Post by Kate BPost by LFSPost by Pennyscrawled in the dust...
Post by Kate BI didn't hear it, but as to bought fish pie (and lasagne and some other
things): when I broke my wrist and, the best beloved not being up to
anything more complicated than omelettes, we had to find an alternative
source of ready-made food, we tried Finest and Difference and everything
Extra Special including Waitrose that we could find and they all fell
between actually inedible and only just about edible, and we were
shocked by the meanness of some of the portions and we do not eat huge
quantities. The only exceptions were those supplied by a company called
Cook which were and remain excellent - their fish pie and vegetable
lasagne taste of real ingredients, not cardboard and wallpaper paste.
Their portions are reasonable too. They apparently make it all in
Sittingbourne and have won all sorts of awards.
Ooo, I thought that might be in the old pie factory - previously Tiffany
Pies and before that... I forget. But I looked 'em up and they operate from
The Eurolink industrial estate and have an interesting history - a couple
of blokes with a good idea which struggled to get off the ground
https://www.cookfood.net/info/history/
The food certainly looks good! Rather more costly than I generally pay when
I decide to eat something I didn't cook myself.
Interesting. They have shop near us. I haven't ever tried their food
but I have occasionally looked in their freezers. The "home cooking"
selling point was emphasised on the packages by including the name of
the person who had supposedly cooked it - by implication in their
kitchen - which always put me off. This doesn't seem to be mentioned
on the web site, though.
It's probably there somewhere, I believe it's actually true, not just a
gimmick. If you took it out of the plastic dish and put it in one of
your own it would actually look home-made. We tend to buy dishes that
are fiddly, like vegetable lasagne or a dauphinoise, or comfort food
like the fish pie, and (when they have an offer on!) their Indian dishes
which are excellent and better than our local takeaways. They have a
good policy on sourcing ingredients. They're a bit expensive, but a
reliable safety-net for emergencies. They seem to be expanding, so I
hope they maintain the quality.
The web site indicates that the names are the names of the chefs but I'm
sure when they started they strongly implied if not stated directly that
this was actually home cooking by named individuals. I think the Oxford
shop was one of the first. Sophie Grigson is often in there, I'm told, I
don't know if she has a commercial interest in the company.
I have a friend who confided to me that she has on occasion served their
food to guests and pretended she had cooked it, and been complimented
for it (IIRC June Whitfield did this in a Birds Eye ad years ago.). She
hasn't done this to us, we would certainly have noticed as she is a
lousy cook and the meals she gives us are not very nice at all!
--
Laura (emulate St George for email)