Midlifekayak

You may remember that “Look what we found!”, the environment and local farmer friendly food company, very generously agreed to provide us with some of their fantastic ready meals for our 2,500 miles around Britain.

Mike, Geoff and I liked them so much we’ve made them the staple diet for our expedition – that along with porridge and chocolate!  We now have 120 ready meals waiting to be boxed up and sent to strategic points around the coast to top up our supplies on the way round.

However, this week we decided to try out a selection of the meals on perhaps the most discerning of palates – that of Freya ‘Egon Ronay’ Poppy, my six-year-old god-daughter who knows what she likes, AND what she doesn’t.

Freya "Egon Ronay" Poppy with her meatballs

I boiled up some Basmati and plain rice to accompany the meals and then presented Freya, her parents and Tanya, eight of the ready meals to sample.

As you can see in the photo of her comprehensive notes (in much neater handwriting than mine), Freya took the task very seriously.  She particularly liked the fact that you could see from the packet where the produce had come from and even the name of the farmer.  She was also pleased that the farmers and their animals were being looked after.

Whilst all the meals were, in Freya’s words, “yummy” – there have to be some winners.  So in order of yumminess with commentary from our resident food critic:

1st – Tees Valley Beef Meat Balls – “more meat balls please”

2nd – Tees Valley Beef Chilli con Carne – “love the barley and beans”

3rd – Cumbrian Lamb Hot Pot – “yummy potatoes”

4th –  Thai chicken curry with brown Basmati rice – “ahhhhh spicy”

5th – Staffordshire Chicken Tikka – “ahhhhh, mummy mummy, another spicy one”

6th – Tees Valley Beef in Black Velvet Ale – “mummy, will I get tipsy?”

7th – Herdwick Mutton Stew – “is mutton just a big lamb?”

8th – Staffordshire Chicken Casserole – “tastes just like Granny’s”

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