Foodmomiac

Dream Dinners Responds!

Longtime readers will remember my Dream Dinners saga. Well, lately, I've noticed quite a bit of traffic coming to the site and reading those pages, and I became a bit curious. Turns out, some Dream Dinners franchise owners and/or employees have been reading through my account and getting upset. One of these women emailed me, and has given me permission to reprint her email in its entirety, provided I keep her anonymous:

I just have to say a few things in response to your comments on Dream
Dinners:

First of all, contrary to what you said, Dream Dinners has a contract
nationwide with Sysco, so the product you get at one DD will be the same you
get at another.  All of our ingredients are specified.  And no, we don't use
"Sysco" brand salsa... we use Casa Solana.

Perhaps had you left the dumplings in a little longer they would not have
been so doughy.  "Note the raw, oozing biscuit dough (I cooked the time
suggested)"..... that's just it, SUGGESTED.  Every oven is different. 
Enough said.

However I do find it ironic that you had time to photograph and document
every dinner that you ate, but then complained that it took you an hour and
a half to prepare one of the meals.

Dream Dinners has an executive chef that develops recipes and specifically
tests them through the freezing process.  Not everyone has the same tastes
and we never expected or said that Dream Dinners is for everyone.  It's
impossible to please everyone.  Dream Dinners mission is simple: to get
families back around the dinner table.  And we do just that.

I realize that Dream Dinners is not for everyone. I also realize that my tastes are different than others, and that I have particularly high expectations when it comes to my meals. However, I do really love the concept of Dream Dinners. It's nice to learn how to prepare things in advance, and I loved the night out with my friends. I just was hoping for better quality ingredients (real cream vs. cream soup and fresh herbs vs. dried), and so I was disappointed. I also was surprised at the amount of time it took to heat everything up. Taking time out of my meal to photograph something is a bit different than entertaining two kids while they are waiting for their meal to appear on the table. As any mom could tell you, once the dinner is served, there is definitely some free time available for photography. Regarding the documentation, that got done after the kids were asleep.

If any other Dream Dinners employee or owner wants to weigh in, please do. I'm happy to give you online real estate to defend your company. And as I emailed to the above woman, I just post my opinion - I don't make any claims that it's more than that.

Dream Dinners - A Postmortem

Well, I figured I'd squeeze in one more Dream Dinners post. After all, I seem to get most of my traffic from wayward web surfers who type "dream dinners" into Google. I need to take advantage of this momentum!

Today, the remaining dinners, about 10 of them I'd say, were given away to someone found through freecycle. The freecycle process was a bit strange. I didn't know what response I'd get, because, personally, I'd feel strange taking food from someone I didn't know. I'm paranoid like that. I mean, what if the person was dirty, or psychotic? What if the dinners were made two years ago? But, clearly, I'm one of the only cynics in Toledo, because I received like a zillion responses. Or, maybe 20. Way more than I expected, though.

And, here's the weird thing. It wasn't just people who needed the food. Some people just wanted to try it out before spending their own money. Some people just wanted free food because, well, hey, why not? In addition to being a cynic, I'm apparently also quite naive. I use freecycle to give stuff away. I've never taken anything because, so far, it's all stuff that I can afford to get on my own, and I just figure that there's someone else out there who really needs it. I suppose that this isn't really the way freecycle is supposed to work. The goal isn't charity. The goal is cutting down on waste. But, wouldn't it be nice if the stuff being given away only went to people who really needed it?

Well, anyway, that's what I wanted to happen with these meals. And, they did go to a family that really needed them. A woman emailed me that she knew a family in need who was having a hard time buying enough food to get by. She picked up the dinners this afternoon and sent me this lovely note:

I wanted to thank you. XXX cried she was so happy that someone would help her and her three children when you don't even know her. She said that is enough to feed them all for at least two weeks.

 

I just wanted to thank you again.

Awesome, right? Here are some of the other, less charitable (and/or just plain strange) responses I received:

Hi. My family and I would love to take those off your hands. Husband loves to eat.

Um, really? So do I. WTF?

Hi Danielle, I know I'm probably too late responding, but if the Dream Dinners are still available, I would love to have them. Never heard of them before and wondered what they are?

So, you have no idea what you are getting, but you want them. Huh?

I would love to take them off your hands. Email me with pick up instructions. BITCH.

OK, I made up the bitch part, but doesn't it fit well with the rest of that email? People, have you heard of the words "please" and "thank you"?

last week i had an operation on my right shoulder so it is in  a sling and my 15 yr old son has been cooking so this will surely be better than soup and hot dogs.

Yeah, you'd think they would be, but they're not. Basically, just smoosh together the hot dogs and soup in a ziploc bag, slap on a cooking instructions sticker, and you've got yourself a Dream Dinner.

Dream Dinners - R.I.P.

I'm officially done.

When Friday night's dinner went straight from the oven to the garbage can, I decided that life was just too damn short to do this any longer.

The Chicken and Dumplings were atrocious. Vile. I just couldn't bring myself to eat it, and I couldn't, in good conscience, force Dylan to do so either. Did I mention how disgusting this dish was?

Edited to add this photo. Note the raw, oozing biscuit dough (I cooked the time suggested) and the spongy-looking chicken. I'm rather proud of the way this photo demonstrates the utter skankiness of this dish. Doesn't it look horrid???

Have you all heard of freecycle? It's a very cool organization that runs via email list. People post "wants" or "offers" and others on the list respond. For example, a few weeks ago someone posted that they wanted candles. I had some crappy candles that I didn't want cluttering up my house any longer. I responded, and one day later she came and picked them up off my front porch. I love freecycling. It's a great way to get rid of things that probably wouldn't sell on eBay and aren't worth holding on to until a garage sale.

I plan to put the remainder of my Dream Nightmare Dinners on freecycle sometime today. I can't eat another one. Just can't do it.

Vegetarian Fried Rice with Egg

  Fried Rice with Sriracha 
  Originally uploaded by Foodmomiac.

The plan tonight was to heat up Dream Dinners Chicken and Dumplings. There were two flaws in this plan, however. First, I did not want a crappy dinner. Second, we didn't get home until 6:10 and D.D. Chicken and Dumplings takes over an hour to cook (despite the fact that the chicken is pre-cooked - that can't be right, but I won't be able to explore that till tomorrow).

I did have some leftover rice in the fridge, so I decided to make Vegetarian Fried Rice with Egg. I've made this before by just winging it, but I wanted to consult a recipe this time, as I've never been totally thrilled with my results. I turned to Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything. Success! This dish took less than 10 minutes, and it was amazing. Dylan ate a bowl and a half. I added frozen peas and frozen haricots verts (from Trader Joe's - love 'em). And, as you can see from the picture, I put Sriracha on mine.

10 minutes folks. For a healthy, delicious meal. Who needs Dream Dinners??

Dream Dinners - Pork Burritos - Edible!!

  Dream Dinners - Pork Burritos - Edible!! 
  Originally uploaded by Foodmomiac.

Wow, edible Dream Dinners two nights in a row! Be still my beating heart.

The best part about this one was the fact that it was ready in less than 20 minutes. That's what I call convenience. I'll probably make my own version of this in the future.

Here's the scoop: shredded pork, corn, black beans and salsa were combined and frozen in a bag. We were also provided with salsa cream sauce (salsa and sour cream) and some scary looking flour tortillas.

The first thing I did was toss the flour tortillas in the trash. Toledo has a nice-sized Mexican population, so I can always find good quality corn tortillas at the market. I refuse to eat trans fat laden craptillas when I can have the real thing. The second thing I did was slice up a perfectly ripe avocado. From past Dream Dinners experience, I realized that the avocado might be the only good point of the meal. I wanted to make sure I had plenty of it!

The pork got reheated in a saucepan and the tortillas were warmed in a skillet. And the meal was ready! In the future, I'd use less salsa in favor of adding my own (higher quality) salsa the night of the meal. The pork was a little bit sweet, probably a result of corn syrup in the Sysco-brand salsa. I'd also use plain sour cream. The version they provided was a bit odd, likely because it had been frozen.

Dylan ate her whole serving of meat, but didn't like the tortilla. When she saw me pull out the telltale plastic bag, she protested, "No more Dream Dinners!", but I told her we had to, and she was a good sport. After tasting the pork, she asked me if it was really a Dream Dinner, because she actually liked it! I love my little gourmet girl. She's so well trained.

P.S. Sorry for the blurry photo! I had a haircut appointment after dinner, and was rushing. I LOVE my haircut, by the way. I'll post the story of that in a separate post so as not to clutter up my ever-growing Dream Dinners chronicle.

Technorati Tags: Food and Drink, Dream Dinners

Dream Dinners Chicken Tetrazzini - Not Awful

  Dream Dinners Chicken Tetrazzini 
  Originally uploaded by Foodmomiac.

Finally, an edible Dream Dinner. No, not photogenic. But edible. Which is a start.

Sadly, this is also the dinner that takes the longest to prepare. I started cooking at 5:30 and ate at 7. First, I had to make the spaghetti (I broke it in half to make the final product easier to eat). Then, I mixed the cooked spaghetti with the sauce, dumped it in a baking dish, covered it with bread crubs and baked it. 30 minutes covered, 20 minutes uncovered.

The sauce wasn't fancy. It consisted of Cream of Mushroom soup, chopped chicken, broccoli, red pepper, artichoke hearts and WAY too many stale dried herbs. But, it all tasted fine. The chicken wasn't spongy like the cutlets, and I liked the crust formed by the Panko bread crumbs.

Tomorrow night is Dream Dinners Pork Burritos. I'm a little leary.

Technorati Tags: Food and Drink, Dream Dinners

Dream Dinners Mexi-Beef Meatballs - Just shoot me now.

Dream Dinners Mexi-Beef Meatballs
Originally uploaded by Foodmomiac.

Yet another gnarly dinner, courtesy of Dream Dinners. Tonight was Mexi-Beef Meatballs. The name is somewhat of a misnomer. Yes, these could have been shaped into meatballs. Another option presented on the instructions was shaping the mixture into a meatloaf. I chose another option all together, and instead molded the beef mixture into a muffin tin, creating 12 muffin-sized meatloaves.

The mixture (a combination of bbq sauce, rice, cheese, corn and meat) was baked for 15 minutes, topped with sauce (salsa, bbq sauce and other junk) and baked for another 10-15 minutes. The meat part was mediocre. The sauce was horrid; cloying is a good adjective. Nauseating is another.

Dylan was amused by the muffin shape until she tasted the damn things. I got her to eat a little bit by scraping off the sauce and letting her drown the meat with sour cream and grated cheese.
I was also helped out by the sour cream/cheese trick. Mostly, I just ate avocado. That's what Max ate too. Luckily, he didn't have to eat it with a chunk of nasty Mexi ball.

Does anyone know if I can donate frozen meals to charity?

Dream Dinners Lemon Artichoke Chicken - YUCK!

  DSCN1021.JPG 
  Originally uploaded by Foodmomiac.

Dylan and I were both grossed out by this meal. The elements included a small bag of seasoned bread crumbs, a large bag of lemon artichoke sauce, and three chicken cutlets (this was a half portion). I rubbed a pan with olive oil (I don't have the pan spray called for in the recipe), pressed the bread crumbs into the chicken and then baked the cutlets for 15 minutes in a 400 degree oven. The sauce was heated and served on top of the chicken.
We had a number of problems with this meal. The chicken had an artificial flavor, was watery and had a spongy texture. The sauce also seemed artificial to me. I don't remember everything that was included in the recipe, but I think this was one of the recipes that called for cream soup. That, combined with flavorless dried herbs, made for a dish that was more reminiscent of an airplane meal than the typical home-cooked dish that I like to make for my family.
The saving grace of the dinner plate were the roasted purple fingerling potatoes that you see in the background. These were tossed with olive oil, salt, pepper, smoked paprika and garlic. Yum.
I couldn't bear to throw out the remainder of the chicken, so I plated it up for our babysitter. I feel bad leaving it for her, but I guess it's marginally better than the frozen pizza she usually makes while watching Max.

Dream Dinners - My Report

Last night was the Dream Dinners party. I haven't tasted any of the food yet (except for a small sample of one of the dishes that they cooked up for us), so this report is incomplete, but I can certainly comment on the experience.

First, I'm glad I brought my iPod! They were playing bad pop music when we arrived, so I plugged in my speakers and started playing some fun music. Sorry, Sam - no K.D. Lang. We did a little Black Eyed Peas, some old school Michael Jackson, Jay-Z, and then mellowed out towards the end of the evening with Jack Johnson.

Second, I'm glad we brought booze! Here we are enjoying it (that's me in the middle - I think I looked 12 last night, for some reason):

OK, the process is as follows: the various dishes are spread out around the room at stations. You can go in any order you like. Each time you switch to a new station, you are supposed to wash your hands and put on a new pair of gloves. After the 3rd hand washing, my knuckles started to bleed, so I just did the glove thing. (shhh. don't tell) Here is Jessica wearing the gloves:

The recipes were fairly easy to follow, and we all loved the implements. They had those awesome OXO liquid measuring cups that you read from the top down, and great scoops for dry measurements. We also were fond of the cute long-handled measuring spoons. Finished meals are placed in freezer bags or foil tins, labeled with cooking directions, and placed in a large fridge unit. Here are some shots of the group at work:

One of the things I appreciated most was the fact that most of the dishes could be split in two. I made 12 dishes, and was able to split all but three in half, so for my $206, I got 21 meals that will all yield leftovers! My only complaint is with the quality of the ingredients. No one else complained about this, but I'm picky. I'm sure Dylan will be thrilled, but two of the dishes had Campbell's soup, which is not something I usually use when I cook. There was also pre-ground black pepper (never use), liquid egg substitute (never use), cooking spray (never use), etc. Again, I'm picky. No one else complained. Dylan will LOVE all of these dishes. They are all ready to go in my freezer, which is AWESOME. If they taste good, I'll likely go again - it's nice to have stuff ready for those really crazy nights. And, look how much food it was!:

We'll absolutely eat a couple of the dishes next week, so I will report back.