Explore Asian Ready-to-Heat Meals

Good morning and happy Friday!

If, like me, you love to peruse health food stores any chance you get, than you likely have seen, if not tried Explore Asian's line of bean pastas.

I used to buy them frequently until suddenly they got super expensive. Like, WTF? They seriously seemed to double in price over night!

Anyways, they're awesome! They're vegan, organic and gluten-free and have a wonderful firm texture. I adore them.

Recently my health food store had a sale on their ready-to-heat line of noodle packs. I'd never seen them before, but having been a fan of Tasty Bite meals as a grad student, I am not above trying this kind of thing. In fact, I've been super busy lately and often in need of a meal I can prepare quickly or heat up at the office and these are perfect.

The noodles are precooked and mixed with a sauce, but junk-free. The ingredient list is pretty clean. I bought the soybean noodles with sundried tomato sauce, and though cane sugar is on the list, its the second last ingredient. Not so bad.

The package says its 2-250 calorie servings. Huh? For a hamster maybe! I knew I'd be eating the whole thing, and even then, I wasn't certain it would be enough food for me. To bulk it up and increase the nutrition, I added 2 spiralized zucchinis, some fresh basil, and chopped sundried tomatoes.

I am pleased to say it was really yummy and, perhaps because the whole package provides 27 grams of protein, I felt satisfied for quite a while afterwards. The package says you can microwave it right in the pouch, but I don't like doing that, so I transferred it to a Corningware dish first. It took just 2 minutes to heat!

These are definitely a much healthier choice than frozen dinners or take-out meals most folks get for lunch.

I would love to buy these again for a quick meal...but only if I find them on sale! Though if you buy your lunch every day, even the regular price on these is probably less than what you usually spend.

I hope you have a lovely weekend. We get our oldest child back (from my parents) today, and then its a pretty quiet weekend. I have to see clients tomorrow, but I'm hoping we can fit in some fun, family activities.

Comments

Japanese 7-Spice Kelp Noodles

I love trying new spices and seasonings, so I am very excited that the President's Choice Black Label line now has a bunch of new spice blends available. My most recent find: Shichimi Togarashi, or Japanese 7-Spice blend. It's a combination of crushed red chili flakes, sea salt, Szechiuan peppercorns, black and white sesame seeds, poppy seeds, orange zest, wasabi powder and nori seaweed flakes. I make Japanese-inspired dishes all the time, but resort to the same old flavours most of the time: miso, soy, sesame, ginger and garlic. I was so excited to be able to liven things up a bit. This dish is easy and tasty, although be warned that this seasoning packs punch. I used 1 tsp, which ended up being too spicy for me, and I have a high tolerance for heat! I recommend 1/4-1/2 tsp, or, if you don't like heat at all, make your own at home and omit the red chili flakes. You'll get all the flavour without the heat. I served these noodles with a mix of seafood (

Book Review: The A to Z of Children's Health

Hey there, welcome to Monday! We had a delightful, relatively quiet weekend. How was yours? Hopefully no one in your home was sick...there is a lot of nasty stuff going around these days. If you're a parent, than you have probably spent far more time that you would like to desperately searching Google and/or parenting books trying to figure out if your child's rash, cough or fever warrants a trip to the doctor or if there is something that can be done to treat it. It's hard not to worry that it could be something more ominous that just an every day infection and while you'd make yourself (and everyone around you) nuts if you panicked every time your kid has the sniffles, as a parent, you naturally want to do everything in your power to prevent your child from harm. Recently I was sent The A to Z of Children's Health , written by doctors Jeremy Friedman, Natasha Saunders, and Norman Saunders, of Toronto's very own Hospital for Sick Children . One of th

How to Look Like a Celebrity

Okay, I know you're going to be interested in this post! I am sure virtually every woman in North America has wondered how Hollywood celebrities achieve such 'perfect' bodies. Well, at CAN FIT PRO last week, one of Hollywood's top fitness trainers, Eric the Trainer , was there to tell us fitness professionals the secrets! Eric the Trainer, gave several presentations, and I caught the one on Celebrity Secrets, and it was most interesting!!! I also found some of what he said rather disturbing. First off, he was very upfront about the fact that celebrities come to him for improve their appearance. Not to improve their health or athletic performance. To look their best. He admitted that his approach then, is entirely dedicated to that end. Male and female celebrities are trained in completely different ways because Hollywood wants women to be lithe and thin and in his words, "look like they dropped out of heaven looking this way without every having ste

Healthy Life Lessons

Search This Blog