How do Charlie Bigham’s new range and the M&S Gastropub meals really compare to eating out?
I’ve eaten some good food at home and some bad food in restaurants, but I can’t recall a time when eating a meal in my own house has ever come close to replicating a restaurant experience. I’ve never felt comfortable putting my feet up on the sofa and watching Celebrity Traitors in a restaurant, for example, but neither have I been asked to do the washing up.
Nonetheless, creating an at-home restaurant experience is the marketing USP of a new range of extremely spendy ready meals from undisputed guru of the sector, Charlie Bigham. This guy already led the market for posh ‘dine-in’ dinners. But now he’s launched an extra-posh line, Charlie Bigham’s Brasserie, which are so exclusive that they’re not sold within a two-hour drive of my home in east Kent.
The meals are available in 70 Waitrose stores in locations where, I’m guessing, they think customers won’t bat an eyelid at spending £29.95 on a beef wellington (for two), £19.95 on a salmon wellington, or £16.95 on coq au vin, duck confit or venison bourguignon. Bigham asks why bother going out to a restaurant when his chefs use “restaurant level techniques”.
Don’t call them ‘ready meals’
Apparently Bigham himself is not a fan of the “ready meal” label, preferring the term “prepared”. I get it. But he’s hardly reinventing the wheel. M&S has done a sterling job of rebranding its own ready-to-eat lines as “dine-in” dishes.
Despite the rebranding, ready meals often get a bad rap health-wise. I ask Priya Tew, specialist dietitian from Dietitian UK. She says: “Ready meals can be convenient, portion-controlled, and even nutritionally balanced. Many brands are improving their recipes, with less salt, more veg, and clearer labelling. They can be a lifeline for people recovering from illness or with limited cooking facilities”.
The downsides? “Some ready meals can be high in salt, saturated fat, or additives, and low in vegetables or fibre,” says Priya. “The portion size is also not necessarily your portion size.” (One of the complaints about Bigham’s prices is that each packet might serve two but isn’t a whole main course.)
“Look for meals that include a source of protein (chicken, fish, tofu, beans), vegetables, and a starchy carb such as rice, pasta, or potatoes. Check the label for moderate salt (under 1.5g per portion) and fibre (at least 3g per meal).”
Is it really like eating out?
Can we ever replicate the restaurant experience at home? Should we even try?
One hopes for great food, but the service, atmosphere, and experience of eating with others out of the house adds up to the whole package. Plating up your own pre-prepared dinner doesn’t come close, and never will.
Charlie Bigham Beef Wellington, £29.95/567g (£52.83/kg), available in 70 Waitrose stores
3/5
After driving home, I’m glad not to have to cook. But am a little miffed when I read that I have to crack and whisk an egg and paint the latticed pastry in egg wash myself, so much so that halfway through the 30-minute cooking time (for medium rare beef, up to 50 minutes if you like to fully dessicate yours) I realise I forgot and quickly daub it on.
No matter: the pastry comes out slightly burnished and tasty looking. On slicing, the beef is perfectly pink, in fact still slightly bloody. But though the meat itself tastes good, the bottom of the pastry is hardly cooked and claggy. The mushroom duxelles is tasty if very salty and no wonder the Pedro Ximenez (good sherry) vaunted on the packet is so strong tasting – on the label it’s listed as a whopping 2 per cent of the total ingredients. One portion packs 2.96g of salt, while Priya recommends under 1.5g.
Fortnum & Mason sells a £70 wellington for four, weighing 770g. At Sainsbury’s, £45 will buy you a whole kilo of pastry-embalmed beef, and at M&S a 950g frozen wellington comes in at £60. Overall, I expect this dish has done more for the beef wellington market than for ready meals overall.
Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference Discovery Chicken Forestiere, £9.25/500g (£18.50/kg)
4/5 – WINNER
This dish comes from Sainsbury’s new ‘Discovery’ range, another example of a supermarket working hard to ‘elevate’ its ready-to-cook options, and involves chicken breast with porcini, smoky pancetta and Madeira sauce.
Nectar card holders can buy a main and side for £10, but as with most ready meals, this requires bulking out with some other cooking.
For such a creamy, rich-tasting and indulgent-feeling dish, 3.6 of saturated fat, 0.52g salt and 164 calories per 100g seems reasonable, though dial that up to half a pack and it’s 8.3g of fat. There is almost no fibre, though we ate it with lots of kale and carrots and it felt like a well-balanced dinner.
This was my favourite of all the meals I tried and I’d buy it again.
Tesco Finest Duck Legs with Pork and Plum, £7.50/505g (£14.86/kg)
2/5
I have concluded that Brits don’t like to cook duck legs, because every supermarket has a version in its upmarket range. I tried the Tesco Finest version and Tesco does a main, side, dessert and drink (including wine) for £15 – Clubcard price – so that’s a free bottle of wine compared with the M&S Dine In deal.
The instructions say “ensure duck legs are skin side up and cook for 30 minutes” but as the raw legs are congealed in fat, it’s impossible to tell which side the skin is on. I spot I have guessed incorrectly halfway through and remedy this, so am not sure if the skin was meant to come out crispy or soft, as it did.
For an overwhelmingly rich dish, the stats aren’t bad: 497 calories, 7.9g saturated fat and 1.2g salt per half pack.
M&S Our Best Ever Rich Beef Lasagne, £10 for 800g (£12.50/kg)
3/5
I’m including this lasagne as I don’t think that most of us, when we’re thinking of a delicious, no-cook treat meal, conjure visions of pastry-encased beef fillet or duck legs.
A lasagne is genuine comfort food that, while easy to make, is time consuming. It certainly can’t be done in half an hour. I like this M&S ‘Best Ever’ product because the ragu is exceptionally tasty and there are lots of layers of pasta, as any good lasagne should have, though it is let down by an excess of bechamel.
M&S Gastropub Steak Pie, £9 for 500g (£18/kg) from Ocado.com
3/5
Part of the M&S Gastropub Dine In deal, which offers a main, side and starter or dessert for £15, with new dishes (not this one) by Tom Kerridge.
I am quite partial to this pie as it’s not something I’d make at home. I rarely think far enough ahead to make slow-cooked anything, never mind a pastry home for it. The beef is really rich, tender and tasty. The pastry is buttery and crumbly and good.
Annoyingly for those with health worries, which can hopefully take a day off over the weekend, half a pie packs 21.3g of saturated fat and 2.2g salt.
Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference Discovery Chestnut Mushroom Filo Pie, £9.25/500g
3/5
After three days, I am so sick of eating rich and salty red meat meals. But as with the Bigham menu, most dine-in-style dishes major on food for hungry carnivores.
I am including this chestnut and mushroom filo pie for vegetarians. The vegetables still resemble and taste like vegetables, even if there are a lot of butter beans for a mushroom pie. I would have preferred more filling, but I wouldn’t mind eating this again.
Charlie Bigham Salmon Parmentier, £10.95/630g (£17.40/kg) from Ocado.com
2/5
I thought I should try something from Charlie Bigham’s existing range to see how it compares.
I felt cheated by this salmon parmentier, without question. Why the fancy name for a bit of salmon topped with sliced potatoes? I could have made it myself in 15 minutes for half the price, but I wouldn’t bother – why not just have salmon, potatoes and leeks instead of dousing the lot in a stiff, salty sauce?
The portions felt really meagre, too, and certainly not a full meal.
In conclusion
Would I serve any of these dishes at a dinner party? Definitely not. Would I be happy to be served them by someone else? Absolutely. Going round to someone else’s for dinner is about seeing them and being fed, not quibbling over cooking methods or produce provenance.
“Eating at home can never replace eating out,” points out Lisa Harris, food and drinks trends consultant at Harris and Hayes. “But it can make it a more achievable alternative.”