Lean Cuisine has been doing some rearranging with their product lines, so lot of things that were once part of the Craveable line are being moved into the Comfort line. We figure this gives us some opportunities to check in on items we haven’t had in a while to see if anything has changed.
Today we’re digging into the Lean Cuisine Comfort Chicken Ranch Club Flatbread Melt. The last time we reviewed it — back when it was part of the Craveable line — we said it was “not a bad sandwich, though it didn’t fill us up as much as we’d hoped.” Well, there have definitely been some changes since then, since the old version weighed in at 370 calories, while this one has 410 calories. Is this redesign worth those calories? Let’s find out!
When you pull this flatbread melt out of the packaging, it looks like a pizza, as you can see in the picture above. It comes with its own crisping tray, so you can fold the box, place the pizza-looking sandwich on the crisping tray, and heat in the microwave for two and a half minutes.
Unless our eyes are deceiving us, this thing is actually larger than it was before. The old version seemed pretty light on toppings, but this one was hard to even close without chicken and cheese spilling out all over the place. We also seem to remember the flatbread being a little, well, flatter.
The flatbread actually holds up surprisingly well in the microwave. It has a nice soft middle with a gravelly texture on the outside, and we didn’t find it to be soggy at all.
Inside that flatbread is a blend of chicken, tomatoes, and cheese. The chicken isn’t exceptional, but it’s not bad and the portion size is generous. The cheese is a mozzarella and cheddar blend, while the tomatoes are there to add a little sweetness. Oh, and there are chunks of green onions inside, which actually look a little bit like celery.
We’re told there’s supposed to be bacon in the mix as well, but we couldn’t find any. (Well, there’s one chunk of it that you can see in our photo of the meal before it’s cooked.) The bacon guy must have had the day off when our sandwich was being prepared.
All of this is flavored with some ranch dressing. Now, some people find ranch to be a bit of a turnoff. Not us. No, we’re true midwesterners here at Freezer Meal Frenzy, and we love us some ranch dressing.
The Lean Cuisine Chicken Ranch Club Flatbread Melt is pretty decent, though still not as filling as a 400-plus-calorie meal should be. While this didn’t fill us up, we do find the new version of this to be an upgrade. We would have liked more bacon, of course, but otherwise the flavor is good enough. It’s certainly not “Craveable” though, and perhaps that’s why it was removed from that line…
To learn more about the cooking instructions, nutrition content, or ingredients for this Lean Cuisine flatbread melt, check out our package scans below.
