Review #214: Claim Jumper’s Chicken Pot Pie
The pot pie is one of the best dishes ever invented. It has everything a meal needs, baked in a pie. Perfect. I was at the store and saw the Claim Jumper frozen foods were on sale. I’d never had their pot pies so I thought I’d give it a shot.
I cooked it for 12 minutes in the microwave. For some reason Claim Jumper’s frozen foods have crazy times for microwaving. The Country Fried Chicken, for instance, calls for a microwave time of something like 4 to 71/2 minutes. The pot pie had various times based on the wattage of your oven. I should have put it in longer. when it came out the center was hot, but I could still bite into it without burning my mouth.
This pie passed the first test. When you order a pot pie at a restaurant the crust is always just on the top. I get that. But when you buy one that’s frozen, it MUST have the crust all around the bowl as well. I run into one once in a while that doesn’t and it infuriates me.
The pie was good, the crust on top was nice and flakey. The filling was good, too, but I did get a gristly chunk of chicken. And there was something about the sauce that made it a little too sweet, and it was gritty. Maybe I cooked it less than I thought, but you know when you’ve had a few and it’s dark and you just keep shoveling it into your mouth? it was like that.
So if they’re on sale, or cheaper than Marie Calendar’s. I say go for it. Just cook product thoroughly.
July 26th, 2007 at 7:20 am
I like Trader Joe’s pot pies. Kinda pricey, but super-tasty.
July 26th, 2007 at 10:31 pm
Unless you’re accustomed to a real pot pie, pie pots seem to survive in the realm of t.v. dinners. I think for “instant” pot pie, the MC ones are the money…except if you’re reliving Mom baking you a frozen one in the oven when you were a kid and the tin-foil dish ones that go for about $1 are it. If you’re making a pot pie at home, I’d say go all the way and make it dumplings, but I don’t like those as much as pot pies.
July 31st, 2007 at 1:03 pm
Never heard of this brand but they probably don’t sell them in this region of the country, much like my beloved Bluebell Ice Cream. As for the varied microwave times, in a bout of laziness, I made four different Banquet frozen dinners for the kids over the weekend. Each one had a different cook time ranging from 2 minuts up to 10 minutes.
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