Lots of nutritional information and news, nice instructional section for how-tos, a nice mix of basics and fancier stuff, menus and how-to’s for entertaining, interesting new kitchen gadgets (but not to an excess, which would irritate me because I’m more into cooking than gadgets). The index of recipes, which is right up front where I like it rather than buried in the back, is coded for quick and easy, make ahead, freezable, and kid-friendly, making it easy to find what you need.

Cooking Light (1-year) for $15 at Amazon right now.

After we played around with the Pom juice and green iced tea, I noticed that Pom Wonderful sells just such a drink. $1/16 ounces at my local grocer. Not cheap, but if you’re looking for a treat that has some healthy side effects, much better this than a sweetened iced coffee or some of the other iced teas that are loaded with various forms of sugar, I think.

Disclaimer: I’m not a health expert of any variation and they sent me the stuff to review. I did however buy some of their green tea and pomegranate juice mix as a treat. My kids loved it and I’d rather have them drinking that than soda.

The foil feels like regular foil. I’m so old I still call it tin foil, which my kids like to tease me about… but hey, if it’s all from recycled stuff that’s pretty cool. I haven’t compared the prices yet to the regular as I haven’t seen it in the stores but I will try to remember to do so and come back here and update.  Still, at the least you can get your free roll!

Even the packaging is eco-friendly. From their web site:

• Food-safe foil made from a mix of pre and post consumer aluminum.
• The packaging and core are made from 100% recovered paper and the inks used on the product packaging are water-based.

My main use of foil is to line a pan that I’m going to freeze something in. Freeze it, pop the food (and foil liner) out and then wrap again in foil and put in a freezer bag or Food Saver it. When it’s time to cook,  the food easily fits right back into your pan so you don’t need to keep the pan in the freezer the whole time.

And a great tip I just saw at their web site, which made me go “Duh!”  To get the foil to fit the pan, put the pan upside down and fold the foil around the bottom, then flip the pan over and slide the shaped piece of foil right in.

A few of my favorites to make ahead and freeze in foil:

• King Ranch Chicken Tortilla Casserole
• Cheese and Spinach Stuffed Shells
• Baked Ziti with Meat Sauce

I was a bit nervous when I saw how little pasta was included but then I tend to cook for leftovers and am notoriously bad at (over) estimating pasta amounts. I made up about 3/4 of a pound of carrots, cooked a slightly new way, as a side dish so we did eat that as well. The 3 of us had our fill of pasta and chicken and carrots and I have more than a serving left for a nice lunch.

The directions were clear and easy to follow. You’ll need 2 pans (3 if you do the side of carrots). It’s not a one-pot wonder, but it is quite tasty! We all really liked it. And I checked out the nutrition label and see that under 1/3 of the calories are from fat. By serving with a vegetable you’re certainly getting into the realm of decently healthy.

$1.78/serving based on 4 servings

Boneless skinless chicken breasts: $1.99
Box dinner: 4.79 (or $3.79 with coupon)
3/4 cup milk: .30 ($4.79/gallon)
2 Tbs butter: .05 ($3/lb)

The containers can go in the refrigerator, freezer, and dishwasher. The tops should not be put in the microwave they say, but the containers themselves can be. And cleanup is a snap since everything can go in the dishwasher. These are easy enough for kids to use (and kind of fun for them as well). I did have an issue with one of the canisters not sealing and wrote to ask them about it. Here’s what they said:

“The guys behind Invental Laboratory Inc. (Jeff and Eric) found that there were a small percentage of canisters where the seal wasn’t working properly. They’ve quickly addressed the issue by instructing the manufacturer to recalibrate the casting process, and they have also added a final step where the canister is manually tested before shipment to customers, ensuring the best possible seal. This has fixed the problem and they have not had any defective products since they implemented these extra steps in their quality control. Please remind your readers to always wash the canisters (remember, dishwasher safe!) before using every SealSaver.”

Their web site has a nice set of photos, recipes, FAQs, and more. Go over there to learn more or buy them, or you can buy them from Amazon as well. And they told me that if you’re local to the Monterey and Santa Cruz stores, there are a few stores in the area carrying them.

Vacuum sealing will help you waste less food for sure. And marinating in a vacuum environment is great. When I first bought my FoodSaver, I made a great yogurt marinated chicken. But you can also keep vegetables fresh longer, crackers crisper, and so forth.