Canned ravioli was my first introduction to ravioli as a kid and I loved it. As an adult I have an appreciation for home-made or restaurant quality ravioli but I have no problem saying there is just something about the canned stuff that’s just so nice in it’s own way. I forgot all about Libby’s as a brand, I haven’t looked them up but I know there was something else they made that I liked, I’ll have to do a little searching later but my only experience with canned ravs has been with Chef Boyardee so I was interested to see what Libby’s was like.
Chef:
This is so familiar, I have a hard time describing it but it’s the lovely mushy pasta squares with an even mushier meat filling. What provides the most texture are the bits of meat in the soupy tomato sauce. The sauce was lacking a little in the flavor department but provided a nice base for the raviolis to slide around in.
Libby’s:
Looks almost identical Chef’s but a little more sauce. The texture of the pasta and filling were the same but we both noticed there was more flavor in the ravioli and the sauce was more “tomatoy”. The bits of meat in the sauce were a little less than Chef’s.
Wrap up:
Both provide the same mushy, slurpy texture (which the 8 year old in me loves) but we were surprised that Libby’s had more flavor and we found our enjoying it more. We agreed that it wasn’t enough of a difference to shun the Chef, he still makes an enjoyable can of mush but since we were evaluating one right after another we did notice Libby’s has a little bit of an edge.
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I was really surprised that these didn’t stick to my teeth at all and I could chew freely without worry. While these aren’t pretty to look at Ethan agreed with me that these had a nice bounce to them. We liked the flavors, (apple, cherry, orange, lemon) but the best to us was the clear bear which was pineapple.
While they had a decent bounce when chewed and they didn’t stick to my teeth, they seemed to have the potential to if bitten on too hard. The flavors were kind of muted, none of them really tasted like anything to me but Ethan said the red has a strong cherry flavor. I think visually they look better and resembled bears more than the gummis.
These have a grainy texture which at least gives you the illusion you’re eating something mildly healthy. I felt like there was a slight chemical taste to them. Rick and Ethan said they were a little dry but really liked the fruit filling. Steph changed her mind didn’t try these saying she knew she liked the other brand better. We asked Kyle if he liked these and he just nodded his head.
Fruit & Grain was slightly different because of the swirled icing on top. I didn’t really notice much taste from that but Steph said that’s why she likes these bars better. She also said she likes how moist they are. We all agreed they were more moist but to me the extreme softness seemed “un-natural” like it was a doughnut or something. There was also a checmical taste to these like with the Nutri-Grain.
These had a nice crisp crunch. I expected more of salty taste from the amount of seen on them but it was pretty mild. Ethan said the salt was well balanced and the prefect amount on each stick. I thought these had some sort of weird after taste to them but Ethan didn’t detect that at all.
Bachman’s was a teeny bit thinner but had just as good of a crunch. This time Ethan thought there was a weird taste which he could only describe as “tastes like how Barnes and Noble smells”. It wasn’t a good or bad thing, just what came to his mind. I thought these had a nice toasty flavor to them and tasted a little saltier, which I liked.
These egg rolls are rectangle shaped, with a well proportioned amount of dough even though they’re not filled as much as what is shown on the package. I thought these were a little peppery tasting and neither of us detected ant shrimp flavor. Ethan said the cabbage took over all flavors and in general tasted very “unfresh”. 
This picture almost looks like it’s sticking it’s tounge out. 
As these are known for, they’re pretty dry and crumbly. Despite that, they have a pleasant crunch and actually taste like a chocolate chip cookie. I think the best part of the cookie is the chocolate chips, they had a nice chocolate flavor and there was plenty of them throughout the cookie.
These are just as dry and crumbly but with much less flavor.
These had a nice shine and vibrant color. They also feature the pleasant trademark lowercase “m” on each piece. The chocolate is pretty good for milk chocolate, it’s a very reliable chocolate that seems to be consistent with every other bag of m&m’s I’ve ever had. Ethan felt the peanut flavor takes over a little but because they’re so good.
These had similar colors but had a duller sheen. The shell was harder and seemed to crumble which revealed a weird “mocolate” that lacked a real chocolate flavor. The peanuts were okay as far as flavor but seemed harder than the m&m peanuts.
The first thing Ethan and I noticed was the extreme saltiness of these crackers. Rick described the texture as moist and flaky, which it was. My 3 1/2 year old nephew said they smell like chicken. I don’t know if I’d say these tasted like chicken if they were called something else but I guess it was something like dry chicken soup mix in a cracker, although Ethan did note that they do actually have dehydrated chicken in it as well.
I thought these crackers looked “friendlier” somehow but all every one at the table had to say about these were “gross” or “just gross”. That’s because they were. the only description I could drag out of anyone (other than gross) was “stale” and Ethan said it’s tastes like the grey pieces of chicken in cans of soup, and it really did capture that essence. My nephew wouldn;t even try it after sniffing it.
One of the great ice cream shop(pe) treats is a root beer float. I’ll make these one in a while at home too. I’ve seen this product of root beer float in a bottle and had my doubts but finally gave in and bought one, just for the sake of trying it. A&W makes a pretty decent root beer so I figured they must know what they’re doing when trying to recreate a root beer float in this format. There is also an Orange creme version of this but for some reason that combo never tasted good to me so I just got the root beer or just “Float” version.
This post is almost too easy because I could wrap it up in one word: “no”.
When I tried to get a cross section of this, it pretty much shattered, it doesn’t really mean anything but I just wanted to explain the poor presentation.
A little more stable when cutting in half, we found the chocolate to be a little better but the marshmallow was still lacking something. I know technically on the wrapper is reads “whipped creme center”, but it really had the consistency of marshmallow and I know some products say “marshmallow creme”, so between that and the fact they’re called “mallow cup” I’ll think marshmallow is what they’re going for. Also, it doesn’t state it on the front of the wrapper but there are also small amounts of coconut flakes in the chocolate. The flavor of the coconut does come through and take over somewhat but considering the marshmallow is so mild, I guess SOME flavor has to be dominant.