Macaroni Kid EATS!
|
|
 |
Chicken Noodle Soup
Chef v. Kids Taste Test
By: Heather Wirtz
Heather Wirtz
True or False? All canned soups are created equal.
Last week, I might have said true -- especially within the chicken noodle variety.
How different can they be? Chicken broth, chicken, carrots, noodles and maybe a few extra veggies. Well, I can now confidently say: canned chicken noodle soups are VERY different.
How different can they be? Chicken broth, chicken, carrots, noodles and maybe a few extra veggies. Well, I can now confidently say: canned chicken noodle soups are VERY different.
Recently, Macaroni EATS held a blind tasting of eight different chicken noodle soup varieties. The tasters: one professional chef and three kids.
We sampled:
- Progresso Light Chicken Vegetable Rotini
- Campbell's Chunky Healthy Request Chicken Noodle
- Wild Harvest Organic Cage Free Chicken Noodle
- Campbell's Condensed Healthy Request Chicken Noodle
- Earth's Best Organic Elmo Noodlemania
- Healthy Choice Chicken Noodle
- Campbell's 100% Natural Chicken with Egg Noodles
- Campbell's Condensed Healthy Kids Chicken Noodle O's
I had two preconcieved beliefs before we began. First, I was pretty sure the kids would favor the "kids" themed ones - what kid doesn't want Elmo shaped pasta in his soup? I was wrong. Second, I assumed that the more expensive brands were sure to be better...once again, wrong.
In a blind taste test, what did we learn?
We learned that one kid preferred soups with less chicken, probably not a common preference when talking about chicken noodle soup. We learned that "mushy" carrots are a problem common to all soups we tested except Campbell's 100% Natural Chicken with Egg Noodles. We learned that noodles, like carrots, tend to be "too mushy", though Campbell's 100% Natural Chicken with Egg Noodles and Progresso Light Chicken Vegetable Rotini stood up better than the rest. And we learned that there are tremendous variations among the broths, with some good, some starchy, some too salty, some not salty enough.
Was it simply a matter of taste? Would the same things that appealed to the kids appeal to the chef? Yes and no.
Remarkably, though they reached their conclusions for different reasons, ultimately the chef and the kids selected the same top three soups in the same order of preference. The kids and the chef agreed that the best soups of the bunch were:
- Campbell's 100% Natural Chicken with Egg Noodles
- Progresso Light Chicken Vegetable Rotini
- Campbell's Condensed Healthy Request Chicken Noodle
We had so much fun with this taste test, we might do it again! Let us know if you have any suggestions for what you'd like to see our team taste test next!
Comments
1) Erin Carlson said:
Thank you for this! I never know which chicken soup she is going to eat. There is such a huge difference in taste between brands. Campbell's always seems to work the best. I'll try all of these and see which one she chooses. Thanks. I'm sure Campbell's would be pleased to hear about this. How about doing a test on fruit snacks? They really vary in softness and sugar/juice content.
2) Amanda Nelson said:
What about the pouch fruits? Thank you so much for this
3) katie said:
Why not try making your own broth! It tastes so much better than canned and without the BPA from the cans, and the extra stuff we don't want in our kids food. You can control the sodium and put more good veggies in it plus the protein of fresh antibiotic free chicken. My 3 year old loves to help too!
4) Sharon said:
After eating Progresso religiously for the last 4 years I tried some Campbells soups that were on sale and did not care for Campbells flavoring. I'll be sticking with Progresso. But you're blind taste test was a very interesting read!
Have your say
© 2013 Macaroni Kid, LLC