eDiets Dinner Review: Barbecued Chicken, Baked Beans, and Green Beans & Corn

by Marianne Plunkert                                   

Overall rating:  3.5 of 5

Meal Description and Cooking Instructions

This eDiets barbecued chicken dinner entrée arrived in a 2-compartment plastic tray.  A small slice of chicken breast with about a tablespoon of barbecue sauce and approximately 1/8 cup of baked beans occupied one of the two sections.  The second section held about 1/4 cup of a corn and green beans mixture.

The instructions called for microwaving the meal on high for 1 to 1 ½ minutes.  I increased the time to 1 minute 45 seconds, as usual, and, as usual, it was the perfect amount of time.

I was to supply items from the fruit and non-fat dairy food groups to supplement the entrée.  I put some blackberries in the blender with 6 ounces of nonfat Greek yogurt and spooned it into a bowl.

Barbecued Chicken, Baked Beans, and Green Beans & Corn

My General Impressions

The meal was colorful enough, with the green beans and golden corn, red hue chicken fillet, brown beans, and purple yogurt, although it wasn’t as eye-popping and enticing as some of the previous meals I’ve had since I started the program.

It wasn’t as delectable as many of the eDiets meals I’ve enjoyed thus far, either.  Although the chicken was flavorful enough, it was a little on the dry side, even with the barbecue sauce spread over it.

The baked beans stuck together as though they had too heavy a coating of molasses, although there was no taste of molasses in this side dish.  In fact, it was pretty flavorless altogether.

In contrast to the baked beans, both the green beans and corn were cooked to a nice crisp-tender texture.  Unfortunately, like the baked beans, this side of vegetables was bland as well, though.

Nutritional Content

It wasn’t an easy task getting the nutritional information for this meal. The nutrition label was missing from the back of the plastic tray in which this meal arrived.  I visited the eDiets website to try to obtain some information, but I was unable to find it there.  So, I called the customer service number. 

I requested to speak to a nutritionist, and the customer service representative said she would have one contact me within 24 hours.  I wasn’t particularly pleased with this response since this was the 4^th time I had tried to contact eDiets nutritional support, and I had yet to receive a call back on my previous 3 attempts.

I informed her of this and asked if she might be able to provide me with the nutritional information for this meal.  She gave me a website address where I could supposedly find nutritional information for all the eDiets meals. Unfortunately, the address didn’t work.  (Color me frustrated!)

This story does have a happy ending, however.  This time around an eDiets nutritionist called me back within 24 hours.  He was able to look up the nutritional information for the meal. It contains 250 total calories, 50 of which are from fat, 21 grams of protein, and 29 grams of carbs, with 3 grams of fiber and 9 grams of sugar.

My contributions to the meal provided me with a full serving each of dairy and fruit.  The chicken represents a serving of protein, and the green beans and corn a serving from the vegetable section of the food pyramid.

Food Rating/Quality

I rate this meal as a “3.5” on a scale of 1 to 5.  It wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t as good as it might have been.  The chicken wasn’t moist and tender as I’ve come to expect from eDiets, and the baked beans were tasteless and had a sticky texture. 

The best part of the meal was the side of green beans and corn.  I enjoyed the combined textures of the two vegetables tremendously, but the dish could have used some seasoning.