A “Scorchin’” Review

I don’t know what’s wrong with me – I’ve had no appetite these past couple of days.  I’ve eaten because I know I need to but I just haven’t had the urge to eat.  It’s really weird.  I hope it goes away soon.

Anyway, I was hoping to get out of my appetite rut by trying something new in the kitchen but I wasn’t in the mood to start totally from scratch.  This seemed like a good time to try a meal kit that I bought at the store a couple of weeks ago.

It’s a Tasty Thai Noodle Meal kit from Spaa Natural foods.  The flavor is what got me – I love sweet and sour products and thought this would be a great meal to try, especially with its three dollar price ticket and all natural label!

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This is what the company’s website says about this product:

Sweet and Sour: Sweet and tangy sauce with herbs

EXPERIENCE: Real Thai meal for two in 7 minutes
TASTE: Closest the restaurant taste
WHOLESOME: Contains chucky vegetables.
SHELF STABLE: (12 months) with no preservatives added.

Impressive stats for a meal kit, especially with no preservatives.  I was a little wary of the sodium – a whopping 38% for only a third of the meal but I figured since it was just one meal, it would be okay.  The best part?  Not only was I able to pronounce all the words in the ingredients list but I even recognized them!  That’s the true test of a meal kit.

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The directions were simple to follow – boil water, add noodles, drain when soft, and then add sauce.  I went a little fancy and did the stove top directions with cut up chicken and a cup and a half of frozen vegetables.

Inside the kit is a package of dried rice noodles and another packet of sauce that is rather large.  As seen in the photo, the sauce packet was the same size as the noodles but a little bit thinner.  I was excited about this – I love dishes with a lot of sauce.

While the water for the noodles were boiling, I cut up the chicken and threw it in a pan with the vegetables and about a tablespoon of olive oil.  Juggling the stir-frying and the noodles was an easy task and I found that they were both ready to go in about seven to eight minutes.

Once the chicken and veggies were thoroughly cooked, I threw them into a medium-sized Tupperware bowl.  As a side note, the veggies were from a Bird Eye’s Asian Stir-fry frozen vegetable blend that has carrots, baby corn, broccoli, water chestnuts, sliced bell peppers, mushrooms, sugar snap peas, and onions.  It’s absolutely delicious and a great bag to have on hand for when a dish needs a little more servings of veggies.

Once the noodles were done, I added them and the sauce into the bowl with the vegetables and chicken.  The sauce smelt so good!  Kind of sweet yet a little bit of spice in the mix.  Yum!  My only beef with it?  There’s no “chunky vegetables” like the website proposes.  Thank goodness I cooked my own.

After mixing it for a couple of minutes so that everything was evenly coated, I split everything in half and placed it into two bowls – one for Alec and one for me!

The final product looked and smelled delicious – definitely not something I would have expected to come out of a triangular box.  True, it had a little help from the extras I threw in but I think the smell and the beautiful sight was all the mix’s benefit.  I took a heaping bite of it and . . .

HOLY MOLEY!

This stuff was hot!  And not temperature wise but spice wise!  Now, I’m not a wimpy kind of girl – I like my food to be spicy at times but this stuff was a lot little too spicy for me.  I checked the ingredients and at the very bottom, it mentions “fresh red chilies” but I didn’t think it would have that big of a kick!  The package also indicated that it would be mild but this was far beyond that.

I tried to eat as much as I could but the heat was overbearing and so I just picked out the meat and vegetables and slurped up a few noodles before calling it a day.  Alec didn’t even make it that far!  We both had a huge glass of water to bring down the heat but even a couple of hours later, I can still feel it in my mouth.

Aside from the heat, I could taste a bit of sweet and sour in it – a good sauce with just a little too much heat for me.  The meal was a good proportion for two people.  To complete the meal, all it would need would be a serving of bread or fruit.  The time it took to pull together was excellent – I was able to prepare everything and sit down to eat in less than twenty minutes.  My only problem with the entire thing was the heat.  I would recommend this products to others but only for those who love a highly spicy dish.

Today turned out to be a relaxing event.  Since this morning’s test was my “big” thing for the week, I’m on coasting mode until Spring Break.  After my last post, I curled up on the couch and took a little nap.  When I woke up, I watched a movie with Alec and ate a couple of hand fulls of the popcorn he had.  I don’t know what the stuff was but I do remember that it was organic and the only ingredients were air popped popping corn and sea salt.  It was amazingly good.

While I surfing the internet, catching up on some blog reading, and playing Text Twist, I’m enjoying a cup of instant hot cocoa and munching on a few caramel kisses.  There is nothing better than downtime and chocolate.

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