Frozen Friday: Stouffer's - Grandma's Chicken and Vegetable Rice Bake

Stouffer's Grandma's Chicken and Vegetable Rice Bake features chunks of white meat chicken, vegetables, and rice in a cheddar cheese sauce.

A 17-ounce box was $2 on sale.

When I saw this at the supermarket, it looked much like a cheddar version of Stouffer's Chicken a la King and there are a fair number of similarities.

There's the rice, which was moist and fluffy without becoming soggy.

There's the vegetables, which are actually crisper here and consists of a slightly different assortment that tasted mostly the same.

Then there's the chicken, which was relatively moist and plentiful.

The major differences come down to the cheddar sauce (versus the creamy gravy of Chicken a la King) and the breadcrumbs that the bake finds sprinkled on top of it. The first makes a fair amount of difference, while the second makes almost none at all.

The cheddar sauce has a mild and creamy cheddar taste accompanied by the sharp bite of excessive salt that made the first few bites hard to eat until I got used to it (probably not a good thing). If there was less sauce to go around this might have been fine, but there was enough sauce to cover every bit of the meal.

Adding breadcrumbs to a meal that will most likely be microwaved is always a head-scratcher for me. I'd understand if it came in a separate packet (or maybe a crisping sleeve), but breadcrumbs in the microwave usually turn out soggy with very little (if any) of the desired crispiness.

Overall, the general flavor and quality of Stouffer's Grandma's Chicken and Vegetable Rice Bake was pretty good but the extra hit of salt ruined it for me and the breadcrumbs, while a nice thought, are a lost cause in the microwave. I'll stick with their Chicken a la King.

Nutritional Info - Stouffer's Grandma's Chicken and Vegetable Rice Bake (481g)
Calories - 660 (from Fat - 260)
Fat - 28g (Saturated Fat - 10g)
Sodium - 1480mg
Carbs - 68g (Sugar - 8g)
Protein - 34g