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Saturday, December 22, 2012

Product review: Rocky Mountain Popcorn in Cinnamon Sugar flavor

As part of the December Goodies.co box, I received a sample of Rocky Mountain Popcorn in Cinnamon Sugar flavor. I do not often eat Popcorn because some of it is so hard that it actually cuts my gumline. I was happy that not the usual butter flavor was included because quite often the artificial butter tastes downright awful.

The popcorn can be purchased on the Goodies.co website here for less than $5 for 3 bags. Each bag is a very filling snack for one person, almost like a meal substitute. A bag can certainly be shared among a couple of people while watching a movie. You can see the portion size below, a good size snack that can last through a movie.

What I really liked about Rocky Mountain Popcorn was the fact that it is definitely crunchy, but not hard enough that someone like me can actually end up with abrasions on the gums like with most commercial microwave popcorn varieties. The cinnamon sugar flavor is natural, not artificially tasting and certainly not overly sweet. A nice well-balanced sweet popcorn. Overall, I find Rocky Mountain Popcorn in the cinnamon sugar flavor a nice snack. I checked out the company website here and they have additional flavors, including caramel, kettle (another one of my favorites) and white cheddar. So if you are looking for a naturally tasting popcorn that can serve as a filling snack, give Rocky Mountain Popcorn a try.

Disclaimer: I received a December Goodies box in return for an honest review and for a moderate subscription fee. The opinions expressed in this blog are solely my own and have not been influenced by Goodies, Rocky Mountain Popcorn or any other third party.

Product review: Michael Angelo's Taste & Tell Family!

I have been a fan of Michael Angelo's for many years. I like the fact that their frozen Italian food actually tastes homemade and not like, well, a frozen microwave dinner. I really like their Eggplant Parmesan as well as their Vegetarian Lasagne. Both, if used as an individual serving, are filling enough to serve as dinner.

Michael Angelo's also has family size servings and I have in the past used their lasagne when I had a party and used my crockpots for chili, but wanted to serve another warm dish. Their family size lasagne are ideal for such an occasion because you can heat them up in the oven, keep them warm until the guests arrive and serve your friends a meal with the confidence that the lasagne will meet the expectations for a wonderful dinner of even your hardest to please friends.

So when Michael Angelo's was looking for people that would act as kind of ambassadors for their meals, I was more than willing to apply. A couple of weeks ago I received my Taste & Tell Family package with contains a DVD with information about Michael Angelo's, coupons for $1 off for sharing, a few coupons for a free family size meals to host parties and additional information about their dishes - like I need to learn anything about Michael Angelo's. I believe I have tasted every single dish in their line, including most of them as single serving and family size portions.

Here are the contents of the Taste & Tell Family package that I received and in the new year, I will host at least a couple of parties to introduce even more of my friends to the fabulous frozen Italian Dinners by Michael Angelo's.

Quick treat/ snack with leftover Thanksgiving turkey or ham - Filled savory crescent rolls

Many people will have to struggle with leftover Turkey or Ham after Christmas, so I thought I would include a quick recipe that I like to make to use up some of the leftover meat from the holiday meals.

I like to make filled crescent rolls because it is very easy and quick to make this snack and the snack is surprisingly flexible in terms of filling or how you eat it. I usually include a mix of cheese and meat to fill the rolls, but you can certainly limit yourself to either cheese or meat and play around with the varieties of fillings you use. I sometimes use ham as a filling and then prior to heating the rolls up in the microwave as an afternoon snack, I drizzle some shredded cheese on top for extra flavor and crunch.

In the above picture, you can see that the cheese has nicely melted and the turkey has slightly browned while in the oven. I used both ham and turkey as the filling and combined it with a spicy pepper jack cheese to balance the buttery flavor of the crescent rolls.

Here I paired the stuffed crescent rolls with a simply chicken broth. I added some frozen chives (leftover from my garden) to the soup and also added the crusted cheese that was stuck to the baking sheet to the soup. The lunch is light, flavorful and filling all at the same time.

Plus, you used up some of the holiday meal leftovers without the meal looking like a leftover.

Harris Teeter Clearance alert - Fage Greek Yoghurt at South Durham store

This morning, the South Durham Harris Teeter on the intersection of 54/751 had several varieties of Fage Greek Yoghurt clearance priced for 79 cents. The expiration date was not until late January 2013. I stocked up, but there were still plenty left in Mango / Guanabana and Strawberry / Goji Berry varieties.

If you plan to go shopping later on today at Harris Teeter, you may want to check out whether your local Harris Teeter has the Greek Yoghurt on sale as well.

I love Fage yoghurt, especially the variety with Mango because I can mix the fruit fresh with the yoghurt while I am eating, rather than purchase it premixed.

For information on Fage, have a look at their website here.

Harris Teeter Produce on sale - Red Currants - give them a try!

Harris Teeter has this week Red Currants on sale. I have rarely, if ever before, seen these tiny little red fruits on sale anywhere. And for a price $4 for around 11oz, the sale price is not too bad.

I plan to plant a couple of currant shrubs in my backyard this spring and hope that the fruits will thrive in this climate. In Germany, red currants are found on a regular basis. But the weather tends to be colder. There is also significantly more rain throughout the year. North Carolina is in Zone 7, red currants prefer zones 3 and 4, but I am hoping that with regular water and good soil, I can manage to grow them in North Carolina.
The shrubs products clutches of tiny red and very tart berries. I love red currant jam, but they are also excellent in pies.

Because the red currants were still quite pricy, even on sale, I did not want to use them in pie or jam.. I decided to make a little dessert plate for an after lunch snack. Since the red currants were tart, I paired them with sweet treats, including a ripe banana and dark chocolate covered gingerbread domino stones. The domino stones were on sale at Aldi the past few weeks and, even though covered in dark chocolate, are quite sweet because their filling consists to a large part of fruit jelly.

We munched on this plate after lunch and the tartness of the red currants was a wonderful contrast to the banana and domino stones.

So if you live in an area in which Harris Teeter stores are represented, you may want to make use of the weekly special that offers red currant berries on sale. I am glad I snatched two packages of these deliciously tart berries. If you want to find out more about red currants, that by the way are rich in vitamin C, have a look at the wikipedia entry here.

Thursday, December 20, 2012

Product review: Subscription box by Goodies Company - December 2012

Today, I received another shipment from a subscription service. This time the box was from Goodies Company, a subscription service affiliated with Walmart. And before some of my readers fear that the items included may be mass produced, the items included in the Goodies box are anything but your standard grocery store fare. Many of the items included are organic, several are gluten and nut free and all of them are what I would call artisan.

As you can see from the image above, the selection this month is heavily in favor of items that can be munched on during the holidays. We have popcorn, apple and vegetable chips, cookies and oatcakes.
All items can be purchased online from Goodies Company at goodies.co and through the end of the year you get the nice present of FREE SHIPPING.

The detailed contents are as follows with direct link to the Goodies website for quick overview of prices:

This is only my second Goodies box, but so far I am extremely happy with the selection. I have not tried any of the items included in the December box and most of the companies I have never heard of. So Goodies is truly a product discovery service. The only company I have heard of is Barefruit, but I have never tasted their products. I am very excited about the selection and look forward to sampling all items.

As I did with my initial box from November, I likely will again make use of the free shipping special this month and order a couple of items that we really like. It will be a nice treat. The Wine Biscuits I ordered last month will be served for a family gathering during the holidays. The Biscoff spread from last month we keep for ourselves, it tastes almost too good to share and we use it instead of peanut butter as a special treat.

Below is the video with my initial impressions of the Goodies Company December 2012 box.

Disclaimer: I received these items in the Goodies Company December 2012 box at a reduced subscription rate in exchange for an honest review. The opinions expressed in the blog are solely my own and have not been influenced by Goodies Company or any other third party.

Wednesday, December 19, 2012

Initial impressions: Winter Favorites Cravebox - December 2012

Today I received my Winter Favorites Cravebox. For those that follow my blog, you will know that Cravebox is subscription service that is intended to introduce its users to new products or rediscover companies that have changed their product offerings. The two prior Craveboxes were the Coffee Lovers, which was nice, and the Holiday Spruce Up, which was disappointing, but to Cravebox's credit they issued a full refund for that. So I had high hopes for the Winter Favorites box because I could envision wonderful food items, but possibly also some items to decorate the house or bring a festive mood to the subscriber.

The box did not disappoint. I was extremely happy with the contents. The coupons included were not the $off kind from the Spruce Up box, but coupons for free items so that the subscriber of Cravebox just needs to go to the store and pick up the item. All items included were right on theme, a festive holiday in terms of meals and mood. I am glad, this Cravebox is the in line with prior Craveboxes and the reason that I fell in love with subscription services. Even though some of the companies are well known, such as Pillsbury, they offer coupons for products that I either have not tried or that I can use in preparing new items. They also include samples from companies that I may have heard of or that are totally new to me. So the mix is just right between brand new and old favorites with a twist.

Below is the image of the content. You can see the box was really filled with items and what a variety!

Below is a video during the unpacking of the Cravebox. It is fairly long, in part because one of the envelopes with actually glued shut and took me some time to open. But you get a good look at the items included and my initial impressions of the box and its contents. Some items I am very excited about trying, even though it is hard to make a choice with this box. One of the standout items is the Green Tea Sage Vitabath sample. Vitabath is a new company for me. I have heard of them, but never tried them. and I love everything green tea, including my green tea toothpaste. So getting shower lotion with green tea is a nice surprise and will definitely make me feel spoiled.

Another item that I love is the Pillsbury pie crust coupon. I love baking, but making your own pie crust is time consuming and so I often use ready pie crusts and occasionally splurge on refrigerated pie crust. Getting a coupon for Pillsbury pie crust is a wonderful treat and I can now focus on what pie I want to make. I am thinking about a lemon chess pie or shoofly pie. Something more unusual for the holiday dinner other than my standard pumpkin or fruit pie.

I am also happy to see the coupons from International Delight, but what really caught my attention was the recipe card included because it uses the ID creamer with salted caramel mocha flavor. I am right now on a salted caramel mission or wave (whatever you want to call it) since I received a Torani syrup with that flavor and I love the mix of salt and sweet. So finding out the ID has salted caramel flavored creamer is nice to know and I may actually end up buying the creamer just to use in baking.

So here is the video with my initial impressions. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: I received the items in the Cravebox for a reduced rate through the Cravebox subscription service. The opinions expressed in this blog are solely my own and have not been influenced by Cravebox or any third party.