First, lets talk about the company. Botticelli Foods is a family owned company that dates five generations. They pride themselves in "presenting a full line of fine Italian foods from their family to your's." They carry olive oils, vinegars, pastas, roasted red peppers and sauces.
We were generously gifted the Tomato & Basil Sauce, Rigatoni pasta, Olive Oil and Extra Virgin Olive Oil to test in our daily meals. (not pictured is the Olive Oil as it was already in use by the messy stove.)
But you know what, I survived and my kids didn't die from eating my dinner.
We started by boiling the Rigatoni aldente. I wanted to see if it would hold its shape after being boiled. It did quite well actually. Some of the other store brands don't hold up too well after being introduced to hot water. But Botticelli's did. It didn't get mushy at all. It even had that homemade pasta taste that you normally can't get unless you breakout the pasta cutter and start working the dough yourself. I was impressed by this.
Botticelli, score 1.
After the noodles were ready, lightly covering a 9x13 glass dish, i poured the noodles in and tossed ever so gently. This served two purposes, it added a lovely olive flavor to the pasta and coated them from burning or sticking to my dish. Then I laid in chicken cutlets and covered the entire dish with the tomato & basil sauce. Topped it all off with some mozzarella cheese because every dish needs cheese and baked for 25 minutes until the chicken was cooked and the cheese bubbling.
It was amazingly easy! Botticelli, score 2.
But the real test is if the crazy #4 boy will eat it? His understanding of Italian food is that it comes from a blue box and is super super cheesy. Bonuses if we add hot dogs or spam. Blech!
And his verdict??
Botticelli, score 4. Full on thumbs up with chipmunk cheeks!
Everything was as amazing as it looked! I'm not afraid to share my opinions, good, bad or otherwise. But there was nothing negative to say about this dish. In fact, the boys, plural, all of them, agreed this was one dish we can remake any time!
Botticelli, score 5! Consider this a 5 star review for a 5 star product!
I think the next test will be to prep it frozen and see how it cooks thawed. It would be super easy to prep as a freezer meal!
These opinions are mine and those of my crazy boys. Other than the products to test, I was not compensated for my review. Unfortunately the husband didn't get much input as he was traveling on business. But he has continuously used the olive oil and is impressed with the texture and taste. This weekend we plan to use it for homemade pasta to see how it flavors the noodles.
Thanks for listing and check out Botticelli Foods for yourself! Leave a comment if you've used their products before. What did you like? What do you recommend? If you haven't, what dish would you make with the things they sell?
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