Fab and Delicious Food

Hi everyone!  Hope you all had a wonderful day! 

A few weeks ago, Laurie, from Marina Maher Communications asked if I would be interested in trying some samples of Thomas’ Bagel Thins.  Of course I said yes!  Now, imagine my surprise when this humongous box arrives at my door.  Huh?  What on earth could be in it?!  It’s not like the bagel thins needed any extra cushioning or packaging! 

Turns out, they sent me a lovely gift basket:

with a nice note attached, about trying the Thomas’ bagel thins

testing out a toaster and sampling a selection of spreads: 

Here are all the reviews!

Black and Decker Toaster

In addition to looking beautiful, the toaster also has a lot of cool features, such as: 

Two sets of independent slots:

Individual toast shade selectors, plus Bagel, Frozen, and Cancel buttons:

And, of course, the toast control lever:

Unfortunately, when I tried toasting the bagel thins in the toaster, one of the control levers didn’t work   The left control lever works like a charm, but the right control lever just won’t stay down.  I’m going to call up the company and see if they can fix it. 

(And hopefully the people at Marina Maher Communications won’t be mad that I didn’t mention this before – I was debating whether to tell them or not – on the one hand, I kind of thought that I should just tell them, and on the other hand, I was afraid they would think I was ungrateful.  After all, the toaster was a gift, totally unexpected and a little different from a regular product review, so I was a little unsure what to do!)

Anyway, besides that, the toaster works really well.  It does take a little longer to heat than a regular toaster, but again, it has all the features a regular toaster doesn’t, so that you can customize how you heat your bagels, or even make two different foods at the same time (bagels on one side, waffles on the other).  Another thing that is really cool is that there are bread glides in the toaster that will automatically adjust to hold thick or thin slices in place! 

It really works!  I put in a bagel thin and the bread glides moved closer to hold each piece in place!  Neat! 

And, last but not least, the most awesome part of all!  The crumb trays! 

I’ve never seen a toaster with crumb trays before.  It’s really cool!  Instead of having to dump the crumbs out of your toaster, you just slide out the crumb trays from underneath the toaster and empty the crumbs into the garbage! 

So easy!  So yeah, after I get that control lever fixed, I’ll be using that toaster all the time!  I just love it! 

Thomas’ Bagel Thins

Bagel Thins are like bagels, just thinner.  The Thomas’ Bagel Thins don’t contain any high fructose corn syrup or artificial sweeteners.  Here is some more information:

I was sent all three varieties to try: Everything, 100 % Whole Wheat, and Plain.  They all have a really nice soft texture.  And, the bagel thins stay so soft even after you put them in the fridge that I actually ate a few of them without even toasting them!  For that reason, they would probably make for good portable sandwiches and snacks!  The rest of the time, you can make toasted sandwiches and snacks – it’s just nice to have options!

Thomas’ Bagel Thins Everything Bagels

Nutrition info:

It might sound like a weird combo, but I decided to try the everything bagel thins with nutella, since the gift basket came with a little sample of it.  And look, it also came with a cute little spreader:

Everything bagel with nutella:

How did it taste?  Amazing!  This was my first time trying nutella, which is like a chocolate hazelnut spread, and it is so good!  Tasted pretty nice with the everything bagel, which was kind of surprising but very cool!  I also spread some nutella on a whole wheat bagel thin, which tasted really good, and I bet it would be awesome with plain bagel thins as well.  A bagel thin spread with nutella would make a delicious breakfast, snack or dessert, and would taste great with coffee or milk. 

I also made some pizzas with the everything bagel thins.  I just spread some olive oil and pasta sauce on top of the bagel thins:

Then added some shredded mozzarella cheese and cooked until melted:

How did they turn out?  Ummm, okay.  I couldn’t really taste the flavor from the everything bagel thins since I had added so much sauce and cheese, so I would add less of both next time.  Also, when I make these again, I will toast the bagel thins first, since they got a little soggy from the sauce. 

Thomas’ Bagel Thins 100% Whole Wheat Bagels

Nutrition Info:

I tried out the whole wheat bagel thins with the samples of peanut butter and jam that were in the gift basket. 

and

Whole wheat bagel thin with peanut butter and jam:

Look at all those chunks of peanuts!  Delish!  Actually, it’s funny – I’ve always been a smooth peanut butter kind of girl, but I think that I might prefer the crunchy kind now!  I really like the added texture the peanut pieces give to the peanut butter – it makes it more interesting to eat!  I bet this peanut butter would also be great with apples! 

The strawberry jam had a really nice flavor and was very easy to spread on the bagel thins.  I also liked that it was all natural (as was the peanut butter).  I bet the jam would taste great on waffles and pancakes, and even a cake (when you have two layers of cake and need something to hold it all together and add flavor as well).

Whole wheat bagel thins with nutella; whole wheat bagel thin with peanut butter and jam:

Thomas’ Bagel Thins Plain Bagels

Nutrition Info:

By itself:

I was sent a few recipes to try, but I didn’t really follow them exactly (I will make them again and follow the recipes more closely, but that will be another post!)  Basically, there were a couple recipes for cream cheese spreads, made by combining a few ingredients together.  Instead of doing that, I just spread a little cream cheese on each half of the bagel thin, and then topped it with the main ingredient.

Original Recipe:

My take: Plain bagel thin with pineapple and drizzled with pineapple juice:

It was actually pretty good – the pineapple and pineapple juice went well with the flavor of the cream cheese. 

Original Recipe:

My take: Plain bagel thin with orange zest and juice of an orange

Hmmm, the orange flavor was actually really subtle!  It definitely needed more juice from the orange (I had only used a tiny bit), but since I had just squeezed it onto the cream cheese, it probably would have made the bagel thin too soggy.  Next time, I will use the tip from the original recipe, which is to combine the cream cheese and other ingredients, let the flavors meld together, and then spread it on the bagel thin. 

Both of them together:

I’m going to make the original recipes soon!

Overall

I really love the Thomas’ Bagel Thins!  They are the perfect size for snacking or eating as part of a meal.  You can add a lot of toppings to the bagel thins and not worry about getting too full too fast.  Instead, you’ll probably be satisfied but not full, which I think is what everyone always says to strive for. 

I know that I chose to make a lot of simple throw-together “recipes” with the bagel thins, but I have some creative ideas of what to make with them in the future.  Also, I am going to make the original recipes I was sent, both the cream cheese recipes shown above, as well as a couple recipes for egg sandwiches, so I can review those as well! 

For more information on Thomas’ Bagel Thins, please click here.  Thanks!

October 4th, 2010 | Tags: Black & Decker, gift basket, jam, peanut butter, Peanut Butter & Co, Product review, Thomas Bagel Thins, toaster | Category: Product review | Subscribe to comments | Leave a comment | Trackback URL