Faggots, peas, sauté potatoes, gravy; side salad; fruit and yoghurt

I was going to do this post with a teaser on Facebook: did I try them or not? Then I realised that the title of the post would rather give the game away, so I didn’t bother.

But going back a step: a number of Pineapple People (I’m still working on a collective term for us) expressed serious reservations about faggots¹ – by which I mean comments along the lines of “absolutely no way would I try those”. I was also hesitant, particularly as the alternative option was a cheese and onion pasty and I know I love those.

I pride myself on being an adventurous eater, though, and I know I like some forms of offal, and a cheese and onion pasty might make for a good lunch but doesn’t make for riveting content, so faggots it had to be.

I also ordered a side salad, and this time remembered to ask for it without celery, so:

I didn’t think salad would go with my main course so ate it as a starter, quickly so my main course didn’t go cold, meaning that when the nurse brought me my lunchtime meds all I could manage through a mouthful of lettuce and tomato was “mmph? Mmph mm mmph! Mmph! “👍 I’m not sure whether to be pleased or worried that, on the basis of three days’ acquaintance, she seemed to get my meaning.

Then time for the faggots, which didn’t look or smell at all intimidating: they look like giant meatballs, which is what they are, really, and smelt of slow-cooked meat, all savoury and umami-ish, if you know what I mean by that.

Cut open, they again just look and smell like a meatball, or meatloaf, or any similar dish made of minced meat.

Taste-wise: if you like meatballs or meatloaf – and I’m very fond of both – you would probably like faggots, or at least this version². What they most reminded me of, in what I think will probably be the most specific, least useful comparison that I will make in any food review, was the inside of the steamed beef dumplings I used to get from a dim sum place in Portsmouth. I do wonder, though, if these particular ones were made partly or wholly of beef rather than the traditional pork, as in looks, texture and taste they were definitely beefy rather than porky to my eyes / nose / mouth.

The accompanying gravy was every bit as thick, savoury, “how much of this can I scrape off the plate without damaging said plate?” as it looks; the sauté potatoes were properly golden and crunchy, except the ones sitting in the gravy which were properly soggy and be-gravied, and the peas were… well, peas.

Several people have commiserated with me over the smallish portions served here, but that definitely wasn’t the case today: I’m just glad that someone realised before lunch rather than afterwards that they should have weighed me when I arrived, and decided to rectify the oversight.

Dessert today was orange jelly (jello, in the US and possibly elsewhere) with cream, but obviously not for me as I’m allergic to citrus and death by jelly isn’t the way I want to go out. Instead, I had my last-but-one pear and a strawberry yoghurt (still good, still not as good as the Muller ones you get in UK hospitals). Then coffee and a dose of Oramorph, which is to blame for any decrease in coherence in the last few paragraphs. 🥴

Scores (as always, I’m not rating the yoghurt as it comes as is and the kitchen here has no input):

• Faggots: 10/10 – I honestly really liked them and would eat them again if I could work out where they came from.
• Gravy: 10/10 – this was proper gravy – good job, kitchen!
• Sauté potatoes: 8/10 – nicely cooked, just needed more of the salt that was on some pieces but not on others (I consider sauté potatoes to be chips by any other shape, and therefore they require a hefty dose of salt³)
• Overall (because I’m not rating frozen peas): 9.34/10 – entirely fair for a very good meal.

1. Not, in this case, that deeply unpleasant old slur for gay people, but a traditional British dish of large meatballs, usually made of pork meat and offal, typically cooked and served in a thick brown gravy. ↩︎
2. I asked where the kitchen got them from, because I liked them enough to consider buying them when I get home, and was told “a butcher’s on the mainland called Cooper”. There are a few candidates that came up in response to a search online using those criteria, but none which mention faggots on their website, so 🤷‍♂️ (that’s a shrug emoji, btw. I know it’s hard to tell!) ↩︎
3. I know salt isn’t good for you in large quantities, but chips (whatever shape) are pretty much the only place I use it and they’re not something I eat regularly, so I figure it doesn’t do any harm. If it does, please don’t tell me and spoil my occasional treat of chips! ↩︎