Mr Brain's Faggots In Rich Sauce (Tesco Mr. Brains 4 Faggots In Rich Sauce)

Member Name: GentleGenius

Product:	Tesco Mr. Brains 4 Faggots In Rich Sauce
Date:	13/10/08 (401 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Cheap, tasty, a very good source of protein

Disadvantages: Much too high in fat

COST (depending on where purchased):

Between £1.00 and £1.20 for 378g (4 faggots)
Between £1.79 and £1.87 for 564g (6 faggots)

NUTRITIONAL INFORMATION (per 189g which is 2 faggots):

Calories: 242
Kj: 1,015
Protein: 10.0g
Carbohydrate: 22.5g
- of which sugars: 4.3g
Fat: 12.5g
- of which saturates: 5.9g
Fibre: 1.1g
Sodium: 0.9g

INGREDIENTS:

The Sauce: Water, lard, wheat flour, modified maize starch, tomato puree, salt, colour (E150c), yeast extract, sugar, onion flavour, spice and herb extracts (celery)

The faggots: Water, rusks, pork rind, pork liver, onion, pork, pork fat, wheat flour, salt, sage, spice extracts

OTHER INFORMATION:

Contains wheat gluten and celery. May contain soya.

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Mr Brain's Pork Faggots, which have been around for as long as I can remember, are to be found in the frozen food department of most supermarkets and some smaller grocery outlets, and are available in packs of four or six faggots.

The cardboard box in which these faggots come is yellow on the top of each surface, gradually fading down to an orange colour. On the front of the box are, in red, the words "Mr Brain's", followed by a green scroll shape bearing the words "4 (or 6) Pork Faggots" in white lettering, then the words "In a rich West Country Sauce" in black. Underneath that is a green circle with a bar through the middle, and the words "Classic Pork Recipe" arranged within. There is an image on the front of the box of two faggots in gravy, a serving of mashed potato, and a few peas on a white plate. The sides of the box repeat all the wording that appears on the front, but minus the picture of the meal. On the rear of the box is the nutritional information, cooking and storage instructions, ingredients list, and manufacturer's contact details.

On opening the box, inside there is a stiff foil carton (like those used for Indian and Chinese takeaways) which is covered with a square of white cardboard. The product can be cooked in a conventional oven or a microwave - I personally prefer to use the conventional oven method (it is recommended on the pack that the product should be cooked from frozen). The lid needs to be removed before cooking in a conventional oven, and if microwaving, the faggots need to be transferred to a non metallic, microwave proof container. Inside of the foil tin, there are four or six (depending on the size of the pack) frozen little balls of brown meat, surrounded by a solid frozen block of brown gravy.

Once the cooking process has started, it isn't long before your kitchen will be filled with a lovely meaty smell - almost akin to a stew cooking. When the faggots are ready to serve and you lift the foil carton out of the oven, the meaty little balls will have browned on the top, and the thick but quite sparse (quantity-wise) gravy bubbles around the edges of the container. The cooked product looks and smells very appetising (well to me it does!), and a good accompaniment for the faggots is mashed potatoes, carrots and a selection of steamed green vegetables. They go great with chips too - especially those bought from the fish & chip shop.

The faggots are really meatballs, made of pork meat and liver, nestling in a rich, thick gravy sauce. They are very tender to slice into, are lightly spiced, and incredibly tasty. I really am not an offal lover at all, but I adore these faggots as I can't taste any evidence of the presence of pig liver in them at all, even though as far as the meat content is concerned, it is proportionately larger than other pig meat contained therein. The gravy is beautiful, and for me just the right thickness (I really hate thin gravy), but I would be happier if there were a little more of it.

For me, the suggested serving per person of 2 faggots isn't enough, and I need 4 in order to satisfy my appetite - I then feel as though I have had a good and substantial meal from them, together with the accompanying vegetables; but, more than 4 would be too many for me.

Mr Brain's Faggots remind me of meatloaf that has been formed into ball shapes instead of pressed into a loaf tin. The consistency of the faggots is softer than a meatloaf would be, but the taste is very similar.

I think a lot of people could be put off of eating faggots firstly because of the unfortunate other interpretation of the word "faggot", but we must remember that the word was around long before it was adopted for use as a derogatory term for gay men - and secondly, because they contain offal. As said above, I am not an offal lover, but I don't even think of or notice the liver content in these faggots at all.

Overall and in my personal opinion, Mr Brain's Faggots are a delicious, cheap and reasonably nutritious meal, are an excellent source of protein for the carnivores amongst us, and an equally excellent source of good carbohydrate in the form of the cereal which is used to bind the ingredients together into ball-shapes.

The biggest downfall of these faggots is that they are much higher in fat than I feel is necessary - a very scary 12.5g per suggested serving! I'm also not too happy about the addition of lard to the ingredients - who uses lard these days? Well, Mr Brain's obviously does.

I do recommend to anyone to try Mr Brain's faggots though, especially in these days of economising, as they are a much cheaper source of protein than things such as steak, chops, poultry etc.

Thumbs up to Mr Brains! I wonder if they will ever consider producing a low fat version of their faggots? I hope so, as I would buy them more often.

Thanks for reading everyone!

Summary: Something even offal-haters would enjoy