Tenth Post: Week 11.

Week 11. It's something that most undergrads will not have heard of. It's something most postgrads will not have heard of because we don't work on an arbitrary weeks system. It's the week after all the undergrads have gone, and all services shut down despite our requirements to work staying the same or increasing. It's unpleasant. It's cold. It's lonely. It's time for 'Adventures in Depressing Food for One'.

To spice things up a bit I will be doing three mini-reviews of four meals that I have not tried before. The Tesco 'Light', 'Italian' and 'Classic English' menus are not ones that I have sampled before, but there's a first time for everything. We will be rounding things out with a nice Sundary roast from Asda.

Wednesday Night: Light Bangers and Mash

The first thing you notice about this dish is the fact that the potato is wrong. It doesn't just look wrong, or act wrong, but it has some sort of transcendental wrongness. It's frozen in a peak, as though it has just been secreted from some ungodly mechanical orifice in the factory. This is not a frozen meal, so I must assume it has some sort of quick-setting property such that even the ripples are still preserved. The whole blob is solid, and can be slid around in the packet as a cohesive whole. I think if I tried, I could snap it. This does not bode well.

Before

After - note the lack of change in the potato

The ingredient list is also pretty interesting. Light meals tend to sound more wholesome, due to their market, so there's not much in the way of E numbers and preservatives, which is nice. One ingredient did catch my eye though: Pork Rind. That's skin, folks. I have to admit that this blog was in large part inspired by Steve, Don't Eat It!, the second episode of which was in fact just a jar of Pickled Pork Rind. Skin in vinegar. I didn't think I would be sinking to such depths so soon.

Welcome to Flavour Country

Upon microwaving, the meal has not changed much. The block of potato has not changed shape but has become more gelatinous. It slithers onto the plate mostly whole. I am surprised by how much onion is in the gravy, as that's quite a good sign.

Speaking of skin, the potato has one.

ACTION SEQUENCE!
Provide your own sound effects

Despite appearances, this meal is actually really nice. The potato tastes like...wait for it...a potato! Not salty crap like most mash you get in packets. Sure it could use some butter, but I really expected worse. The sausages are a little anemic in meatyness but the gravy is delicious. Its onion and redcurrant I believe. It makes the potato quite pleasant too.


Roundup:
Skin Level: Copacabana Beach
Saving Grace: Sauce
Rating: 7/10. Tasty, but a little unfilling, and a little scary

Friday Night: Fish and Chips
As I live with the spectre of Christianity, and I am British, I chose to get fish and chips for Friday. The dish had the classic boxart/reality gulf that one has come to expect from these ready meals.

Even the puppy tray in the background looks worried

I received some Christmas cards in the post today and so chose to add a bit of festive cheer to my plate. I think it adds a little something, even if that something is an additional layer of ennui.

Don't worry, the black bits are just because my baking tray needs a good scrub

As one might expect, the chips are utter shit. Some are burned to a crisp, some are flaccid and undercooked. All are tasteless and unpleasant. They have that sort of floury texture that implies that it's all reconstituted slime. I had to literally douse them in Tesco mustard to make them palatable. The matter was also helped by a bottle of free Mulled Wine I pilfered from a university Christmas outreach event, which added to the flavour.

The fish is alright actually. Doesn't taste bad, and the batter is pretty good. It's a very thin piece of fish, which clearly takes a bit of skill to produce. It's quite grey under the batter, but given that this meal cost me £2, it's actually a pretty cheap and easy way to get some fish into your diet, relative to the fresh stuff.

Reminds me a little of the fish committee scene in
classic 1970's borstal drama, 'Scum'

Regardless, this was all pretty bad. I wouldn't recommend it. Just go to a chippy or something, or get a reputable frozen brand. Tesco do a pretty good bag of frozen salmon that's cheap and quite tasty. I would recommend that over this. Now if you will excuse me, I need to go and get half-cut on free mulled wine before I go to see the Hobbit.

Not Middle Earth's intoxicant of choice, mind

Roundup:
Salt content: 37% of your GDA - surprising for the lack of flavour
Rating: 4/10 - Why would you choose this over decent chippy stuff?

Saturday Lunch: Light Sweet and Sour Chicken
This is another example of where I am trying a different version of a dish I have had before. Instead of the standard Ken Hom stuff I am intrigued to see what the Light version is like. It's clear to see there are smaller portions, which makes sense, but otherwise there doesn't seem to be any big surprises in the appearance of the meal.

Colourful!

Rather than the usual egg fried rice I think this is boiled rice. In addition to the customary peas you get in other Tesco Chinese meals, there are flecks of red pepper. These are mostly cosmetic as they don't really have any discernible flavour. The same goes for the rice, which has a good texture but no real flavour. At least the peas are sweet and juicy, unlike the bullets you often get in a microwave meal.

The chicken is alarming. The flavour is alright but it has the chalky texture common to most Tesco ready meals. There is no evidence of the creepy ridges from my last review. I have no idea how one manufactures a meal that requires the chicken to marinate in the sauce for literally days and still maintain absolute lack of moisture. This is dryer than an Oscar Wilde quip.

"Don't bring me into this" - Oscar Wilde

I suppose it would be better if the sauce was pleasant but really it's just tangy red syrup. I wouldn't dip a chip in this.

Roundup:
Comedy categories: Will not dignify
Rating: 4/10, just dissatisfying

Sunday Dinner: Asda Roast Beef for One
Ahh here we go...this is what we are all here for. My first entry on this blog was inspired by a Sunday Asda lunch, and here we are again. There's a special kind of despair associated with a traditional family meal that can be prepared for one in 6 minutes. The question is, am I a GENIUS for picking this up for £2.50, or are the people who are lovingly preparing a meal at great cost and expense really the winners in this imaginary situation? Let's find out.

A Rainbow on a plate

The meal consists of mash, about four thin slices of roast beef in gravy, and some carrots and broccoli as a side. Note the odd inconsistency of the gravy...at 12-2 o'Clock on the plate it is thick and congealed. At 8-12 o'Clock it is thin and watery. It's basically a diurnal representation of my smokers cough.

The meat is amazingly thinly sliced, so I have to fold it up to get any kind of bite into it. Its oddly rubbery and tastes like it has been soaked in some salt to preserve it. It's halfway between sliced sandwich beef and pastrami, either of which would be nicer than this. Apologies for the sound on this clip, it was Kirsty Wark repeating an ignorant homophobic quote from Arnold Schwarzenegger.

 

The veg is really quite good, and the mash tastes like there's at least some butter in it. This does not distract from my alarm that they saw fit to comb the mash like a zen garden in the packet. Either that or they press a trilobite into each tray.

Zen?

I guess the problem here is that microwave roast dinners are sufficient mimics of true roast meals to remind you of happier times, but are not in themselves pleasant enough to create happy times of their own. This juxtaposition of sentimental nostalgia and contemporary unpleasantness creates a heady mix.

There's a certain unpleasantness on the packet. It has a kind of stamp or brand that labels this a 'Meal for One'. I am reminded of the Soviet Bureaucracy simulator 'Papers Please'. It's just a badge of shame, and nothing more.

The Dark Mark

The Roundup!
Packaging: Designed to shame
Meat thickness: Only Waf-fer thin
Rating: 5/10 - Palatable but misery inducing