Bostin' Beans (Heinz Mean Beans Sweet Chilli)

Member Name: flodombey

Product:	Heinz Mean Beans Sweet Chilli
Date:	14/07/09 (62 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Tasty, pretty healthy, good value, high in fibre

Disadvantages: Sugar and sweetener

Fancying something a little different for my lunch one day this week I grabbed a couple of tins from this fairly recent range of Heinz products, humorously titled Mean Beanz. They have basically produced 4 new 'flavours' of the old classic Heinz Baked Beans which are Jalfrezi, Mexican, Tikka and this particular one I am going to review here - Sweet Chilli.

I do love baked beans and eat them quite often, partly because being on the weight watchers plan these tend to be a great low point option for lunch with a jacket or on wholemeal toast. However, beans can be a little on the boring side.....unless you try the mean beanz range....

I paid 67p for a 390g can and the nutritional info tells me that in half a can (the portion I would have) there are 142 calories and only a trace of saturated fat, in points terms this means that the half can is worth 3 points. This is quite high for a filler / toast topper, but if I have it with a small jacket or one slice of wholemeal I can still get my meal to around 5 points which is fine.

So, on day one I poured half the tin into a pan and heaed while warming up a jacket spud. The smell when I opened the tin was quite something, definitely a spicy kind of smell and a slightly darker colour than your average beans. In usual Heinz quality the beans were in a thick sauce and were of regular size and shape. Stirring them round for a few minutes they soon reached the required temperature.

Taste wise I was actually really impressed. I am a big fan of anything 'sweet chilli' and use the sauce a lot in my normal cooking methods, this product managed to capture the taste of sweet chilli sauce with the texture and filling capacity of usual beans, to say it was tasty was an understatement. I even contemplated heating up the rest of the pan there and then but managed to talk myself out of it!

There is an unmistakable kick to the sauce these beans are in, it manages to be both spicy and sweet at the same time. I was really pleased to see that the ingredients list was made up of entirely recognisable things and no nasties or MSG or artificial flavourings. There is both sweetener and sugar in these beans, sugar is usually present in baked beans but I assume that there is added sweetener in this because of the sweetness of the chilli sauce they were seeking to recreate.

The next day I had the rest of the beans on some toast and they were equally delicious. All round I think this product is a success and is one I will be buying again, beans are such a convenient and relatively healthy, quick meal and to have a variation on that is a great option in my opinion.

I think 67p is pretty good value for money, it would be nice to see the rest of this range on some kind of special offer to encourage more people to try them but I would buy them at full price anyway.

I have also bought the Tikka variety and will get round to reviewing that at some point, it will have something to live up to with these though so watch this space!

Summary: A great alternative to plain beans to liven up your lunch