

Rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars Decor, nothing fancy.  Clean, and plenty of windows for some light to come on in
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars Everything was fairly reasonably priced.
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars Food was pretty delicious.
Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars I’m feeling too lazy to do the math, but I liked the place and it was something different than burgers and fries in Kentucky.  So, enjoy your 3 and a 1/2 stars Fusion Cafe.  Keep on bringing a little bit of the rest of the world to Lexington

The girlfriend and I decided to go to Crabby Bill’s on a muggy summer evening. We had gone together once before, and we decided to come back because she loves crab-legs (on the last outing the Snow Crab legs were delicious, I snuck a taste). Immediately after crossing the Clearwater Memorial Causeway you’re assualted by the typical tourist-shit; surf shops, neon-lights, and families with backpacks and flip-flops dragging little Johnny along. By this time there are no girls in bikini’s, just loud music and motorcycles.

When you enter Crabby Bills, it’s a bit like walking into a beach-side CrAppleby’s. There’s the same goofy, campy shit on the walls, a tired server with listless eyes counting down the time left, and a bar. I’m fine with the bar. Going to Crabby Bill’s on a Thursday proves fruitful as a cup of anything on tap is about $2. The atmosphere is clearly a drag, but the menu looks alright. On my last visit I made the mistake of ordering the Fried Platter, which was fine for what it was but you are pretty much just eating overpriced batter and grease.

The appetizer comes out, we ordered the Seared Mahi-Mahi. The tuna is seared and then rolled in Basel and Parsely. We’re disappointed that it wasn’t rolled in pepper or something a little more suitable for seared tuna. Unfortunately the Mahi-Mahi is a bit on the warm side, it felt like it hung out under the lamp leaving the interior with a skin-temperature level of heat. The saving grace is that the flavor is spot-on. As you can see the side-salad is the average fare.

Our entrees come out, I ordered the Broiled Platter which comes with Scallops, Grouper, Shrimp, Conch Fritter, Southern-style Green Beans, and French Fries:

I first break into the scallops; they’ve been cleaned well and were broiled in butter. Pretty fucking delicious. They’ve been cleaned properly, so no sand to grate between your teeth. I next tear into the Conch Fritter, it tastest akin to a spicy crab cake. If you haven’t had one before, it’s like eating a bite of moist, spicy, corn bread. The shrimp and the grouper are on par with everything else. The fries are fries… fried, greasy, delciious. If you haven’t had Grouper, it’s very similar to cod or whitefish… very neutral not much ‘fish’ flavor. For the unitiated, Southern-style green beans are a combination of “No he just didn’t” and “Why didn’t I think of this?” Essentially, someone decided to dice some onions, cook some bacon and then marry it with green beans. If this won’t get your kid to eat vegetables, you’re raising a lost cause. Leave it at the next church you pass.

The girlfriend’s entrée is as follows:

I didn’t sample her entire plate, but I did have a bit of the crab. She has found that Snow Crab has more base-’Crab’ flavor than the King Crab and I heartily agree. After trying a bite the first-time-round, I had to have another taste to be convinced this wasn’t some trick (my previous experiences with Crab were in a Crab Rangoon, a poor decision to order All-You-Can-Eat-King-Crab-Legs at the ‘World Buffet’ [behind the Lansing mall in Lansing, MI... next to the Salvation Army.  Salvation Army and Buffet go hand-in-hand right?], and that synthetic stuff at a friend’s house). The texture of crab isn’t particularly remarkable, it’s like eating a bite of filet mignon… it’s tender. The part of this that intrigued me was that the crab itself tasted somewhat buttery yet wasn’t dipped in butter. If you’re a crab fan, I would highly suggest Snow Crab Legs.

In closing, this trip may have been “enhanced” by imbibing 3 or 4 Yuenglings. According to Chris (another contributor to the site, just not yet) Yuengling originated from PA, but there is a local brewery for them here in Tampa. It’s like a classier Budweiser. It’s smooth, with an almost milky back-end yet not as rich as a Blue-moon or an Oberon. The prices weren’t great (other than the beer), the décor was a turn off, but the food was delish.

CRUSTACEAN ATTACK ATTACK!

-Matt in Tampa
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars