A couple of days ago I bought a bag of

Contessa brand frozen Orange Chicken. We'd tried the Cashew Chicken and liked it and the Orange Chicken is just as tasty.

It comes with the rice, chicken, vegetables, and sauce, is very easy and quick to prepare (I cooked the rice in the microwave and the rest in the electric skillet) and while it isn't quite like what we get in restaurants it's very good and fed us both for five dollars and a little change. The bag says there are 2.5 servings but I consider it more like 2. Even though we love the variety and quantity of buffets, eating out would cost us at least twenty bucks plus gas so we saved quite a bit and still got our chinese food fix!

An added benefit is that we didn't overeat so it was better for the pocketbook and the waistline...and that's a very good thing indeed.

If I have any criticism it's that there wasn't enough broccoli in this dish. The picture on the bag shows this lovely product with several nice looking florets of the green stuff but what we got had two very tiny florets in it. There was enough sauce that I could have added a little broccoli without much change in flavor and quality. There wasn't a lot of chicken either and the package said, "Now with 20% more chicken!" but since we're cutting back on meats that didn't bother me. More broccoli would be great, though.

We don't eat a lot of convenience foods and some might wonder why I didn't just make Orange Chicken myself. Well, in the living situation we have right now we don't have a real kitchen. I have a small sink, a microwave, three slow cookers, a digital pressure cooker, and an electric skillet. I probably could have made the same dish with the electric skillet but I've made Orange Chicken from scratch before and honestly, it was a lot of work and cost about the same as this did. This is one of the few situations where paying for the convenience is worth it for me.

For those to whom it might matter, Contessa's Orange Chicken is touted on their website as "Green Cuisine". The site says this about Green Cuisine:

"In 2007, Contessa opened the first environmentally responsible, LEED-certified frozen-food manufacturing plant in the world. Located in Los Angeles, our new plant uses advanced design and technology to significantly reduce Contessa's environmental impact. The facility, its processes and the products manufactured there are known as "Green Cuisine."

That wasn't a factor in my picking this particular item at the store but its nice to know.

So there you have it, a review of sorts of Contessa Orange Chicken. It's a winner in taste and price and will more than likely be a regular in our freezer.