Comfortably Baked

I've noticed a new trend with frozen meals.  A baked experience, when something actually comes out of the microwave.  I know that some things like Hot Pockets use those special crisping sleeves to cook up the outside and give them that oven baked crust/outside.  That whole process is pretty cool and the susceptor basically takes the energy created by the microwave and redistributes it as conduction or infrared radiation.  Science!  Anyways, seeing this made me wonder what they were going to do to the container to "bake" it.  I knew I was going to eat one anyways (it's a hard life blogging about mac n' cheese), but now there was curiosity of how it was going to cook bugging me and I quickly added it to my eat this one right away list.

The Review

Brand:

Marie Callenders Comfort Bakes Mac & Cheese

Price:

$3.99 at Safeway

Packaging Description:

(On Front)

From my kitchen to yours since 1948.  Oven baked taste from the microwave 350 ^ Delicious Calories (per serving)

(On Back)

Enjoy Oven Baked Taste from your Microwave! With special attention to detail and quality ingredients - Marie's Mac & Cheese meal tastes just like homemade.  Our special Even Bake Tray makes it taste like it came out of the oven.

Preparation:

*Remove the tray from the box

Originally I had this comment saying why would they had to mark this tray as single use only since these paper trays don't survive the cooking process let alone a cleaning and reuse, but now that I've written the intro, I put two and two together and now realize that there is a susceptor inside, and those only survive one cooking.

*Cut a slit in the plastic film.

*Put it in the microwave and cook for five to six minutes.  I split the difference as usual and cooked it for 5:30.
*Once the meal has finished it's run in the microwave, let it stand for two minutes to cool.

I wasn't sure where to cut the slit, or how long it should be, so I cut one down the whole side of the tray.  It worked, though I don't know why I was surprised that it did. This isn't rocket science I'm doing here.

*After cooling, remove the plastic film and give it a stir.

No stir....

Stirred!

*Commence with the nomming!

Taste:

I got a reasonably strong smell of cheese out of the microwave (thanks large slit in the plastic!).  The sauce had a good consistency and wasn't overly watery or thick.  The noodles were quite overcooked and mushy.  The sauce was very cheesy and it had a nice cheddar taste, with a little bit of a twang of a sharp cheddar cheese.

Final Score:

While the noodles were really overcooked and that kind of killed it, the sauce was quite good, which was a surprise.  Good enough for me to overlook the noodles. However, this was another in the line of more than one serving in the tray meals. Even worse, this one is REALLY bad for you even just as a single serving, so be wise when digging into it.  Draw that line in the middle and do not cross it.  Otherwise you've just taken in most of your salt and fat for the day on this meal.  And even though it's pretty tasty considering, it's not so great to justify that many calories.

Nutritional Information:
Serving Size 1cup (209g)
Servings Per Container about 2

Calories350
Calories From Fat 190
Total Fat 21g (32% Daily Value)
Saturated Fat 11g (55% DV)
Trans Fat 0.5g
Cholesterol 45mg (15% DV)
Sodium 690 mg (29% DV)
Potassium 290mg (8% DV)
Total Carbohydrates 26g (9% DV)
Dietary Fiber 2g (8% DV)
Sugars 2g
Protein 14g