Yahoo LifestyleUnusual Christmas foods available this year
Mince pie flavoured crisps, mince pies that smell like Christmas trees and a Christmas beef burger – we look at some of the more unusual Christmas themed foods available this year.
Mince pie ice cream
This year, both Sainsbury’s and Tesco have stocked their freezers with mince pie ice cream. We tried the Sainsbury’s version, which they call “Christmas on a spoon”. The ice cream forms part of their Taste the Difference range, and is made from the creamy milk of Jersey cows and studded with spiced, dark fruits along with small chunks of soft pastry. It’s definitely creamy and sweet, and the fruits didn’t taste too strongly spiced, so kids will like it, too. Perfect eaten as it is, in a festive cone for the kids or spooned alongside other desserts to add a festive touch.
[Useful: 10 great Christmas gift ideas for food lovers]
Heston’s pine sugar-dusted mince pies
After the success of last year’s Hidden Orange Christmas Pudding, Heston Blumenthal has come up with another unusual treat for Waitrose this year: mince pies dusted with pine-scented icing sugar. These square, chubby pies are filled with a sweet mincemeat filling with ingredients such as rosewater, apple purée and lemon curd. You also get a sachet of pine-scented icing sugar that you dust over the pies while they’re warm. Sniff the icing sugar when you open it and it smells strongly of Christmas trees. But once you’ve dusted it over the warm pies, the pine flavour is actually quite subtle, with the pine-scented sugar releasing its aroma as you eat. Definitely something different, and will get your guests talking.
The ‘Christmas pizza’ and Christmas doughballs
Pizza Express have come up with a special ‘Christmas Pizza’ to celebrate the festive season. The colours of the Polpette Bolognese pizza definitely evoke the spirit of Christmas. A deep red, spiced Bolognese sauce on the base, topped with a tangle of dark green rocket and a snowy dredging of grana padano cheese. It’s also topped with mozzarella, beef meatballs and roquito peppers, is larger than their usual pizzas and is cooked Romana style – so it’s very thin and crispy. Still got room for pudding? Pizza Express have also launched a sweet, festive version of their classic doughballs, sprinkled with cinnamon and served with a vanilla cream dip.
Mince pie flavoured crisps
From the supermarket that brought us the lasagne sandwich comes the mince pie-flavoured crisp. Launched as part of their Finest range, Tesco proudly state that these are the UK’s first sweet crisp. But are they any good? Having got our gnashers around these, we can confirm that they taste exactly like a sweet, softly-spiced mince pie - but with all the crunch of a hand-cooked crisp. It’s a bit confusing at first for your taste buds but once you get used to it, it’s actually hard to put them down. They’re sweet, they’re fun and they don’t taste as weird as you think they will.
The ‘Christmas burger’
Created by Muddy Boots Foods, the Christmas Burger is a festive twist on a fast food favourite. It’s made from the top cuts of Aberdeen Angus beef, and studded with cranberries along with pieces of creamy Camembert cheese. The burger is causing quite a stir, with Fine Burger Co restaurants at the O2 and St Pancras stocking it, as well as Waitrose and Ocado. Robert Tame, founder of the Fine Burger Co called the burger “fantastic tasting” and added that its flavour was “unique”. Christmas Eve barbecue, anyone?
