Sainsbury’s II: This Brownie Is My Pudding

Brownie Basics

I’ve never seen this in Sainsbury’s before: maybe it’s a chance for the supermarket to redeem itself? This is a microwave brownie pudding.

Brownie Backstory

Remember back when I had a brownie from Pizza Hut? Ready for a really boring story? I arrived too early and wandered around the big Sainsbury’s in the retail park, and happened to spot this ‘Belgian chocolate brownie pudding’ in the chilled desserts aisle. I earmarked it for a later date, or rather, to see if it was just a weird Leicester Sainsbury’s thing (spoiler: it was not), and now I’ve finally got round to buying one and microwaving and eating it.

Man. Doesn’t it sort of suck when a supermarket disappears the best things on the menu? (Incoming food #opinions) So, Sainsbury’s does a few different types of ‘own brand’ sliced cheese, and last time I checked these are: Cheddar (three different strengths), Red Leicester, Gouda, Emmenthal, Edam and Double Gloucester. Well enough, and also you can get some other branded cheeses e.g. Jarlsberg, Leerdammer. Cheese is great – it is known – and this is a reasonable range. But… they used to have Maasdam. Maasdam is a Dutch cheese that was the absolute best thing in the Sainsbury’s cheese selection. And it disappeared for some reason? I have to go to Aldi for my Maasdam, and if that’s not the definition of #middleclassproblems then I don’t know what is.

When I was younger I also used to enjoy a brie and bacon tart from Sainsbury’s. It was as delicious as it sounds, assuming that you think that sounds as delicious as it is. They stopped existing at about the time that I went to university and started being able to buy my own food like all the time, so maybe that’s for the best as otherwise I might never have eaten anything else. But I did eat a lot of Taste The Difference chicken and bacon pizzas, and they’re completely gone. As has, I dunno, the white chocolate and orange cookies (unless that’s a Christmas thing only?), or the ham and cheese pasty slice… oh no wait, that was Gregg’s? Clearly getting distracted down a food memories hole here. What I’m trying to say is the world is always changing, and sometimes it changes in a way that takes away delicious foods from you and that is a shame.

No idea what that had to do with this pudding really. So this was a microwave thing, took two minutes to heat up, and then I decided to decant it onto a plate as you can see in the picture above. In the picture on the packet it’s been very smoothly brought out of the microwave dish, and whipped cream has been added, etc, etc. My plating was more of a scooping-the-contents-out-desperately type thing and so it ended up in a big mess, but you know, the proof of the pudding is in the eating, so let’s eat it.

Brownie Points

Taste: It tasted pretty good actually. There were a couple of components: the bottom of the pudding had dark chocolate sauce, and then there was a brownie layer, with some chocolate chips in the top that had of course melted by the time it was done. I liked it overall. 7/10

Texture: Really good at first, but started to wear a bit as the pudding went on (admittedly it was apparently meant for four people so maybe that’s an element of it). It was gooey and thick and rich, but possibly a bit too gooey in the end – it had an element of… custard? Blancmange? Anyway, it was pretty nice overall, but not the best. 7/10

Presentation: Looks pretty good, lovely dark colour with an appealing topping. Not gonna blame it for the difficulty I had in getting it out of the container! 3/5

Value: £2.70 for what is, supposedly, four people’s worth of brownie pudding. I think that’s pretty great, even if I also think ‘serves four’ is a bit generous and it’s probably two people’s worth. 8/10

Fudge Factor: I liked this, without a doubt, but I don’t think it did anything particularly exciting to justify any extra points. 0/5

Pudding Proof: 25

Should I Buy And Eat This Brownie?

Knock yourself out! Maybe share it with someone, though. Then you’ll make a brownie friend!

Closing Thought

I think it’s underrated just how good Friends was back in the day, at least in the earlier seasons. Some of the humour or the social attitudes have aged poorly, for sure, but it was hilarious!