Evian Water

Maybe you are not old enough but back in the day when this water first came out it was considered the fanciest thing a person can drink. French bottled water was considered an unnecessary, expensive, luxury for the elite.

Evian came along and changed the perception that fancy water can be for everyone. The problem with this water is that it taste like melted snow which is not a good thing. Yes I know this is supposed to be glacial spring water but has so much natural metals that it has a dirty taste, if that makes sense. I am not a fan of water in general but I can think of dozens of others brands that taste better.

Summer in New York City means a bottle of water is part of your ensemble but this is one that you rarely see. It just does not refresh. I got it for free so I do not know the current store price.

Recommendation: Avoid it for goodness sake .

LAY'S Classic Potato Chips

Compared to every other healthy chip I reviewed these greasy bags of salt were the best. Classic LAY'S Potato Chips are the standard to which all chips strive to be. Made with potatoes, vegetable oils, and salt they need nothing else. This small contains 10-15% of your bad choices for the day but it may be worth it.

There is a perfect grease to crisp ratio that few chip makers can match. Since they are more or less natural the chances of finding brown or black chips is high, although the smaller bags contain less bad chips.

The website over at Frito-Lay gives lots of information and nutritional facts. I know what the foodies may say about such a name brand item but good is good, mass production means little to my taste buds. If I could make them at home I would.

Recommendation: Buy it if you can.

Avocado Oil Potato Chips Sea Salt

From the same people who brought you the Olive Oil Potato Chips Rosemary I reviewed last time this is the Avocado Sea Salt chip. Good Health Natural Products markets this with all the health benefits of Avocado oil.

Avocado oil has lots of good fats and vitamin E but that is usually best when applied to your skin. So maybe after eating these chips I should have rubbed my face to get my money's worth. Still they had a good flavor that was not to salty or greasy. That kettle style was still annoying but that is expected when not using corn oil to fry stuff.

At $2.50 a bag it is in line with other chips but it does have 50% vitamin C which again is not bad for a snack. I like the few Good Health Natural Products chips but they lack that intense flavor I get from name brand chips.

Recommendation: Buy it if you can.

New York Pizza

Classic and known around the world as one of the best types of pizza. Virtually any neighborhood pizza joint is the same as long as they were once Italian owned. Now for you non-New Yorkers I will address your concerns.

This pizza is meant to be folded and eaten on the go and I would recommend some garlic powder and may some red pepper or whatever spice they have floating around you local pizza joint.

The complaints are usually that they are too greasy, saucy, and not crisp. All of these so called problems are from people who never had a proper slice. The grease can be blotted off or just let it drain off the end of your slice. The sauce is what makes a pizza, if there is no juicy sauce then you just have cheesy-bread. As for crispness the crust should be tough to crisp but the the center should bend a bit. I pretty sure nothing about this meal is healthy.

NY pizza is the best but that does not mean other styles are not good too the just fall short of a true pizza. I am not sure about the myth that NYC water makes the dough better but there is a logic to that.

Recommendation: Buy it if you can.

Starbucks Refreshers: Valencia Orange

Valencia Orange Starbucks VIA Refreshers™ if I want to be accurate is an instant drink that is not coffee. Although it has green coffee extract and some caffeine there is nothing coffee-like about it. I have seen these Starbucks Refreshers around and as the blazing summer heat came upon us I decided to see if this is better than iced coffee...it was not.

There three ways to get these Refreshers I chose the do it at home instant powder method. There are also Sparkling Refreshers in a can and having made at Starbucks by baristas. At five drinks for about $5.00 on sale I figured it has to be the cheapest option.

Kind of reminded me of crushed vitamin C pills or powdered candy. I followed the instructions and used 16 of cold water, added the powder, mixed well, then added ice.

It had an initially medicinal taste. After a bit of drinking that went away but it left an odd after taste. I also tried it in the blender and that just made it very bubbly and more medicine-like. On a cool day this was not going down well then on a 100 degree day it tasted much better, although at that point licking frozen chicken would have been fine.

I would not try these again or explore different flavors. I might try the canned version. They have 110% of you vitamin C and not much else. Old fashion orange juice is still better.

Recommendation: Avoid it for goodness sake.

Olde Brooklyn Flatbush Orange Soda

Soda is like a snack or dessert for me and should be as indulgent. Diet soda is awful in every way but I always give natural sodas a try. Orange soda is among the best flavored soda, when done right. Olde Brooklyn did not do it right.

Flatbush Orange Soda is bland and lacks pop. The fact that these use cane sugar should not make a difference but the glass bottle should. Most glass bottle sodas taste better because it holds the carbonation better and gets colder faster. This does not matter when the Olde Brooklyn guys do not put a lot of bubbles in the bottle, on purpose. As for the orange it is not sharp at all less like an orange more like orange extract.

It is soda so nutrition is not a factor and ingredients are mostly natural. The website lacks any kind of detail aside from a mission statement.

Recommendation: Avoid it for goodness sake.

Turback Tuscan Style Crisps: Cracked Pepper & Herb

Flavored crackers have been the best thing to come out of snack industry since flavored chips. They seem like a relatively new thing since I do not recall such varied flavors when I was kid, a long time ago. Most of the herb and spice infused chips work well while I tend to avoid the other flavors.

The Turback Tuscan Style Crisps may come in few flavors but I only saw these Cracked Pepper & Herb box. There are two foils packs on each box and contain about 36 crackers per foil. the first foil pack was a bit deflated and the crisps were less than crisp. They absorb humidity like a sponge. The second pack was better still not crisp and slightly oily they still had a good flavor. Not very peppery and subtle herbs the sea salt is also low.

Nutrition information is clear and for 12 crackers it has a fair amount of fat. Looking over the ingredients it is not a surprise that peppercorn is the last ingredient. The website is nonexistent I think the company was taken over but the new company does not show anything about these crackers or anything but one page about Turback Spices. Bought at Home Goods for $1.99 there seems to be no other place to buy them, luckily I did not fall in love with them.

Recommendation: Try it for yourself.

Double Dark Chocolate Zone Perfect Bar

I went through dozens of energy bars when I started seriously walking/jogging. I wanted something that is high protein and that could be a replacement meal. Zone Perfect Bars are great for that unfortunately I found most of their flavors horrid.

While I was not a chocolate person I did try their dark chocolate bars and they were great. There is a coffee ground flavor and texture that you may need to get use to but there entire dark chocolate series is worth it. I have eaten them as lunch and also as a snack. They will give you some energy but proper meals are still a must.

Now look at that list of ingredients and nutritional facts. This small bar is packed with goodness and made in the U.S.A., although in a lab. The Double Dark Chocolate page is packed with information easily available on the product page and not hidden like other sites. On average the bars are about $2.00 each but of course buying in bulk is better, the bigger the box the cheaper they get. Double Dark Chocolate Zone Bar on Amazon is the best but many vitamin and drug stores also sell the big boxes.

Recommendation: Buy it if you can.

Market Pantry Half Dozen Large Eggs

Market Pantry is a Target brand that is usually cheaper than traditional supermarket brands. In most cases the quality is not as good. The taste and texture is not great for their prepackaged foods. So when I saw the half dozen eggs on sale I decided to go for it since I do not see how you can mess up chicken eggs.

These large eggs seem a bit small but with all those jumbo and extra jumbo sizes in supermarkets you get use to bigger eggs. Having bought fresh farm eggs before you cannot compare the two. These Target eggs are plain and flavorless but they also are clean. Nothing is worse than eggs with bloody yolks or that gunky slimy thing attached to the yolk.

For someone who does not use a lot of eggs a half dozen from Target is great and often on sale especially around Easter. Be aware these are eggs and two of them will be about 125% of your daily allotment of cholesterol if you live a 2,000 calorie life, disregard if you are an athlete. 

Recommendation: Try it for yourself.

Olive Oil Potato Chips Rosemary

I do love chips even if I am not a big snacker. I promise I will start to review real food soon. Until then here is another bag of chips I recently picked up. Good Health Natural Products Olive Oil Potato Chips Rosemary is a long name for bag that is half empty.

Were I a real foodie I would have a bowl of the chips displayed too.

The chips are made kettle style meaning they are thicker and more crisp, translation means extra fried. They had a good crispness without cutting your mouth like other kettle chips. The top chips barely had any rosemary but the bottom ones were overwhelmed with it. I guess shaking the bag a bit may help but these were very unevenly seasoned. They are reasonable greasy and overall I enjoyed them but they are not my favorites.

Available in more locations than I thought and online these Good Health Kettle Style Olive Oil Potato Chips go for about $2.50 per 5 ounces. The website actually has a lot of information from preparation to nutritional info. Heavy in salt and fat is expected these are chips of course, surprising is the 20% Vitamin C guessing from the rosemary. Four ingredients potatoes, rosemary, sea salt, and olive oil make it all-natural.

Recommendation: Buy it if you can.

The Peanut Shop Virginia Peanuts Lightly Salted

The Peanut Shop of Williamsburg, not the Brooklyn Williamsburg made these tasty treats. These peanuts are the closest nuts I ever had that tasted like peanut butter. Oh and I do not like peanut butter. Still they were good although they lacked salt so I had to add a little more. Lightly salted should be changed to barely salted. I like roasted and unroasted nuts of all kinds so I would like to try more of these if I can find them again.

There is a lack of nutritional both on the can and on the website. I did love the allergy warning. It turns out these peanuts contains peanuts! May also have traces of tree nuts, milk, wheat, egg, and soybeans. American made they were about $5.00 for the 10.5 ounce jar and they had an oxygen remover pack inside to keep them crisp. They also had a refrigeration after opening suggestion which I found odd.

Recommendation: Buy it if you can.

Regine's Multigrain Tangy Ranch

Regine's Multigrain Tangy Ranch pita chips are actually quite good. Claiming to be all-natural they are with 7 grains, rye, wheat, oats, barley, corn, sesame seed, and flaxseed. They are crunchy but not like rocks which tends to happen with pita chips. I cannot quite place the tangy flavor and did not read the ingredients so all I can say is that they are sharp and does not require dip.

Pita chips and hummus have been making quite a splash lately and these chips would be great with bland hummus. This is an American made product although the Regine website is lacking nutritional information. Available at $2.50 or less they can be hard to find but I did pick up a bag a Home Goods.

Recommendation: Buy it if you can.