New Products Hits & Misses for 09/16/2009

Ratings Criteria

With over 50,000 products in the average supermarket, people don't have the time, or the money, to test every product on the shelves and with 15,000 new products every year consumers need to know what's out there!

So Phil does the testing and the tasting for you and gives the product a rating out of 100 so you know what you can expect when you try something new!

SupermarketGuru does not sell the foods we review, nor receive any compensation from the manufacturers for reviewing or rating them.

Phil taste-tests and judges each product based on the following 8 criteria:

(30 points) Taste: The most important attribute of any food
(20 points) Value: Is it worth it?
(15 points) Health: Based off the nutritional information, is it nutritionally balanced?
(15 points) Ingredients: What's in it, how natural is it?
(5 points) Preparation: When applicable, how accurate or good are the directions *
(5 points) Appearance: Is it appetizing and does it resemble its photo or description
(5 points) Packaging: Is it appropriate for the product and does it have any benefits such as resealability, added freshness, better storage, etc.
(5 Points) Sustainability: Is the packaging biodegradable, is it wasteful, is the company endeavoring to offset their carbon footprint?

* products that do not have any preparation will have the full value of these points included in their total score

Curry Love Blissful Banana Ginger Curry Sauce

87

This product is a HIT! This Blissful Banana Ginger Curry is a sweet tasting, not too spicy blend of banana, coconut milk and ginger. It would taste great over fish or shrimp or other mild seafood like Tilapia or Sole. While the label says “medium” I really found it to need a little more kick. Retails for $6.99.

Curry Love
888 635 8886
http://www.mycurrylove.com

Scoring Breakdown:

Honey Ridge Farms Wild Blackberry Honey

89

This product is a HIT! By now everyone knows about the possible disappearance of the honey bees. And did you know that if they disappear about 1/3 of the products on the supermarket shelves would have to be reformulated? This Wild Blackberry Honey comes from the Northwest and the blackberries from Oregon and Washington. The flavor of the blackberries does not overpower the honey and it really is a nice alternative to just plain honey. Save the bees! Retails for $9.98 - $10.98.

Honey Ridge Farms
360 256 0086
http://www.honeyridgefarms.com

Scoring Breakdown:

PureVia Sweetener

90

This product is a HIT! By now you must know that I’m a big fan of stevia; it is an all natural, zero calorie sweetener that comes from the stevia plant. Purevia is another brand who wants to make it as convenient for us to use stevia as those artificial sweeteners. One package is the equivalent of 2 tablespoons of sugar. The taste and sweetness are great and the texture is just like real sugar. Retails for $3.99.

Whole Earth Sweetener Company, LLC
800 824 2334
http://www.purevia.com

Scoring Breakdown:

Hodgson Mill Apples and More Muesli

83

Remember when the only place you could buy health foods was from a hippy owned store that was usually located in a run-down shopping center? Well times have changes and there are more healthy offerings and places to buy more healthy foods than ever before. Hodgson Mill makes great products, so what happened here? Their new Apples and More Muesli, while loaded with all natural ingredients and certainly great nutrition, has practically no taste. Just one bite gave me a flash back to the early 70s, when good for you foods had no flavor. Retails for $3.95.

Hodgson Mill, Inc
800 525 0177
http://www.hodgsonmill.com

Scoring Breakdown:

GarLic It! Sliced Garlic Savory Basil Flavor

89

This product is a HIT! I love this product, and it is a hit. It’s crunchy, marinated, sliced garlic. This flavor is savory basil which also has a touch of anchovy. This is delicious to eat right out of the jar, or to cook with. Just imagine cooking a plate of spaghetti and then adding this right before you serve. And most important, this garlic is grown in Washington State and not China as much of our garlic is these days. Retails for $7.99.

One Far Star
425 999 4894
http://www.slicedgarlic.com

Scoring Breakdown:

Thank You

We hope you enjoyed this edition of

New Product
Hits and Misses

If you would like Phil to consider your new product for review, please send 4 samples of each flavor you to submit for review, with the suggested retail price and other product information. We regret that we can not review all products submitted. Please send to:

New Product Review
SupermarketGuru.com
3015 Main Street, Suite 320
Santa Monica, CA 90405

Product reviews are conducted by randomly selecting one flavor of a product and taking into consideration the information available on the package itself as it would appear in the retail environment. Information contained in advertisements or on websites is not taken into account for evaluation or ratings.

Email danielle@supermarketguru.com with any questions and whenever possible please be environmentally friendly when packaging your products.