M&S Fruity Gruesome Sweets - jelly brains! (@NLi10)

 Today is all saints day (never-ever...) and Halloween was yesterday. We had precisely zero (0) trick-or-treaters, seems most children got dressed up and went to the corner shop with their parents. This means I have 20 fun size Choc bars to eat. Hoooray!

We also got gifted this discounted tub of normal year trick or treat sweets.

Look how fantastic these are! May contain traces of terror! Why? Because after the first child at the door scoops a handful of these you might as well bin the rest due to covid... perfect for pre-lockdown house parties, not great for sharing now.

And - believe it or not - this gruesome bowl of brains and bones is actually suitable for vegetarians. I mean, it just doesn’t appeal to vegetarians or vegans, being a bowl of brains and bones.  And I suspect that while they don’t have the logo these are also Halal, so suitable for Halaloween, but again - I’m not sure they’d appeal to that market either.  

I think it’s a little too twisted for it’s own good.

I suspect marks and Spencer’s still have a lot of these to shift in their sale sections...

So what are they like? Well - they are similar to the other veggie gum sweets out there, just the right amount of sticky and chewy to be exciting. Perfect for film night snacks, and really fruity to boot.  In the right year these would have flown off the shelves.

2020 is not the right year so I have to eat 800g of brains and hearts myself.

Yes, but are the Greggs Vegan sausage rolls actually any good? (@GreggsOfficial) by @NLi10 (not @piersmorgan )

At the start of the year everyone releases diet based food so that people who want to atone for the festive excesses can feel like they at least tried.  This year 'Veganuary' is the big theme, and people who think that flexitarian is a real thing have declared that they will eat slightly more vegan things than they do in a typical January.  None of these people ever mention that chips are vegan.

I have my own live-in vegetarian, and I tend to cook a decent amount of the meals so at home we use a lot of the meat substitutes like Quorn.  When Greggs announced that they were doing a vegan sausage roll my main surprise was that there wasn't already one, and that it had taken this long to get there.  I don't think it really blew up on Twitter until one of the British versions of the Kardashians (a gent called Piers Morgan) said he didn't approve. Then everyone had to jump on the bandwagon and join in with the taking of sides, so inevitably I'm having to review it.  It's the post-Christmas lull though so frankly I'm ok with that.

This is a Greggs.  For those that don't know the UK too well it's basically the HMV of the bakery sector, reducing choice and helping to push little independent chains off the high streets of bigger cities.  I miss being able to get lots of different options from each bakery, but at least they do the best Egg Custards in Britain and you can usually get a steak bake.  Heck - at least it's not a Tesco Metro.

And here is the view of the rolls themselves (Cinabar took this - thanks!).  On the top shelf we have a nicely shaped golden vegan sausage roll.  Below we have a slightly overcooked meat version - but it is 5p less! (20p if you eat in - for that luxury Greggs dining experience).

As someone who has reviewed a lot of vegan food (most of the things I cook at home are vegan until my partner adds cheese on hers) I think I am uniquely positioned to judge where this particular snack falls in relation to other items.  But lets get this out of the way first - I'm not a fan of the normal Greggs sausage rolls.  I used to be when I was little and didn't like to explore the whole hot cabinet.  Now I look down upon the humble sausage rolls and gravitate towards the steak bakes and other square delights.  Even though these will almost certainly burn you with their gravy, the actual meaty bits and occasional veg actually feel like a meal.  The sausage rolls are not, being purely for people looking for an inbetween meals snack.

The vegan sausage rolls then really don't have much to beat.  And as predicted they sail onwards into the more difficult to beat snacks.

If vegan food was safe, why would they put injury and hazard warnings on the bag? 

The latice work is great, I know that means you get less pastry but it means it's not as sweaty and has cooled quite evenly.  This means each bit is crisp, with a (very) soft centre.  The vegetarian had a bite too (she doesn't like things that try to taste like meat) and seemed to enjoy it but refused further bites.

The inside is Quorn based, but is Greggs own recipe that they say has taken years to perfect.  It's basically soft, salty Quorn.

And don't get me wrong, this is what I expected and it tastes good, but I'd expected them to find a little more firmness or finesse along the way.  Maybe they will do luxury sausage rolls if this takes off (as the It Boy Piers pointed out, most people are still on their first roll - will they buy a second?).

There are lots of terrible vegan sausages out there, and this is not one of them.  Linda McCartney's efforts are always dry and lifeless.  Heck, some of Quorns own offerings are not to be repeated.  This though is pretty decent, worth the £1 asking price, and to be repeated for sure.

But unfortunately for Greggs there is a little company called Fry's and they also make Vegan sausage rolls - and they easily outperform this.  You can get them from the frozen section of Holland & Barrett or Ocado and you instantly can boast that your cafe/bakery has better vegan rolls.  It won't take long before one of the other bakery chains on the high-street figures this out and... oh - Greggs pushed them all out - well played Greggs.  This does mean that you can take some decent vegan food home with you from town (their vegan chicken nuggets are frankly amazing) and impress people who bring up the Greggs rolls in conversation with your diverse food stocks.

Thing is though.  January is a bit cold, and if I was going to Greggs for my lunch I'd still probably get a steak bake (and the three pack of Egg Custards).  Now though, I have the option to get a nice vegan sausage roll as a snack (or a starter) which can only be a good thing. And if they use this newfound recipe to make a vegan bake then I'll possibly get those too.

I may be flippant about it, but showing people that vegan options aren't scary (or even a lot of times different enough to be interesting) is great.  It saves our planet a little bit (I mean - we are already doomed, but it's nice to try) and reduces some of the burden on the NHS by getting us to eat nutrients.  Pizza Hut have also launched more vegan options, middle class people like Pizza Express and Pieminister have had ace vegan options for years (see Kevin for example).  Even Cornetto have a vegan option!!  And like I said - chips are vegan, and they aren't scary either.

There is also an alcohol free version of Veganuary called Dryanuary, so next week I'll be eating an alcohol free sausage roll instead.

KFC - Double Down (UK Halal version) @NLi10

FOMO - Fear Of Missing Out.  It's a really big thing at the moment in the marketing world, especially for fast food where they are desperate to create a habit of return visits through time limited events (why do you think there is a different Happy Meal toy each week?).

KFC have had a series of fun recipes recently that are essentially twists on the basic formula.  The Double Down is essentially the ultimate version of this - they replace the horrible nutrition free bread with lovely chicken!  And it's only for a limited time! How limited they didn't say, so I better go fast before I miss out on this special treat.

It comes in a special gold bag so all the people at the neighbouring tables know to watch you to see how you manage to eat it.  But if the bread is chicken - then what is the chicken?

Well in the UK Halal version (apparently 100 of the KFCs here are Halal only) they replace it with nothing at all!  In the original it was lovely bacon, which makes sense.  Here you appear to pay the same and just get no bacon.  Maybe you get an extra slice of the insulting yellow plastic that they call Monterey jack cheese.

Either way, holding it like a wrap and gradually eating down the length of it is a fun experience - that is over very quickly.  I'm sure it contains very similar amounts of calories, but it's the bread and chips that trick the brain into feeling full and so I could have easily eaten a second.  I didn't though and was full enough for the evening on just this and a large Pepsi that I won on the charity scratch cards on the last visit (more chaining of visits!).

My complaint really goes back to the FOMO argument at the start - why didn't they just replace the bacon with a  similar halal ingredient?  I replace bacon in veggie things with sun-dried tomatoes (carbona like this is amazing), or even just a turkey rasher here where it just has to be halal and not vegan.  Heck - anything with a salty contrasting flavour would have done enough to create a second opportunity for people to try the Double Down without having to worry.  I've never been that keen on my local KFC (maybe there is a variation in the 11 herbs and spices to make that halal, maybe it's just a drive-thru and not quite up to scratch) and this kind of encourages me to save my cravings for when I'm in Birmingham town centre?

I've no real objection to Halal only (or Vegan only) restaurants and frequent them regularly, my only issue was finding out a couple of hours after eating that the reason it didn't taste that special was because the main ingredient was missing.  Never-mind KFC, just gives you an excuse to roll out the apology Double Down with a turkey rasher in for Xmas exclusively in the Halal branches.