LDN - Redwood Foods Meatballs & Desert Review

Redwood Foods were kind enough to send me some of their new products to try and review. Wrapped amongst a defrosted ice pack were

A packet of ‘Gourmet Meat Free Meatballs’; 2 ‘Wot No Dairy?’ Deserts; 1 tube of ‘Vegan Tuna pate’, 1 tube of ‘Gourmet Mushroom pate’ and a box of ‘Meat Free Duck pieces in hoisin glaze’. Today, I’ll be reviewing the meatballs & the deserts.

I decided to cook the obvious which was ‘Spaghetti & Meatballs’. My girlfriend was as excited as I was to try these new treats, so I added a few extra touches. The cooking instructions recommend you oven cook or grill them, so I oven cooked them, but took them out a little early as I was cautious they could be over cooked or not soak up any of the flavours if I just added them into the sauce at the end. I fried up some onions and garlic in a little olive oil and then when soft, added oregano and basil. I then added the meatballs and moved them around so they were coated in a little oil. I then added red wine and allowed the meatballs to soak some of that up whilst it also reduced.

Then, I poured in 2 cans of chopped tomatoes, seasoned with salt & pepper and allowed the sauce to thicken.

As this is obviously an Italian dish, I thought it deserved Italian wine. Marks & Spencer have just started labelling all their wine accordingly, so I tried a bottle of the ‘Barbera d’Asti’. It was a cracking bottle, but we’re not here to review the wine are we…

The meatballs tasted fantastic. They were nicely spiced and actually resemble a sausage meatball as opposed to a beef meatball. Some fell apart, but I think this could’ve been due to me cooking them through the sauce, but I didn’t mind as it added a really nice texture to the dish. My girlfriend said through happy bites, ‘vish tayshts umazun’, which I translated as being ‘this tastes amazing’. So it looks as though the meatballs were a winner! We ate leftovers the next day and I actually think the meatballs tasted even better.

I also made some, what I affectionately call ‘Pikey Garlic Bread’. Just toast some bread, spread on some vegan butter, sprinkle garlic powder on then grind on a touch of salt & pepper. Smooth it all in, put in the oven for 2 mins. Boom!

Next up was desert! What’s interesting about these deserts, is that unlike most other non-dairy deserts, they’re also soya free. I have no problem with soya products (as it can be an allergen for some people), but I don’t like to go overboard, so this was a perfect end to the dinner.

I didn’t do anything special other than add them to some fresh strawberries. Fresh berries for desert is always fine by me as it keeps things light.

The plain desert was actually more like a vanilla pudding and the raspberry one was like a cross between a yoghurt and a pudding. Both were really nice and after quite a heavy meal, didn’t leave us feeling like we were about to slip into a food coma. However we did sit on the couch for the next 2 hours watching Parks & Recreation.

Thanks again to Redwood Foods for sending these over. I’ll be reviewing the other products soon.

Gareth

Disclaimer - As hopefully some of you already know, XVO is run by 2 people. Aaron in New York & me (Gareth) in London. Aaron is straight edge so doesn’t drink. Any alcohol references will only ever come from me and if they do, they’ll be minimal because I’m really not a big drinker for an Englishman.