What does Amy's Kitchen Know About Thai?

We're not huge soup-in-a-can fans. To buy this stuff, I usually have to be sick or, since you know I'm a sucker for marketing copy, looking to give something new a shot.

We had a bad experience with a corn chowder lately. It was on sale at Whole Foods and part of a line called Bar Harbor that seemed to be upscale and from New England (what could be bad about New England corn chowder or anything New England?... as you may know, we are in love), so we tried it. It was tinny with no flavor - a big disappointment (the potatoes tasted like canned potatoes - and in a way they were). My husband claims he is ruined and will never eat canned soup again.

Anyway, so why did I take another leap today and buy the Amy's Soups Tom Kha Phak (Thai Coconut) soup? I was very skeptical, but it appealed to me as an easy and exotic dinner.

Now, if you get turned off by oil floating on the top of your soup, you should stop reading.

For everyone else, here's the scoop. When you open the can you see a milky, curdlike substance that smells wonderful. You just dump it into a saucepan and heat - but not too much - as the label warns. As the temperature of the soup increases, what looked like curdled milk disappears, but here's where the oil slick comes in...there is a layer of oil floating on the top of the soup. Now, this soup is not lowfat by any means since it contains coconut milk (13g of fat to be exact) and sunflower oil (high oleic, which is good for you), but I was a little surprised to see so much oil beading on the surface (a little is normal based on my experience of eating Tom Ka Gai in Thai restaurants for the last decade).

So you want to know how it tastes? Well...it was fine, definitely edible unlike the New England Corn Chowder, but not spectacular. It did resemble the Thai soup I'm used to, but unfortunately the aroma was much better than the taste. It seemed to be missing something - maybe fresh lime juice or fish sauce? It just didn't have that POW! that authentic Thai soups have - most of which leave me saying that I could eat Thai soup every day.

The bottom line is that for $2.29 I would buy the Amy's Soups Tom Kha Phak (Thai Coconut) soup again, if I had no other Thai options available to me or if I were vegan (which I'm not) and needed a quick meal. That means I probably wouldn't buy it again...and to answer my question, well, I think Amy's should stick to the less exotic fare.

Alexia Garlic Baguette

I work in an office two days a week. On those days when my husband and I get home after six, our freshly-prepared home-cooked meals are few and far between if we want to stick to our daughter's bedtime schedule (even if we could pull something together from scratch, I'm not sure we'd have any extra bandwidth or desire to want to think about chopping and measuring). So, we rely on either take-out (it's never too early to introduce chinese food to the kids!) or a quick dinner made with the help of our "friends".

Many times we choose the ever-popular spaghetti with sauce and garlic bread (and spinach salad thrown in for good measure). Well, I have to tell you about this garlic bread that I found in the freezer section of Whole Foods. It's called Garlic Baguette from Alexia. It's part of their Artisan Breads product line. It has no trans fats, unlike most other brands you may find in a conventional supermarket. It's made with real butter and does it taste good! We just pop our loaf in the toaster oven, which starts preheating as soon as we get in the door (takes less time and uses less energy than our full-sized oven). Bake it for just eight minutes and, voila, you've got some delicious garlic bread. It comes out so nice and crispy on the outside with a soft center of butter, garlic and herbs. There are four servings per pack and each serving only has 4.5g of total fat and 3g of saturated fat!

I've noticed that this bread flies from the shelves at our local Whole Foods, but I think I've also seen it at Genuardi's (owned by Safeway). Although we usually eat it with spaghetti, my husband had a rather indulgent, but so delightful, idea of using this bread to make meatball hoagies! How good would that be! The best part of this bread is the price. It's retail price is $1.69 per loaf, but it's often on sale for $1.50. You can also visit the Alexia website to get a $0.50 coupon! What a great deal and, trust me, once you try it you'll be buying in bulk.

For those of you who would prefer to make your own homemade garlic bread, I invite you to check out 101 Cookbooks, for Heidi's dad's recipe, or Everyday Food, for a version that uses boiled garlic cloves to take away the garlic bite.

Milk Chocolate Covered Banana Chips

My new obsession started on the car ride home from my local friendly Trader Joe's...toddler safely buckled in carseat, car in drive and dying to bust into my Trader Joe's Milk Chocolate Covered Banana Chips. Just a little mid-morning pick-me-up snack for the mom of a 2-year-old who has a lot of energy during the day and in the middle of the night.

I quickly grabbed a handful of chips, keeping both eyes planted on the road. These little morsels ranged in size from a pencil eraser head to the size of my pinky finger - nail to knuckle. I first noticed the texture - smooth, but a little bumpy, on the outside and crunchy on the inside. The crunch wasn't what I expected at all - maybe I was thinking that since bananas are soft these would be, too, but silly me, of course they would be crunchy since they are called "Banana Chips". After my second handful, I concentrated on the smooth milk chocolate flavor. Now, I've been trying to train my taste buds to appreciate dark chocolate given the flavonoid benefits, but truth be told I am a milk chocolate lover at heart...good milk chocolate (Cadbury from Ireland to name one), not Hershey's (I wholeheartedly agree with you David - see David Lebovitz's humorous post on Hershey's). Well, this creamy milk chocolate is definitely one on my "love it!" lists. No off flavors here. On the other hand, the banana flavor is a little lacking, but certainly doesn't take away from the overall addictivity (is that a word?) of these treats.

Check them out on your next trip to TJ's. $3.49 per 10.5 oz.

Trader Joe's Frosted Shredded Wheats

Some people are addicted to chocolate, some to potato chips, and some to crack (hey, I'm sorry but it's true and I certainly don't endorse this addiction).

I'm addicted to breakfast cereal.

I don't know what it is about cereal, but it's one food that I love to eat at any time of the day. Breakfast - of course, it's a staple! Lunch - sure when there's nothing else to eat! Dinner - definitely when the husband is away and I don't feel like cooking! Snack - yes indeed, at any time of the day!

One cereal that I can't get enough of is Trader Joe's Frosted Shredded Wheats. This frosted shredded wheat cereal is perfect. I've had a long-running affair with frosted shredded wheat, starting with Kellogg's in high school (which I found resulted in a mouth full of dry cardboard "wheat", but aside from that you need to check out their mini wheats mascot - so cute!), then a variety of store-brand versions (trying to save money throughout college). And, finally, my favorite for years has been the Trader Joe's brand.

There are so many things I love about it. The squares are the perfect size and the wheat is compacted to just the right density. They are really thin with a crispy frosted shell - and this is what melts my heart - the shell stays crisp even after swimming in the milk for a few minutes. Trust me, I've tested this many times as my daughter requires my attention asking for "more waffles" or "more mango". It's almost as if the little squares pause from absorbing too much milk just to wait for me to sit back down and start eating again. There is no partially hydrogenated oil and no corn syrup baked into these goodies. However, they are a little high in sugar at 11g per serving, but that is somewhat balanced with the 5g of fiber. Add some fresh strawberries, raspberries or blueberries to the bowl with some organic milk and you will be ready to climb a mountain.

I've also noticed that the squares are uniformly made with very few imperfections. What I mean by this is that they all have the same texture and mouth feel. Haven't you ever had the bag of cheese Jax where some of them are puffy soft and melt in your mouth and some could break a tooth? Product consistency is not an issue here at all.

If you are thinking about buying shredded wheat from TJ's you need to be prepared for choice. They come in a wide variety of flavors...Frosted, Vanilla, Maple, Cinnamon. I have tried most of these and have always found my way back to the original frosted wheats in the blue box. They have just the right sweetness (the Maple version was so sweet that even me, the girl with 32 sweet teeth, could not stomach).

Did I mention the price? If you are like me and love cereal you know that those cute boxes cost a small fortune, especially for someone who eats through 1.5 boxes a week. At just $2.99, Trader Joe's Frosted Shredded Wheats are a bargain!

We're Trans Fat Free, But Now What?

For years, my husband and I have been trying our best to avoid trans fats. We have been reading food labels closely and shunning all foods containing partially hydrogenated oil. Discussions with friends and family members about the topic and my vehement stance against trans fats have resulted in a lot of interest and just as many rolled eyes. After what seems like eternity of thinking that the ingredient lists were never going to change, I'm so happy to see a drastic change of events.

Large food corporations, the government, the media and the medical and scientific communities are now backing the detriments of trans fats. Entire cities - New York and Philadelphia - have passed a mandate that restaurants are not allowed to cook with oils containing trans fats. Whole Foods has a company policy that they will not sell anything in their stores that contains any partially hydrogenated oil, or trans fats. Trader Joe's is working toward eliminating the same (however, I have found that certain frozen "chinese-style" stir fries, a couple cookie varieties and panko bread crumbs still contain trans fat so keep vigilant. I should note that upon confrontation of management on several occassions, they assure me that, while there is no imminent company policy changes being made like Whole Foods, they are working toward removing it from all products.)

So, what now? Well, in my opinion, the fight is not over on two fronts.

1. The government is allowing companies to include less than .5g of trans fat per serving and claim that there are "no trans fats" on the product packaging (most of the time in a very prominent manner on the front of the packaging and in the Nutrition Facts grid on the back). I see this as deceptive and am concerned that folks who don't know what ingredients to look for (e.g. partially hydrogenated oils) may not know that these products still contain trans fats. It's super-scary to think that people could be eating more than one serving at a time thinking that they are safe with this "no trans fat" claim on the packaging, but in reality be ingesting a couple grams of the stuff.

2. Now that we've removed partially hydrogenated oil from foods, what do we replace it with? I've observed that most respectable companies will use poly- or mono-unsaturated fats such as olive, canola, sunflower, or safflower oil, but some are not. Some are replacing trans fats in hydrogenated oils with saturated fats in pure oils such as palm or coconut oils. The New York Times ran an article that talks about this very topic.

Bottom line is that we all still need to be cautious about what we eat. And, when you eat out, you are taking a chance that your food will contain trans fats or saturated fats.

For more information about trans fats, visit Ban Trans Fats and Wikipedia's Trans Fats entry.

Welcome to Love Good Food!

The food reviews in my head are finally coming alive! Thanks for checking out this new blog featuring reviews of natural and organic foods found at your local market or at specialty stores such as Trader Joe's, Whole Foods, etc.

If you've ever wanted to ask other shoppers in the market, "have you tried this?" and "did you like it?" this is the place for you.

A sucker for good marketing copy and a pretty picture on food packaging, I am willing to try anything that I can convince myself is trending toward healthy (a big NO to anything with partially hydrogenated oils and it takes something really special with corn syrup to get into my pantry). Some might call these convenience foods, snacks, or trash, but most of the time we call them tasty. Now, with that said, I am a firm believer in cooking from scratch and believe that the majority of dinners I serve my family should be made from fresh ingredients. But, truthfully, we all know that packaged items come in handy and I feel comfortable knowing that the items I choose are made with real ingredients, not a two-inch-long list of chemicals I can't pronounce.

My job here is to share my great finds with you, and I hope you will share yours with me.