Don’t donate Frey bentos pies to food banks

[isitworthit124]

They need a special can opener to get into them

Is the OP going to come back to explain what made her write the post?

I loved Heinz tinned ravioli as a kid! Now just the thought of that (was it slightly gritty, or is that a false memory??) stodge makes me feel sick... there's something about tinned, highly processed meat that turns my stomach.

Didn't Jack Monroe publish a tin opening hack which involved a hammer, a saw, a brick and a blowtorch or something?

Perhaps her moment has come at last.

Just turn the tin openers through 90 degrees so the cutting edge is along the top of the tin.

This. Our foodbank asks for food that doesn’t need cooking as a lot of their customers live in B&B accomodation and they only have a kettle. The top items on the suggestion list are pot noodles, canned food, breakfast cereal, long life milk and shelf stable boil in the bag stuff (eg microwave rice, sachets of stew) as they can be warmed through in the kettle.

Pies don’t get turned down as some people are able to cook and those people are likely to have a can opener. I’m pretty sure if someone needed one though the foodbank have some. They do have quite a lot of household stuff.

They certainly aren't easier for this person with reduced strength and dexterity. It takes quite a bit of strength to pull open the can and I am always getting stuck with it half open. I also cut myself more easily on the ring pull cans.

And there's always the danger of that one person who hears "It's a pie that goes in the oven" and doesn't realise that you have to take the lid off first...

Ah, the mystery is solved.

If you look at the product information for the pies on supermarket websites, you'll see that they 'highly recommend' Brabantia or OXO Good Grips can openers.
It's probably the case that there's very little overlap in the target market for canned meat pies and premium branded can openers and Fray Bentos obviously want to change this.

No

You're 60% water. And you're still meat.

Perfect for those people who do have a shed full of half a branch of B&Q, but mysteriously not a £1 tin opener that you could pick up at Spar!

Used to buy these for my son - he loved them and they were a quid.

That was only a couple of years ago, now they're £3 each. He doesn't get them anymore...

If you pour boiling water on pasta and leave it for a bit, it won't be raw. Same goes for couscous and bulghur wheat.

Second this. They are popular at our food bank as HMO occupants can store them safely in their room rather than in communal fridges (where they tend to get eaten by someone else).

I would have thought a tin of corned beef would be better since it comes with its own opener and can be eaten cold or used for cooking.

I always think that AG Barr should make a luxury version of these - a pie of a similar format, but one that very much does live up to your taste-expectations, with only quality ingredients of good provenance - and brand it as 'Frae Bonnie Bentos'.

You don't need a special can opener. You can just use your Swiss Army knife!

Or in extremis- a crowbar. I once witnessed my mother determinedly bashing her way into a tin of condensed milk, at the back of her 2CV, in the car park of the Aust services. Admittedly a lot of the condensed milk ended up on the crowbar/ground/car, but still, she got in.

In a Pukka Beef Pie, meat is the first ingredient on the list. So more beef than water!

The last time I tried to open one with a can opener, I only managed to make a hole in the side. If that had been the only food I had available, I would have wept. So I wouldn't donate one, just in case the person who got it didn't have a strong enough can opener.

How do you cook them? I’ve never bought one but may have tried it once back in the 80s but I wouldn’t have been the one cooking it.

You might be surprised how many people don’t have a standard tin opener. Anyone who has had to leave home in a rush(to escape domestic violence for example) may well lack that kind of thing.

Personally, I donate cans that have ring pulls attached to them for this reason. But have also bought a big load of cheap can openers and donated those too.

PS: there is a scene with a tin of pineapple in 'Three men in a boat' by Jerome K Jerome that is so funny the first time I read it I had to put the book down and walk away from it.

That tin of pineapple has nothing on a Fray Bentos steak and kidney pie. Nothing.

Indeed. To be fair, this is the same poverty activist who suggested one could make fire lighters out of the fluff out of the door of your washing machine.

By the time you've followed all those tips, a fray bentos pie is likely to be the least of your troubles. Compared to third degree burns.

Take the lid off (that part is extremely important) and then just shove it in a pre-heated oven for half an hour or so.

When done, you can even eat it straight out of the tin, to save on washing up, if you want to.

If a pie, you take the lid off with a can opener and bake it and the pastry is puff and luscious.

If a pudding, you take the lid off (I think, maybe just make a hole in it) and boil it in a shallow pan with water half way up the side of the tin.