Sainsbury’s Spaghetti Meatballs

This didn’t look very appetising in my local supermarket – a splat of tomato on some rather fake looking meatballs, under a pile of spaghetti that will inevitably disintegrate on heating in the microwave.

Still, I fancied something Italian, and I thought I’d review this for the benefit of you, my lovely dear reader.

First thing’s first: the packaging is terrible. It rips apart into a hundred little turtle-choking pieces when you try to peel the film lid back (even after heating). It also looks deceptively small, so I was worried this wouldn’t fill me up.

After a sloppy stirring halfway through cooking, I scraped this onto a plate and delved in.

The meatballs have a strong taste of herbs (oregano?), but are otherwise pretty dry, chewy and tasteless. Made from beef, pork and breadcrumbs, the packaging neglects to tell you what proportion of each (I suspect the answer would be embarrassing). Actually I write that in jest, as you get 58% of your recommended daily protein from this, but it just doesn’t taste very flavourful.

The spaghetti is actually pretty nice! All too often it’s over-cooked in the microwave and ends up being textureless filler, but not here. Pleasantly al dente and with good, long strands.

The marinara sauce is just pure tomato, with a hint of garlic. Not bad, but you can’t really go wrong with marinara sauce. It tastes quite virtuous and good for you, so I was surprised this meal has 39% of your daily fat allowance in one meal. From WHERE, I wonder?!

Whilst it looked quite small initially, by the end of the meal I was quite full actually! Perhaps the psychological effect of knowing how fatty it is.