Dr. Gourmet's Food Reviews

Amy’s Light & Lean Sweet & Sour Asian Noodles

Greek Inspired Red Rice & Veggies and Light & Lean Sweet & Sour Asian Noodles

Today's new product from Amy's is from their new series of meals prompted by international cuisines. These include a Greek Inspired Red Rice & Veggies (one of today's reviews) as well as Mexican Inspired Veggies & Black Beans, Moroccan Inspired Vegetable Tagine, and Indian Inspired Vegetable Pakora.

Unfortunately, only the Mexican Inspired Veggies & Black Beans and the Greek Inspired Red Rice & Veggies are low enough in sodium content to be acceptable to us: they have 580mg and 450mg sodium each, while the Moroccan and Indian meals have 780mg and 790mg apiece.

Amy's meals tend to be higher in sodium than they need to be, and the sad truth is that it's just not necessary: when the company makes the effort to reduce the sodium content in their foods the result is often more than acceptable. Today's dishes are no exception.

As we mentioned, the Greek Inspired Rice & Veggies has an impressively low sodium content of 450 milligrams of sodium to go with 500 calories and 6 grams of fiber.

The dish has a soft but not too tart scent of vinegar - more tangy and umami with a touch of sweetness than sour or sharp. The red rice is well cooked, with a bit of chew, and the garbanzos add savor.

While the flavor is good, the package says that there's "1 cup of veggies per serving." That's only true if you are including the (soft and tasty) chunks of sweet potato in the definition of "vegetables". Technically, yes, sweet potatoes (and russet potatoes, for that matter) are vegetables.

But when there are only 5 small broccoli florets in the dish (well cooked and flavorful, to be fair), and the kale appears on the Ingredient list after the rice, broccoli, sweet potatoes, garbanzo beans, and extra virgin olive oil, I start to regard that claim of "1 cup of veggies per serving" as a bit of an exaggeration.

Worse yet, the total weight of the meal is 8.65 ounces, while a dry cup is 8 ounces.

I looked at the dish again and wondered how such a small amount of food could have 500 calories. As I mentioned above, the Ingredient list for this dish starts with the rice, then is followed by broccoli, sweet potatoes, and garbanzo beans, and then extra virgin olive oil. By weight there is more olive oil in this dish than kale, onions, feta cheese, or spices. And the Nutrition Facts bear this out: there's 29 grams of total fat in this dish: about half of the calories in this meal are from fat.

While it's great that this is extra virgin olive oil and not an oil higher in saturated fats like coconut oil, I can't help but think that Amy's could have doubled the actual amount of vegetables (which are low in calorie density) and cut back on the olive oil (higher in calorie density) and had a just as tasty meal with the same number of calories, even more fiber, and less fat.

Even so, while this might be a little bland - we could wish for more feta to enhance the flavor - it's quite a tasty dish and one of the better meals we've had from Amy's.

We last reviewed Amy's Light Lean Sweet & Sour Asian Noodles back in 2014, when the dish had 250 calories, 610 milligrams of sodium, and 4 grams of fiber.

It's grown a bit since then, and not necessarily for the better: it's now 260 calories, but has 640 milligrams of sodium and 3 grams of fiber. A few more calories, more salt, less fiber.

It's still good, however, if a little salty-tasting.

The rice noodles are impressive - they hold up well to microwaving and have the firm bite of (almost) wheat-based noodles. The tofu is just the slightest bit rubbery, however, but there are tons of veggies, from red bell peppers to broccoli to green beans, all with a bright crunch.

Unlike many frozen sweet and sour dishes, this doesn't come across as sickly sweet in the least. It has an assertive soy and sesame flavor to balance the sweetness from the pineapple juice and still may be the best dish we've had from Amy's.

Comparing this dish at 260 calories to the Greek dish at 500 - Amy's could easily add a few more noodles, a ton of veggies, and just a little more sauce to the dish to bring it to 500 calories while keeping the sodium to calorie ratio lower and increasing the volume of the dish. That would make this a full and satisfying meal. Even at its current size, with a piece of fruit to go with it, a good choice.

Read all reviews of Amy's products »

Posted: April 23, 2021