Beef & Ale, mmmm lovely (Colman's Beef & Ale Sauce Mix)

Member Name: soutram

Product:	Colman's Beef & Ale Sauce Mix
Date:	18/09/09 (143 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Very quick and easy to make

Disadvantages: none

Having a 6 month old baby means I don't always have the time to cook really nice meals from scratch, I seem to be forever sticking chips and pies etc in the oven so I decided to buy some packets that would enable me to make some nice casseroles etc

When I was looking through the available sauce mixes I spotted the Colmans Beef & Ale sauce, the picture on the front of the packet looked very nice so I bought one and cooked it that evening.

The Packet
The top half of the packet is brown with the Yellow and red Colman's logo, beneath the logo you have a picture of what the dish looks like (meat mushrooms in a sauce) then below that you have the contents (for one meal).

On the reverse of the packet you have the ingredients, how to cook instructions and the nutritional information. It also has a something special section that gives you a slight alternative to the cooking instructions which makes another tasty meal.

How To Cook
Firstly you need to have the following ingredients
1 Packet of beef and ale mix
450g lean braising steak
1 medium onion
115g mushrooms
425ml cold water

Simply preheat your oven to 180, put the beef, onions (sliced) and mushrooms (chopped) in an ovenproof dish, mix the sauce contents of the sachet with the water and pour over the beef, onions and mushrooms, cover and cook for 1 hour 30mins or until beef is tender.

Nutritional Info
Complete meal for one
Calories 209, Sugar 3.2g, Fat 6.8g, Saturates 2.9g and salt 1.2g

The Sauce
I absolutely love this sauce mix, because you cook it for a long time the beef is always so tender and the flavour is lovely, you can def taste the ale in this mix, the sauce is nice, thick and creamy, I think this would work very well as a pie.

The colour of the mix is a dark brown (gravy like) and even though it thickens up quite a lot you still get plenty (which is good for me as I love my gravy). I find that this sauce works very well with either good old mash or even roast potatoes and Yorkshire puddings with a bit of veg.

My Opinion
As I said having a small child means I don't always have the time to cook so these mixes are the perfect solution for me, I just bung in all the fresh ingredients and an hour and half later we have a lovely tasty meal. They don't cost the earth either, this particular packet mix cost me 74 pence (serves 4) and to be honest I wouldn't have a clue how to make something like this from scratch.

I now buy quite a few of these packets (various flavours) and love using them, it makes my life so much easier and I feel like we are having good food rather than chips and pies etc all of the time.

Summary: A great meal that very quick and easy to make, ideal if you don't have the time to cook from scratch