Credit: Liv Averett / Instacart / Target / Walmart
The hardest thing about dieting isn’t trying not to eat, it’s figuring out what to eat. Even if you’re cutting calories to lose a little weight, you have to do it safely, and that means you gotta eat. And when you need something quick and easy, sometimes you just gotta eat frozen diet meals.
We’ve taste tested a lot of frozen dinners. When we rank them, we always do so based on how good they taste—and once in a while, the lower calorie, lower fat meals actually taste better than a lot of the more indulgent ones. We love when that happens! Whether you’re watching your fat and calorie intake or you simply prefer a lighter lunch, here are the best diet frozen meals we’ve found so far.
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Our favorite high protein frozen meal is not diet-friendly (chicken alfredo will always be sort of decadent), but our #2 pick is a little more reasonable. Not all Healthy Choice meals are winners, but this is one of their frozen diet meals that is worth a damn. You get bits of grilled pork atop a bed of grains, beans, greens, and other veggies. As Sporked editor-in-chief Justine Sterling put it, “It tastes like something you’d get from the Whole Foods buffet, but this way you aren’t paying $20 for it.” That’s pretty impressive when you’re dealing with diet frozen meals!
Is there anything that sounds more depressing than a crustless chicken pot pie? I mean, you just took the pie out of the pot pie, my dudes! Still, when we sat down to taste test low carb frozen dinners (full ranking coming soon), this Atkins meal was a pleasant surprise. Would it be better if it involved some crispy, buttery pie crust. Sure. But it’s surprisingly delicious if you can get past the lack o’ crust. It’s creamy and packed with chicken and vegetables. The broccoli is nice and crisp rather than turning to mush. Now, this isn’t a “diet” frozen dinner in the traditional sense since it contains 19 grams of fat, but it’s very low carb (only 6 net grams per bowl), so we think it deserves a spot among the other frozen diet meals on this list.
Credit: Liv Averett / Walmart
Rating:
9/10
Sporks
Best Lean Cuisine Meal
Lean Cuisine Protein Kick Salisbury Steak with Macaroni & Cheese (250 cal, 6g fat)
Salisbury steak is a classic TV dinner, and it’s fun that being on a diet doesn’t preclude you from indulging in a little gravy-doused hamburger steak. This frozen diet meal made the grade in a couple of our taste tests. It ranked among the best salisbury steak dinners and it came out on top when we taste tested all the Lean Cuisine meals we could find. The patty is tender and the mushroom gravy is seriously savory. This is one of those diet frozen meals that gets major points for sheer nostalgia.
Credit: Merc / Target
Rating:
9.5/10
Sporks
Best Lower Cal Frozen Meatloaf
Lean Cuisine Meatloaf with Mashed Potatoes (250 cal, 7g fat)
We taste tested a lot of frozen meatloaf, and most of it simply is not meatloaf—it’s glorified Salisbury steak. Only two frozen meatloaf meals made the cut, and one of them happens to be a fit on this list of the best frozen diet meals. Lean Cuisine Meatloaf is genuinely good. The mashed potatoes are creamy and loaded with chives, and the meatloaf itself comes drenched in a tomatoey gravy that really works. Comfort food doesn’t have to be heavy, and the best diet frozen dinners are proof.
This is an elite Lean Cuisine meal, and an elite frozen turkey dinner, too. So many frozen turkey dinners come with a few thin slabs of chopped and reformed turkey that look more like deli meat than slabs that were carved off of a bird. But Lean Cuisine Roasted Turkey Breast dinner—which comes with stuffing AND mashed potatoes—comes with lovely little turkey medallions that actually look and taste like turkey. This is a classic for a reason, and it fully deserves a spot among the best frozen diet meals.
Gwynedd Stuart, Sporked’s managing editor, is an L.A.-based writer and editor who spends way, way too much time at the grocery store. She’s never met an Old El Paso taco or mozzarella stick she didn’t like.
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