Convenience Frozen Meals

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StirBlue

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What experience have you had with frozen meals? I was having a rush rush day and picked up two Marie Callender meals. They were on sale for less than half the price. While they were filling, they were not delicious. I was disappointed since they have always been so pricey. Now it seems that the whole line of Marie Callender products are on sale.
 
There are some bagged frozen skillet and crockpot dinners that are ready to go except for adding your own meat, and are pretty darned tasty!
Stouffer's brand has some good frozen dishes, also.
 
I have no experience with commercial frozen meals/meal preparations. Most of the time I depend on what's in our freezer. At the moment I have about 17 whole meals there.

Cooking for two often results in an overabundance of a main dish, so I freeze what we don't eat. Surely has helped in times of sickness, fatigue, etc. Hasn't hurt the budget either because, as Stir said, the ones in the grocery store can get pricey.
 
I do like the Marie Callender pot pies - they are pretty darn good.

The problem SB, is we COOK. At one point I would imagine these would be quite tasty. But really, when I eat a frozen meal I just taste the preservatives.

I do, like I mentioned above, LOVE the pot pies. They are quite tasty!
 
a few years ago I was staying at a self catering cottage in Derbyshire UK and picked up some Green Giant frozen dinners and they were excellent. Now I do not know if Green Giant makes different products for the foreign market, but they were definitely delicious. And I kinda have high standards for the food I injest.
 
Marie Callender frozen dishes have always been tasteless to me too; I bought a couple of the pot pies a few years ago and found bones (chicken) in it!!! After that time, I never even look at that brand. Constance is right about there being other brands that are pretty good. Both daughters have told me that the skillet and crockpot dinners are usually good.
 
I usually do all the cooking hee. But Dh does like Marie Callender pot pies. The only frozen things I buy are from Trader Joes and these are things like a package of 2 tamales, they have beef, green chile and chicken all are very good. They make a mushroom appy in pastry that my kinds love as well as tiny pizza's that the grand kids enjoy. These are a now and again type thing. As far as things from the grocery store, I pick up pre=cooked maple sausages, toaster swirls for the kids but most everyting else I make myself..
kadesma:)
 
Ok - this is a bit OT, but does anyone besides me remember the original frozen Mexican dinners? I can't recall the brand name at the moment. They were sadder than sad by today's standards, but I literally BEGGED my parents to buy them after visiting the World's Fair in Flushing, NY, & getting my first taste of enchiladas & tacos as a kid. And back then there were no Mexican restaurants around where we lived.

The frozen dinners were set up in the usual 3 aluminum compartments with a couple of enchiladas/tacos, rice, & refried beans. Lord, I absolutely LIVED for the nights when my parents would let me have one - lol!!!
 
BreezyCooking said:
Ok - this is a bit OT, but does anyone besides me remember the original frozen Mexican dinners? I can't recall the brand name at the moment. They were sadder than sad by today's standards, but I literally BEGGED my parents to buy them after visiting the World's Fair in Flushing, NY, & getting my first taste of enchiladas & tacos as a kid. And back then there were no Mexican restaurants around where we lived.

The frozen dinners were set up in the usual 3 aluminum compartments with a couple of enchiladas/tacos, rice, & refried beans. Lord, I absolutely LIVED for the nights when my parents would let me have one - lol!!!

Don't know how old you are Breezy, but I remember those dinners, too. The sauce on the enchiladas and the filling in them were just yucky but we ate them like they were fine cuisine. And, unfortunately, my mother almost always overcooked them, which only made them worse.
 
Lol - glad to hear I'm not the only one who remembers them. And I'm 51 - & proud to have lived this long & still going strong - LOL!!!!
 
We've always cooked, too, but when we were raising our grandson, and I was still working, sometimes DH had to work second shifts (3:00 to 11:00). Sometimes that happened during my busy season in the greenhouse, when I meeting myself coming and going anyway, and I found myself using a lot more convenience foods. The Stouffer's frozen dinners of all kinds really came in handy.

I'm a bit embarrassed to admit that I also bought a lot of frozen junk food when the boy was here. The kid would eat the bark off a tree if I didn't keep him fed, so I taught him how to work the oven and the microwave, and kept him supplied with Totino's Pizza Rolls, Mozzerella sticks, fish sticks, and burritos. He usually had friends with him when he came home from school, so we went through a lot of the stuff (plus anything else we had in the house).

I've tried the Marie Cavender's pot pies, and didn't think much of them. I thought they tasted kinda pasty, and they were exceptionally high in fat and sodium.
 
Weight Watchers (SmartOnes) has some pretty good ones as well. I've been a fan of the three cheese ziti. And all their desserts...droooool...
 
Personally I like Stouffer's. I guess growing up in Ohio they were the major brand. My parents would go to the factory store and buy stuff by the case cheap. We loved their french bread pizza and lasagne the best. Most of Marie Callender's stuff is okay but not great. I do prefer her pot pies to other brands and she has a great Razzleberry pie ( raspberry, blueberry mix ).
 
I buy Stouffers lasanga sometimes. Its easy and pretty tasty, not as good as homemade but after a hard day at work, its handy.
 
Frozen Foods

We started on Weight Watchers a year ago and I used to buy the SmartOnes for our lunches (quick/simple/and only on sale). They tasted fine, nothing like home cooking, but my husband's blood pressure stayed pretty high, although he lost about 40 lbs. The frozen dinners have a really high sodium content. I still buy frozen foods when they are on sale for quick meals, but prefer homemade any day.
 
The only thing I like frozen is pizza. Either Lean Cuisine or Smart Ones and an occasional DeGiorno or Freshetta pizza. Generally I consider processed food a waste of calories. Even bagged lettuce is hard for me to stomach. I do stock the freezer with my own homemade concoctions. Comes in handy and tastes so much better.
 
Well as other have said, and as my signature testifies... we try to not eat processed food, so I have no experience with these. I cook as much from scratch as is possible.

However, my mother is a huge fan of these types of meals and she has tried them all. She really likes something called "Hungry Man" meals? I have no clue about them. She says that the are her favorite. She's mentioned the one the OP is asking about and I think my mom said that there was one dish (something with alfredo in it?) that she says is good. Mom grew up eating chemicals, though, and I cooked for myself growing up and didn't. I can't stand the taste of chemicals in food. It totally ruins it.
 
kadesma said:
I usually do all the cooking hee. But Dh does like Marie Callender pot pies. The only frozen things I buy are from Trader Joes and these are things like a package of 2 tamales, they have beef, green chile and chicken all are very good. They make a mushroom appy in pastry that my kinds love as well as tiny pizza's that the grand kids enjoy. These are a now and again type thing. As far as things from the grocery store, I pick up pre=cooked maple sausages, toaster swirls for the kids but most everyting else I make myself..
kadesma:)

Like kadesma the frozen items I buy are from Trader Joe's. I particularly like their penne arrabiatta and vegetable pad thai. But similar to other prepackaged food you still need to check sodium levels and fat content.
 

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