Monday, January 01, 2007

A good idea at the time!

It’s New Year’s day and we have no hangovers to nurse so we head into town for a further foray into the sales. And we’ll pick up some yummy treats from M&S for tonight. But lo, M&S aren’t open and we have to resort to a very annoying large supermarket which is collectively our least favourite place to buy food but is shockingly local. No names - but you know who you are! And they may be open but they don’t have want we fancy, in desperation as they are announcing that they are closing we decide on an easy Italian feast - some garlic dough balls and some of the ‘finest’ fresh ravioli and fresh cheese sauce (as we have some left from the soufflé potatoes). And T has his favourite pizza.
Well this has got to be the finest example of style over content, everything looked good but that’s where it ended. The fresh ravioli contained Parma ham, mozzarella and ricotta - well that’s what it said on the packet because none of us could ascertain the flavour contained within. Even the dough balls which apparently contained garlic butter were extremely sub standard. And the ravioli? - words failed me! As I plated them up one burst open and this disc of pale pink something appeared. Alarm bells should have rung at that point. It looked a little like cheap sausage or very reminiscent of cat food (not the moist stuff with gravy) but the pâté like stuff. It was just really horrible and tasted like nothing else ever. Actually it was similar to some grey unidentifiable meat D and I consumed a few years ago - I won’t name the cook, but it was made with love so I’ll just leave it at that.
So that meal didn’t go well, it does beg the question that if this ravioli was supposedly the highest echelon of their ravioli range, what does the budget stuff taste like? I promise that I never intend to find out. I am so making my own pasta next time. I have to prove to MC that fresh ravioli can be really good. Actually I often make open ravioli so the pasta and the ‘filling’ can be cooked to perfection and then assembled attractively afterwards. And it tastes probably a million percent better than today’s meal!
We finished the meal with a PUDZ pudding. These are frozen preservative-free desserts. I plumped for my first taste of the Pudz Chocolate pudding. Not bad at all, the little 'lumps' are actually molten pieces of chocolate. The dessert was the only redeeming feature of this meal. I wish we’d just gone straight to pudding and threw all of the pasta in the bin instead of just most of it. Shameful!

2 comments:

Maggie said...

How did you manage to eat that wicked chocolate pudding on New Years Day?!!

J said...

Okay I admit it, I didn't finish it all but remember we did chuck the awful pasta in the bin!