Wish-Bone Salad Spritzers Vinaigrette Dressings. Balsamic Breeze, Italian and Red Wine Mist Cabernet. $2.89 per 7-ounce spray bottle.
Bonnie: Now you can be puttin' on the spritz with Wish-Bone's new Salad Spritzers. Each of the three flavors is a unique spray bottle full of dressing to spritz your salad. It's fun to do. Ten sprays, of 1 calorie each, cover about a cup of salad.
I found these very light-tasting — not surprising considering that water is the first ingredient in all three, with either high-fructose corn syrup (in the Italian) or vinegar (in the others) as the second ingredient. I like the flavor of the Red Wine Mist Cabernet the least, the Balsamic Breeze the best.
If you frequently find yourself ruining the nutritional benefits of a salad by topping it with too much high-calorie, high-fat salad dressing, you might want to give one of these new spritzers a try; that is, assuming that a simple squeeze of lemon doesn't do it for you and you can afford these spritzers' high cost.
Carolyn: With these Salad Spritzers, Wish-Bone is bringing the I Can't Believe It's Not Butter! Spray idea to salad dressings. It's a pump-stroke of genius, considering how easy it is to unintentionally overdispense dressing with conventional bottles and that the first or second ingredient in most salad dressings is fat. Wish-Bone also manages to nearly match ICBINB Spray's unbelievable 0 calories per spray (Spritzers have 1 calorie).
Considering that, these tasted better than I expected. That's probably because the non-water ingredients are high-quality ones like balsamic vinegar, extra virgin olive oil and real cabernet sauvignon wine. These are still probably a bit too watery and acidic for anyone but serious dieters. That's why I'm hoping Wish-Bone extends its Spritzers line to include full flavors for people who want the benefit of a spray bottle's superior dressing distribution abilities — which would naturally result in people needing to use less dressing.
Diet Ocean Spray Juice Drinks. Orange Citrus Spray, and Cranberry Spray. $1.39 per 16-ounce or $1.99 per 1-liter bottle, and $3.59 per multipack of four 12-ounce bottles.
Bonnie: I like neither the taste nor the ingredients in these new Ocean Spray drinks. Both have a horrid aftertaste from the artificial sweeteners. The cranberry juice flavor in the Cranberry Spray tastes watered-down, mainly because it is. The orange tastes like a cross between Sunny D and Tang, both of which also contain a small amount of juice and are enriched with vitamin C. Both Orange Citrus Spray and Cranberry Spray contain at least 5 percent juice, but also the artificial colorings and sweeteners that I dislike.
I do like cranberry juice and often recommend that people drink it for its many health properties, which include increasing the "good" cholesterol and warding off urinary tract infections. But to get the many health benefits of cranberry juice, you need to consume 8 ounces of cranberry juice cocktail, a quarter-cup of fresh cranberries or a third-cup of dried cranberries. A glass of these diet drinks won't do it. If you're looking for a more natural lower-calorie drink, I suggest mixing equal parts of cranberry juice cocktail and sparkling water.
Carolyn: My first thought upon hearing about these new Diet Ocean Spray juice drinks is that they weren't really new. Ocean Spray has been making reduced-calorie diet cranberry drinks by combining cranberry juice concentrate with artificial sweeteners since the '60s. Now called Light, these drinks are most easily found in 48- or 64-ounce containers and have about 40 calories.
These Ocean Spray diet juice drinks contain only 5 calories and come in portable 12-ounce, 16-ounce and 1-liter plastic bottles. In other words, they're meant to compete with zero-calorie bottled water and diet soda, 10-calorie flavored water (i.e., Propel) and the watery-tasting Crystal Light. But these Diet Sprays taste stronger and more authentic because they contain real juice. (This is particularly true of the cranberry; the Orange Citrus is like Orangina, minus the bubbles.) In this way, Diet Ocean Spray is similar to Minute Maid Light refrigerated juice drinks.
In other words, anyone who regularly buys Crystal Light, Propel or Minute Maid Light should try Diet Ocean Spray: Like me, you just might prefer these.
Annie's D.W. Whole Wheat Pasta & Alfredo. $1.79 per 7-ounce box.
Bonnie: In terms of nutrition and ingredients, Annie's new Whole Wheat Pasta & Alfredo is a winner. One serving provides a hefty 5 grams of fiber, its pasta is made from whole grains, it uses real cheese, and it contains nothing artificial.
All in all, this is much less processed than Kraft's blue box of Macaroni & Cheese. Annie's also contains a third less calories. But will your kids eat it? Probably not right away if they're used to the blue box. If you've started them on that, I suggest you begin by mixing Annie's and Kraft, and then slowly weaning them off Kraft. I also suggest making this using the optional butter that greatly improves the bland taste of Annie's.
Carolyn: Annie's doesn't routinely use licensed cartoon characters to sell its pastas. The fact that this Wheat Alfredo pasta dinner features PBS cartoon character D.W. indicates that Annie's knew it was going to have a tough sell with this product. I'm betting that not even the sister of the popular Arthur the Aardvark is going to be enough to get kids to embrace this extraordinarily wheaty-tasting pasta. For that, the box would need to contain about twice as much cheese powder.
Kraft's whole-grain blend of white and whole wheat flour pasta in Supermac & Cheese is a lot more palatable and just another reason why, when it comes to mac and cheese, Kraft is king.
Bonnie Tandy Leblang is a registered dietitian and professional speaker. Carolyn Wyman is a junk-food fanatic and author of "Better Than Homemade: Amazing Foods That Changed the Way We Eat" (Quirk). Each week they critique three new food items. For previous columns, visit www.supermarketsampler.com. © Universal Press Syndicate