Boston Market

Check out Boston Market's website here. See if maybe they're hiding something...

J-LAM SAYS:

I love Boston Market. I really do. I mean, let's be honest: as a Terrific-or-Turd aficianado, you know I've eaten some things that probably have to bribe someone just to be considered food. I'm probably not as picky as I should be, considering a family history of being fat and bald. And maybe I should make a more concerted effort to eat "real food" as a more significant percentage of my daily intake.

But, I'm also a busy guy. I've got a family depending on me bringing home the bacon, so I'm stuck in the rat race. (Sorry about the mixed metaphor and inappropriate food reference.) Therefore, as a red-blooded American in need of at least 1200 calories per meal, at a rate of no less than 100 calories per second spent consuming them, fast food is pretty much my only option.

Now, when I walk into a Boston Market, I'm greeted with (in my humble opinion,) the best of both worlds! Here, spread before me (behind a wisely-placed sneeze shield) is a veritable smorgasbord of steaming-hot side dishes to tack onto a main course of hot and juicy rotisserie chicken.

THAT'S REAL FOOD!

AND IT'S ALREADY READY ALREADY!

THAT'S REAL, FAST FOOD!

So, I'm impressed from the start. I chose the cheapest meal, the 3-piece dark, which comes with two thighs and a drumstick and two heaping sides, plus a piece of cornbread. I ordered up the sweet corn with garlic butter and the creamed spinach.

Wipe off your mouth! You're drooling!

I know I was. And it was on my plate, ready to eat in under three minutes.

Awesome.

So where's the dark side? What is Boston Market hiding? How can so much goodness really be good?

Well, here's my thought: unsuspecting diners may be choosing Boston Market as opposed to Burger King or McDonalds because they assume that the "real food" they are going to consume MUST be healthier than the burgers and fries they'll get elsewhere.

Problem is, they're not. My meal, small in comparison to many of the full meals available, weighed in at (yikes) 1120 calories, (double yikes) 61 grams of fat and (holy yikesarama!) 2275 milligrams of sodium! And that's not counting the 290 calories, 11.5 grams of fat and 390 milligrams of sodium I racked up splitting a fudge brownie with B-Com for dessert! I discussed this matter in great depth with him while we ate, and he seemed intrigued. He even thanked me for bringing it to his attention, which is the only reason I decided to go into such depth on the matter in the blog.

So, bottom line: I love Boston Market. The flavor and speed make it a guaranteed TERRIFIC regardless of just about any other factors. Just don't think you're automatically eating healthy because you need fork to shove it down your pie hole.

TERRIFIC!

B-Com Says:

I'm willing to bet that J-Lam's post is going to be all about bashing the nutritional value of Boston Market's offerings. He spent a solid 20 minutes while I was trying to eat, going on and on and on about how this place is trying to "trick" us into thinking we're eating healthy, and how they must be hiding something.

And I'm giving him my best blank stare, but it's not working, he just keeps spewing his thoughts (and more than a few kernels of corn, too) while I listen. Finally, I thought to myself, "preach on, J-Lam" and started considering what I would write in the blog about his rediculous tirade. But hey, he's a fun lunch partner.

Look. Do I sit down at Boston Market thinking I'm automatically eating healthy? No.

Is it possible to eat healthy here? Yes.

They have a gorgeous side of steamed vegetables staring at me. I went stuffing and gravy.

I can't believe they left the skin on this half-chicken I bought! I dip it in the gravy and chow down.

Who the hell put this butter on my corn bread?!?!?! Yup, me.

My point is, Boston Market isn't doing anything shady. Far from it. They're serving up a full meal, fast, hot, tasty and delicious. (Did I really mean to write both tasty and delicious? Yes, I believe I did.) I am actually very impressed that no matter what type of diet you're on, if any at all, there are meal components that fit that lifestyle. And nothing feels forced, like the God-forsaken "Atkins Whopper" that you could order at BK back when everyone was doing Atkins. (Yeah, you guessed it -- they took away the bun, piled up the rest inside a bowl and stuck a fork in the top. No, I don't feel like a dork carrying THAT back to my seat!)

Boston Market is a little pricey for fast food -- about $10 per person, with room to add more if we wanted bigger meals -- but they definitely hit the mark on every other level, so that makes it worth the price.

TERRIFIC!

Rockin' Nut Road Snickers

As soon as B-Com reached for it I thought "Oh God. This is not going to be good." You know what? I was right. The Snickers Site is conspicuously sans Rockin' Nut Road. (Maybe they know something you don't!) But we will more than make up for it. Buckle up kids, it's going to be a bumpy, Rockin' Nut Road.

B-Com Says:
I have to ask myself a question each time I pick up a "limited edition" item based off a staple classic of the genre. I'm 36 years old, and Snickers has been essentially unchanged for as long as I can remember. It is a perennial favorite. It's pedigree is not to be taken lightly. I've found in similar circumstances in the past that a company can make an irreplacable classic (like the Snickers bar,) and yet are curiously incapable of "improving upon" the original, no matter how hard they try. Examples:

• Snickers Peanut Butter and Dark Snickers. (When I tried Dark Snickers, I couldn't chew the thing. Not sure what's up with that, but I don't see people whipping out a Dark Snickers and chowing down as they're walking through the office, so I have to assume others feel as I do.)
• Reese's Peanut Butter Cup with the chocolate cookie. Remember those? You're not alone.
• How about Crystal Pepsi? The product's multi-million dollar advertising blitz was followed by a six-month flame out. I can still get my hands on some (thank you eBay) but do I want to? No.
  
• And perhaps the biggest atrocity in this category: The New Knight Rider. What NBC exec green-lighted this fiasco? Hello? Hasselhoff and the souped up Trans Am were cheesy the first go around. It became a cult classic because it was bad!! You really think the concept deserved a rehash?

Anyway, we're here to discuss the Rockin' Nut Road Snickers bar. It tags itself as dark chocolate, almonds and marshmallow-flavored nougat. As I mentioned above, the last time I tried a Snickers bar covered in dark chocolate, I had a tough time biting through it. This one was surprisingly well-textured and soft. However, the flavor of the dark chocolate overpowered the other flavors to the point that it dwarfed the marshmallow and nuts. I doubt they would have gone through the trouble of naming it after Rocky Road if they intended for me not to notice the nuts and marshmallow. This unfortunately named Snickers bar is definitely a

TURD.

J-Lam Says:

Like I mentioned in the introduction, I wanted to run away as soon as I saw what it was. It was the marshmallow that threw me. I don't have fond memories of campfire S'mores or of roasting marshmallows with my Boy Scout buddies. My only vivid childhood memory regarding marshmallows is what I like to call "The Microwave Mushroom Cloud" which was an experiment gone bad when I was about eight years old. It proved two things: 1) A marshmallow nuked on high for 45 seconds will grow to the size of a basketball before exploding and 2) a basketball-sized marshmallow exploding inside a microwave oven takes about six hours to clean up.

This horrific incident aside, I've never been really fond of marshmallows anyway, so it seems to me that nougat artificially-flavored to taste like marshmallows may be worse. And if that equation could become even scarier, I submit this mind-bender: What the hell is nougat anyway? I mean, we eat this stuff all the time, but I challenge anyone reading this blog to explain in three sentences or less what nougat is! The comments button is right over there. Go ahead.

So, needless to say I was not expecting to like it, but I took one for the home team and popped it in my mouth. I pretty much got what I expected. I'm a fan of dark chocolate and almonds, but the marshmallow-flavored-whatever-it-is ruined those ingredients. I did not have a chance to enjoy them because I was too busy trying to get that funky marshmallow flavor out of my teeth. Not only does this Snickers bar look like one, it really is a

TURD!

Burger King's Angry Whopper

Burger King has introduced another of its gimmick Whoppers, and who's there to make sure it's safe for the masses? Terrific or Turd.

First, consider this...

Angry Whopper

880 Calories

55 g. Fat (18 Saturated, 2 Trans)

1670 mg. Sodium

59 g. Carbs

3 g. Fiber

13 g. Sugar

37 g. Protein

Angry Triple Whopper

1360 Calories

91 g. Fat (33 Saturated, 4 Trans)

1680 mg. Sodium

59 g. Carbs

3 g. Fiber

13 g. Sugar

77 g. Protein

B-Com Says:

After taking the picture above, then sitting down to my "regular size" Angry Whopper, minus the jalepenos (yeah, I'm a wuss,) I was reminded of a comedy bit done by Dave Attel about "time travel." Of course, he's talking about how when you drink too much, sometimes you black out and wake up at another bar... or seven years down the road.

I'm reminded of this story because I remember the first time J-Lam and I tried a gimmick Whopper from Burger King, it was the KONG Whopper, which I made sure to order for him with extra EVERYTHING including a fourth patty! That afternoon, about two hours after he downed that sucker, J-Lam called me to tell me he had suddenly felt very light-headed and chilled, he had rushed to the bathroom, planted himself on the john, and promptly "time traveled" for about ten minutes. He blamed it on the burger.

So, I picked up my Whopper with trepidation. Will I time travel this time?

Having been fairly disappointed the last time we did this (the horrendous Indiana Jones Whopper,) I was not expecting much any way, time travel or not.

But my first bite turned that around in a hurry. I was amazed how the burger wizards had melded so many ingredients very different from the standard Whopper (bacon, crispy fried onion, funky red-yellow-orange sauce) and yet the flavors meshed flawlessly. I genuinely enjoyed this fast food burger.

I did not even consider the nutritional facts. When I pulled them up back at the office, I was, of course, horrified by what I just put in my body. But, it was so good... I might just do it again!

TERRIFIC!

J-Lam Says:

Now look. You're walking into a restaurant where you order your food standing up from bright, image-laden menus on the ceiling above you. Your host wears a maroon polo shirt and a matching visor cap. You decide whether you want the kid's meal just so you can play with the 3-inch-tall Barbie they're offering this week, and you carry your food to your table on an unbreakable brown plastic tray.

All things considered, if you've delved this far into America's fascination with early death, why would you come back to the office and look up the nutritional facts? You know you're killing yourself. There's, like, a Surgeon General's warning on the entrance isn't there?

Anyway, that being said, I too was taken aback by the day's worth of nutrients I inhaled in the ten bites it took me to finish my Angry Triple Whopper.

As you know, I'm a huge Whopper fan... in more ways than one. And whenever we try one of their new variations, B-Com insists I go super-size. I hate to see him whine and stamp his feet, so I comply. If my wife is reading this, let me make it clear that I did not order fries. That would have been suicidal, and probably was a contributing factor to the whole Time Travel episode B-Com mentioned.

I ordered the Angry Whopper just as it comes, including the jalepenos. (I am not a wuss, at least when it comes to hot things.) I thought the whole presentation was excellent. The new Angry Sauce was really tasty - a combination of sweet and spicy that brought to mind honey-mustard and Red Hot, although that may not be accurate. The crispy fried onions were a delicious touch, and the plain old Whopper goodness still showed through all that to make for a spectacular burger experience.

The only thing I would suggest is if you order it with the jalepenos, make sure the pimply-faced kid in back spreads them out evenly. Even if you're not a wuss, a bite with nine jalepeno slices in it because they were all thrown on in a pile is no fun.

TERRIFIC!