Mr. Brain's Pork Faggots

barelyedible |  With Christmas and the New Year done, I thought it was time to get back in the saddle and try some more shite food. For lunch today I finally tried Mr Brain’s Pork Faggots after multiple requests. Loyal readers will know that offal based meat products hold no fear for me and I was quite looking forward to sampling Mr Brain’s variety of this traditional dish. According to good ol’ Wikipedia, “A faggot is traditionally made from pig’s heart, liver and fatty belly meat or bacon minced together, with herbs added for flavouring and sometimes bread crumbs”. These ones are a little tamer, as they have left out the heart, much to my disappointment.

After getting the foil container out of the packet, my first reaction was ‘I’m not going to light the oven’. Thankfully you can Microwave them. I do not own such a thing a Microwave dish, so I put the huge meaty icicle into a microwavable dish and gave it its first 4 minute nuking. As you can see from the bottom right ‘midway’ picture, things were not looking good, however, they did smell quite appetising. The aroma took me straight back to my childhood, so after stirring and putting the faggots back into the Microwave for a final 3 minutes and 1 minute cool down, I decided to phone my mother to see if I had been fed them as a child. She denied all knowledge but said I could have had them at my Grandparents. More than likely. Enough with the nostalgia, it was time to eat.

It says on the packaging “You asked for it! Now with more sauce”, thinking this must be pretty good, I tried the sauce/gravy first. I wasn’t disappointed. I will go as far and say it was the tastiest sauce I’ve eaten so for in this voyage of culinary discovery. The faggots themselves are like a soft meatball and have a slightly haggis like smell (which I love). They have a distinct liver and sage taste, with a hint mace and pepper. Not bad at all. By now our Bengal cat was whining at my feet expectantly. I shouted out to my partner “these are lovely!” to which she replied “well they smell f**king disgusting”. I looked down at the cat with a smug look on my face and said, “you’re not getting any of these, son” and polished off the lot. 

Ingredients West Country Sauce 62%: Water, Lard, Wheat Flour, Modified Maze Starch, Tomato Puree, Salt, Colour (E150c), Yeast Extract, Onion Flavour, Sugar, Herb & Spice extract. 

 Pork Faggots 38%: Water, Rusks, Rehydrated Pork Rinds, Pork Liver (15%), Pork (4%), Pork Fat, Wheat Flour, Salt, Sage, Spice Extract.