Iceland 12 Party Mini Pies Chicken & Steak

Description: Chicken in a creamy sauce encased in shortcrust pastry. And, Steak in rich gravy encased in a shortcrust pastry.

Cost: Party pack of 12 (6 Chicken and 6 Steak) come in at £2 or they are on a "3 for £5 " deal also.

Cooking: Number 7 for 20minutes

Verdict: Saw these in Iceland whilst buying some Weight Watcher meals for the missus and couldn't resist them. £2 seems cheap enough. You get 12 pies in the box, 6 Chicken and 6 Steak. Ive had mixed results with the Iceland pies, but for £2 figured it was worth a gamble.

As always the picture on the front shows pies which look like they have been crafted by Gods fair hands himself. Full to the brim of tasty chicken or steak.

In the oven they go, and 20mins later the tasty looking golden treats are ready to be eaten.

Steak one first... and wow.. seriously tasty. The chicken one was very tasty too. Hmmm... they  are only bite sized, so i`ll have another... and another.. and another... hold on.. id better check the insides to see what they are like before I hoover them all up.

Sure enough, the steak one really had no steak in it at all.. maybe a couple of bits of mince and that was it. The chicken one wasn't far behind... just chicken gravy with a spec of chicken in it.

But wow... they are very tasty and quite filling too! God knows what they put in them, but id definitely be buying these again. Ideal party food even if there isnt much meat in them.

Calorie wise, a single chicken pie comes in at 66 calories and a single steak pie is a bit more at 78 calories.

Rating? 6.5 out of 10.

Iceland 4 Individual Steak Pies

Description: Shortcrust pastry base filled with tender pieces of steak in a rich gravy topped with a puff pastry lid.

Cost: £1.50 for 4 pies. Your looking at 2 pies per person with these sizes.

Cooking: 30minutes on number 6.

Verdict: First impressions? Well, when you see this in a freezer at iceland, you think wow! £1.50 for 4 pies thats good value. And the pie on the packet looks huge. So, I threw this in the shopping trolley straight away.

Of course, I should have known better. Feeling a bit hungry i open up the packet and these pies.. well.. they should have said "4 bite size pies" on the packet. Ive never seen pies so small in my life. I had to get a magnifying glass out just to see them. Still being hungry, in the oven they go, but already they are falling way down on the points compared to the tesco value pies which giant physically above these! Looking at the picture on the packet, god knows how they found carrots small enough to make this pie look like a mountain of a pie on a plate. Hats off to the photographer!

On the plate and next to the peas and potatoes these pies are dwarfed. Cut them open and the insides show some sparse bits of meat akin to what i see in the whiskas food i give my cat. Nothing like what is on the packet. Whats the taste test like? Well, the pastry base and the crust is filling and nice, the pie physically is very small, the filling, the meat is very small and hardly any of it. You could blink and miss it. But, it tastes okay. Not great, nothing fancy but okay. I certainly wouldnt buy again. Its a lager shandy compared to the tesco value pie.

Calorie count for this pie is 307 calories per pie, but with the small size of them you`ll be cooking 2 to try and fill you up.

Rating?  4.5 out of 10.

Iceland Family Pie

Description: "Short crust pasty filled with tender pieces of steak in a rich gravy topped with a puff pasty lid."

Cost: £2 for the family sized pie, or 2 of my sized portions!

Cooking: 60 minutes on number 6.

Verdict: First impressions, I was not expecting much from this pie. £2 for a large pie is very cheap and iceland is not renown for its quality pies. Also, I have been spoilt, the last pie I reviewed was from Waitrose, so its from one end of the scale to the other! The pie looks okay from out of the packaging, but the cooking will be the proof of the pudding...  (or the pie!)

Well, 60mins on number 6 as per the instructions and the pie looks done, but middle was not quite cooked. I'm now doubting my cooker, i may have to replace it as this isn't the first time this has happened. So, I bunged it in the microwave for 2 Min's to finish it off.

Cut it in half and nice amount of gravy came out, had it with mash and peas as always. My first shock was the meat in this steak pie was all the steak was pre cut into nice 1cm square cut pieces of meat. That was really unexpected and really strange as i expected chucky bits of steak not something which looked like it came out of a press! 

So on the plate it goes and I tuck in.

The gravy was plentiful and very tasty. Nice and thick and plenty of it. Nice steak tasting, thick and had a nice hint of onion & steak to it. The dodgy looking cubes of meat were actually tender and tasty whilst the pastry matched what I expected from a puff pastry pie. Have to say I was very surprised. I expected a seriously dodgy pie here, but whilst it looked a bit crap with the weird looking squares of meat this is a tasty pie! And for £2. That's a bargain, this would easily feed a family, and for that price you cant grumble. I do wonder what they put in it to make it taste so good, this pie was a real surprise, I just didn't expect it to taste any good. I think for £2 i would definitely buy this one again. Its not the sort of pie you would dish up for the romantic meal for 2, but for a cheap weekday family meal this is definitely on the shopping list.

Calorie count as always for those healthy people, this pie is 960 calories per half a pie, which really amazed me, as I'm still slightly peckish, which just isn't right after gobbling nearly 1000 calories down me.

Rating? 6.5 out of 10.