As our gluten-impaired readers know, prepared foods can be pricey for people with food restrictions. Reader Gary tried some frozen lasagna from the brand Udi’s, and found that what was in the box didn’t resemble what was shown on the box.

He bought two boxes of the product, noting that they cost $4.69 each, plus $.47 in sales tax. That’s not cheap for a frozen meal, so he was expecting something that at least sort of resembled the tasty lasagna on the box. What he got was… not that.

“What a disappointment for a frozen meal that costs so much,” Gary wrote to Consumerist. “The box does say the picture is a ‘serving suggestion,’ but I’d like to know how they suggest I make the serving look like the picture. As best I can tell, I’d have to stack two meals onto each other and add the cheese topping to even come close to looking like the picture.” That was not why Gary bought two meals.

While the weight printed on the box reflects the weight of the total package, he was even disappointed when he popped the lasagna on a small scale and found that the meal without its paper dish weighed only six ounces.

The good news is that Gary contacted Udi’s, which sent him a nice email back and a few coupons for free meals. “Please be assured that the experience you shared with us does not meet the high quality standards we have for all of our products,” they wrote back.

Will those keep him trying the brand, or at least make up for the amount he shelled out for these two sub-par sausage lasagnas? Will Udi’s actually work on their lasagna quality control? We don’t now yet, but at least Gary got some coupons.

Lasagna is apparently a difficult food to freeze and store: our readers have submitted other disappointing lasagnas at various price points, including the low-price Michelina’s brand and the mid-priced Healthy Choice brand.

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