THUMB'S UP FROM A CHICKEN LOVER?!?! (Quorn Lemon & Black Pepper Escalopes)

Member Name: Wee_Jackie_163

Product:	Quorn Lemon & Black Pepper Escalopes
Date:	22/06/09 (106 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: GREAT TASTE, CONVENIENT AND EASY TO COOK

Disadvantages: NONE FOR ME

It was whilst I was looking in the "Chillier" cabinets in my local Asda supermarket (in the Vegetarian section, as I had veggie sausage and mash in mind for dinner) that I spotted that several products with the "Quorn" brand name on them were on special offer.

Having been vegetarian in the past, a lifestyle of mine that had a span of a decade, I have tried several Quorn products over the years, some of which I still buy regularly and some of which I detest.

The Quorn Escalopes have proven to be a bit of a "hit or miss" with me, usually due to whatever coating or stuffing they have - some of them are just not to my taste. Again, some of them I buy regularly and some of them I tend to avoid like the plague.

One such variation of the Quorn escalopes that I DO buy quite regularly though, is the "Lemon and Black Pepper" variety. I was happy to note that the packet of two large escalopes was on special offer and would only cost me one pound. (I think the usual price is around £1.90 from my local supermarket - (not Asda)!

As I knew from experience that these escalopes could be frozen easily until I was ready to use them, I opted to buy two packets as I felt that the special offer price was too good to pass up!

In my freezer they remained, until last night when my other half was in charge of the cooking. He stumbled across the package in the freezer and asked if I fancied them for tea. Agreeing that I did, he set about cooking them up with a few Yorkshire puddings and some lovely broccoli and other bits and pieces and all in all it proved to be a tasty little dinner!

The Quorn escalopes, for those of you who are unfamiliar with them, is a piece of Quorn, a man-made fungi based product, which is coated in lovely golden breadcrumbs. The idea is similar to that of a chicken escalope or one of those pre-prepared-all-you-need-to-do-is-cook-it chicken breasts that are available to buy in the freezers in all major supermarkets.

The Quorn itself is a kind of "fake chicken". It is a similar colour and size to chicken, although I find that the texture is a bit of a give away.

The taste of the Quorn itself is evident in this product, as is the case with most similar products available from the Quorn range of foods - I find the taste to be not all THAT similar to the taste of chicken, but it definitely has a 'meaty' taste to it.

The breadcrumb coating was very generous and covered the Quorn perfectly. I found the taste of the coating to be quite delicious although it was probably lightly flavoured in terms of the black pepper (I actually ended up adding a little more black pepper to mine) but the lemon most definitely came through and was obvious when I was eating it. That said though, I did not find it to be over-powering.

As for cooking the escalopes, this is very easy to do. They are provided in a plastic black tray with a clear lid, from which the escalopes should be removed, placed on a baking tray and popped into the oven. They are reasonably quick to cook too, and only take around 15 minutes or so. There is also an option to grill these if you prefer, but I have never cooked them this way so cannot comment on whether this is better or worse than the oven-cooking option.

The product is of course suitable for vegetarians, and in fact the packaging proudly boasts the emblem of "The Vegetarian Society" to ensure that consumers know that it has been approved by them. The packaging also gives allergy advice so that an easy decision can be made by consumers who suffer from food allergies.

The nutritional advice on the packaging states that 100g of this product will provide 11.7g of fat and 226 calories, which I do not think is all that bad considering how filling and satisfying the escalopes are.

All in all I find that these escalopes offered a very tasty and pleasant evening meal. I will definitely buy them again and would recommend giving them a try.

Put it this way - my other half is a HUGE fan of eating chicken (I detest it) in all shapes and varieties and he approached these escalopes with more than a little trepidation. At the end of the meal, I asked him what he thought, and although his mouth was stuffed full of grub, he gestured a 'thumbs-up' signal to me. That is all the proof that I need that these are a winner!

There is a website which gives details of the range of products available from Quorn, which can be found at www.quorn.co.uk.

They get full marks from me! :-D

Summary: THESE GOT A THUMB'S UP FROM MY CHICKEN LOVER!