Bove's Meatballs

A few weeks ago, I got an email from the folks at PMG asking if I'd like to sample Bove's meatballs.  Since PMG represents some fabulous local businesses, I happily agreed.  I must admit that I had a bit of an ulterior motive.  I remembered that Bove's Cafe was featured on the Food Network on Throwdown with Bobby Flay, where the throwdown challenge involved lasagna!  Bove's lasagna looked so delicious that I could only imagine how wonderful their meatballs would be!

I received two packages of Bove's Italian-style frozen meatballs on Wednesday but I didn't get a chance to dig into them until Friday night.  The meatballs are all pre-cooked and made by hand in Vermont.  This should come as no surprise since Bove's Cafe is a third-generation family restaurant located in Burlington, Vermont.  I was happy to be able to read and identify every single ingredient listed on the package and the packaging boldly states that these all natural meatballs have zero grams of trans fat and no MSG.

I normally make my own pasta sauce but I was feeling a little lazy and headed over to Top Shelf to pick up a jar of pasta sauce.  Much to my surprise, I was happy to discover that Top Shelf carries Bove's pasta sauce!  I picked up a jar of the roasted garlic pasta sauce for dinner.

I followed the instructions on the bag and put the frozen pre-cooked meatballs in my Dutch oven and covered it with the entire jar of pasta sauce.  I put the pot on the stove at medium heat for about twenty minutes.

While the meatballs were cooking, I quickly sauteed some spinach leaves with salt, pepper and garlic.  I normally would eat meatballs with pasta but I wanted something lighter since we had a huge breakfast that morning.  The spinach wilted quickly and this was good because I was starving!  The aroma of the roasted garlic sauce was doing nothing to make me less impatient to eat! 

When the meatballs were done cooking, I placed some of the wilted spinach in a bowl and topped it with a few meatballs, some sauce, and grated Parmesan cheese. 

The meatballs were seriously delicious.  They tasted like something you'd find in the North End and not in the frozen aisle.  I was definitely impressed!  And the roasted garlic sauce was seriously amazing.  If you know me, you know that I am a garlic-fanatic and have a heavy hand when it comes to garlic.  This sauce had such an incredible roasted garlic flavor that I couldn't get enough of.  Plus, the sauce had no sugar added so it wasn't too sweet like a lot of store-bought sauces.

We had plenty of leftover meatballs, which were perfect for a baked meatball wrap the next day.  And I'm happy to know that I have another bag in the freezer waiting for me the next time I'm looking for a quick but authentic Italian meal. 

Full disclosure: Bove's meatballs were fully complimentary, but as always, my opinion is honest and completely my own.

Delightful Ice Cream Sandwiches With Walker's Shortbread Cookies

When the wonderful folks at  PMG asked me if I'd like to try out some products from Walker's Shortbread, I was thrilled and also very nostalgic.  You see, my grandmother LOVED shortbread cookies and would always have them on hand at her place for when my sister and I came to visit.  While my grandmother is no longer with us, to this very day, when I eat a shortbread cookie, it brings up the fondest of memories of eating these cookies with a tall glass of milk at my grandmother's place.

Thinking of family in mind, I was happy to discover that Walker's Shortbread is made by the Walker family in Scotland and they have been producing their shortbread cookies for over a hundred years.  Although technology has changed, the company still bakes their cookies in small batches to produce the classic shortbread flavor and appearance.  In fact, I had no idea that their shortbread is baked with no artificial flavoring, coloring or additives.  These cookies contain simple ingredients - flour, pure creamery butter, sugar and salt.

The folks at Walker's Shortbread sent over several packages of cookies for me to try out:

Chocolate Chip Shortbread

The chocolate chip shortbread cookies were a big hit.  I received a box with 24 packs and each pack contained two cookies.  I loved these cookies because it had the rich buttery shortbread flavor with little chocolate chips in it.  The packaging made it easy for me to throw a pack in my purse to snack on at work.  But I didn't want to be tempted with eating them all of them so I put them in a big bowl on our dining room table.  Our friends loved snacking on them just as much as we did, especially when I would encourage them to take a few for the road!  


Of course I couldn't just eat the cookies plain and I also made delicious mini ice cream sandwiches with softened vanilla ice cream in between the two cookies.  Because of the shortbread consistency, these cookies didn't get soggy with the ice cream filling.  These were a big hit with my friend KK when I made them for a dessert when she came over for dinner one evening,  I forgot to take a picture so I just had to make another ice cream sandwich another night for the photo.  

My boyfriend was happy to oblige in eating the ice cream sandwich after the photo was done!

Stem Ginger Biscuits

The Stem Ginger Biscuits were by far my favorite of the Walkers products.  These were hard ginger cookies with small pieces of candied ginger in them.  I am a huge ginger fan and I think these biscuits hands down beat any other ginger snap or cookie for its ginger flavor.  

I again used these cookies to make an ice cream sandwich.  After all, I couldn't let B eat his chocolate chip shortbread sandwich by himself, could I?  

I really loved the flavor contrast of the sharp ginger bites and the smooth creamy vanilla ice cream (I used Haagen Dazs).  For the same reason, I'd love to try using the Stem  Ginger Biscuits as a crumble atop something rich and creamy, like a buttermilk pie! 

Shortbread Fingers

The Shortbread Fingers were really interesting.  They had the same shortbread delicious buttery flavor but they were so much lighter than your usual shortbread variety.  While these fingers didn't quite "melt in the mouth" as the package indicated, the lighter consistency did make the shortbread fingers the perfect nibble with a cup of my favorite Tazo chai tea.  


I think that a package of these shortbread fingers would make a great pumpkin pie or cheesecake crust in lieu of a graham cracker crust.  I haven't tried it out but I'd guess that the shortbread fingers buttery consistency would work well after its been reduced to a crumble consistency in the food processor and mixed with softened chopped pieces of butter.


Overall, I really enjoyed testing out the Walkers products.  I checked out their website and discovered that you can order these products online although I have found them locally at DeLuca's Market and Cardullo's Gourmet Shoppe.  The website also has some useful recipes for different ways to try out their products.  But for me, my favorite way is to eat them plain - straight out of the package.


If you have any questions or would like to know more about Walkers Shortbread products, please let me know and I can put you in contact with them  Also, thanks to PMG for introducing these yummy shortbread products to me and sending them my way!

Olivia's Croutons Straight from Vermont

Last week, my friends at PMG reached out to me to introduce me to one of their clients - Olivia's Croutons.  I did some research and discovered that Olivia's Croutons has been around for a little over ten years.  Located in Vermont, the company started out in their home kitchen with one crouton flavor - Butter & Garlic.  As business grew, Olivia's Croutons relocated and utilized a commercial kitchen to make their croutons.  They eventually moved to New Haven, Vermont and expanded their products from just croutons to also include tostini and organic croutons.  When I checked out their website, I discovered that they had a variety of different flavors of croutons.  And lucky for me, Olivia's Croutons generously sent over five boxes of different flavors for me to sample.  

I've got to be honest, I'm not a huge crouton person.  I've found that most commercial croutons are either too dry or artificially seasoned that it loses its natural bread flavors.  But Olivia's Croutons is really different.  The company has a focus on delivering "a wholesome, all natural, uncomplicated product" and that is absolutely what you find.  When the package arrived, I immediately opened a box of the Organic Garlic & Herb.  I discovered that the croutons were so good that I could actually snack on them straight out of the box!

As good as they were to snack on, I was excited to try using the different flavors of croutons in a variety of dishes.  I decided to try the croutons out the old-fashioned way - with a salad.  I started out with the Vermont Cheddar and Dill.  I of course tried a crouton one straight out of the box and it had a nice baked cheddar flavor with a mild hint of dill. 

I decided to make a very simple salad using leftover Olivia's Organics herb salad tossed in a light Italian vinagrette.  I also included some leftover goat cheese, tuna fish and fresh cracked black pepper.  I added the Vermont Cheddar & Dill croutons, which was a great complement to the salad. 

The greens with the tangy dressing and goat cheese nicely contrasted with the mellow baked cheddar taste of the croutons.  I was definitely pleased using the croutons in a traditional salad.

The following day I decided to try the Multi-Grain Garlic croutons.  These croutons were cut from multi-grain bread and it had a nice herby and almost nutty taste.  There was a mild flavor of garlic in the croutons overall although some pieces tasted a bit more garlicky than others.

Since I had previously paired the croutons with a salad, I wanted to try it with a soup instead.  A few weeks ago, I made a huge batch of rustic beef stew and I froze half of it.  Since I knew I'd be working late, I took the beef stew out of the freezer to dethaw during the day.  Besides, I figured that a rustic beef stew would be perfect for a St. Patrick's Day dinner.  We usually eat beef stew with a piece of crusty bread, but we decided to try the croutons with the stew instead.

As you can tell from the picture, the croutons were huge and matched the size of the chopped vegetables and beef.  Because of the large size of the croutons, they didn't sop the soup up as well as a piece of bread would have.  But the crunch was a pleasant addition to the stew and even after the sample of croutons are long gone, I'll definitely think about pairing croutons with a soup or stew in the future.

Finally, last night, I decided to try the croutons a bit differently.  I took a box of the Butter and Garlic croutons and each crouton was deliciously buttery with a nice garlicky flavor. 

I decided to use the croutons to make a nice bread crumb coating for some chicken tenders.  I decided to use our handy food processor, which is one of my favorite kitchen appliances, to grind the croutons up to a fine crumb texture. 

I ended up with a few cups of bread crumbs but I wanted to be on the safe side so I decided to throw a box of the Organic Garlic and Herb croutons in the food processor as well.

I combined the two different types of bread crumbs.  I immediately knew these would be much better than generic bread crumbs because they were a bit thicker in crumb texture and way more flavorful.  The herb and garlic flavor tasted like herbs and garlic - not the artificial flavors that you find in other bread crumb products.

We did a simple flour, egg and bread crumb coating and baked the chicken in the oven.  I paired the chicken with a roasted beets tossed with goat cheese, white champagne balsamic vinagrette, caramelized onions, olive oil and a garlic mustard.  I used a recipe adapted from one of my favorite food blogs, Closet Cooking.

The bread crumbs were more crunchy than commercial bread crumbs although not quite as crunchy as a panko bread crumb.  The thick and crunchy bread crumbs created a really memorable breading on the chicken because the flavor really stood out.  Unlike commercial bread crumbs, the herb, butter and garlic flavors really popped and added something nice to a simple baked and breaded chicken dish.  The croutons resulted in bread crumbs that just tasted so much better than anything you would get off of the shelf at the grocery store.

In fact, I found that no matter what way I used and of the croutons, the natural flavor of the bread and herbs really came out.  Although I don't normally do a lot of product reviews, I really can't say enough good things about Olivia's Croutons.  Everything is simple and straightforward - from the packaging to the flavors.  I found the company to be incredibly thoughtful in sending out so many packages for me to try out and to even enclose a handwritten note from the co-owner, Francie Williams Caccavo.  But I shouldn't be surprised coming from a company that started out in their own kitchen and naming their company after their daughter, Olivia.  

Olivia's Croutons is located in New Haven, Vermont.  I'm hoping their products will hit the grocery store shelves near me soon but in the meantime, they take both retail and wholesale orders through their website.