Boxed dinners are fairly inexpensive and make cooking easy, but do boxed dinners offer a nutritious meal? This review of Leonardo Tuna Dinner will look at that very question. In this review, I will focus on cost, ease of cooking, overall taste, and nutritional contribution of this cheesy pasta skillet dinner in this article.
Leonardo Tuna Dinner Cost
Believe it or not, I picked up Leonardo Tuna Dinner for a buck at the Dollar Store. So putting that together with the cost of a cup of milk, a can of tuna, and three tablespoons butter, the cost of the entire dinner comes to less than two bucks. It makes 5 one-cup servings, but my experience is that the one cup servings seem slight on a plate and cooks would be more apt to get only 3 servings out of the prepared meal.
Leonardo Tuna Dinner Taste
The 7.75-ounce box of pasta includes the dried pasta packet and a cheesy sauce mix. When prepared, the taste is very cheesy, smooth, and maybe a bit on the salty side. One thing it is not is plain. Leonardo Tuna Dinner has taste, and that’s more than I can say about some other boxed tuna and pasta brands I’ve tried.
Leonardo Tuna Dinner Easy of Cooking
In large print with plenty of visuals, the box gives directions for cooking this meal in one skillet in about 15 minutes. I’ve made the meal twice, and I’ve discovered its directions call for a tad too much water. I reduce it by 1/4 cup at least, because I cook pasta to al dente, and my family likes to eat the meal very hot, not overly cooled.
On one side panel, the box offers stir-in ideas, such as adding chopped onions or chopped broccoli and topping ideas, such as shredded cheese. On the other side panel, the box gives microwave directions as well as the stovetop directions on the back panel.
Leonardo Tuna Dinner Nutrition
As prepared per serving, the meal has 300 calories, with 110 of those calories coming from fat. The sodium contribution is 1130 mg, and if one eats more than the single-cup serving, that’s a whole lot of sodium for the day–coming from just one meal item. One serving has 29 carbs, 6 grams of protein, and less than a gram of fiber.
Leonardo Tuna Dinner is manufactured by Leonardo, Inc. in Devil’s Lake, North Dakota, USA. Its ingredient list includes yellow colors #5 and #6, monosodium glutamate, and partially hydrogenated soybean oil–giving it one gram of trans fat.
Leonardo Tuna Dinner Conclusions
Based on the ingredient list and the nutritional contribution, I would conclude that nutrition might not be Leonardo Tuna Dinner’s strong suit. But cost and taste sure are. If you like cheap, if you like the cheesy taste, and if you are not concerned about high sodium content, trans fat content, dye content, monosodium glutamate content, or lack of fiber, then Leonardo Tuna Dinner might be a nice choice for tonight’s supper.