Pimp That Snack

Baked Bean Castle

by Stuart Lawrence 10 photos Rated 59% 342 votes when voting closed

When challenged by a friend to come up with a pimp of worth proportions I had to delve deep into my childhood to find something magical, edible and super-sized.

And lo…….my mind flickered towards the Baked Bean Castles I made with my sausage, mash and beans as a child (and maybe, from time to time, still). Savoury – yes! But, like, big!

The ingredients:

5kg of Potatoes
4 tins of Heinz Baked Beans (415g each)
16 Sainsbury’s Large Pork Sausages
20 Sainsbury’s Cocktail Sausages
Milk
I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter!
Salt (trace)
Lego Man, Toby (Castle owner)

Ingredients: four tins of Heinz baked beans, two packs of pork sausages and a bag of potatoes

The snack recipe has a simplicity that would make Sloth from The Goonies blush! To begin the 36 sausages were carefully placed on a baking tray and pricked to avoid a meat disaster!

Raw sausages packed across a foil-lined tray, a Lego minifigure standing among them for scale

Next 5 kgs of potatoes were peeled. Joy? No. Hell on Earth. However, my mood lifted on completing the task……the sight of 5kgs of peeled potatoes is a truly beautiful thing.

Big pan filled with peeled potato chunks, Lego minifigure perched on top for scale

The potatoes were placed in boiling water to soften them and make ready for mashing. Meanwhile, in the vicinity of the oven……the sausages cooked.

To ease the pressure on the hobs the Baked beans were moved into microwave-proof Tupperware ready to be nuked. Toby, the kidder, did some laps.

Bowl of baked beans in tomato sauce with the Lego minifigure lying at the edge

In no time the potatoes were ready to be mashed! In the distance the sausages continued to cook….

Three pans of boiled potatoes and butter on the hob, masher in the nearest one

In the time-honoured tradition, the potatoes were mashed with a potato masher. Milk, fake butter and salt were added to the mix.

The walls of the castle were then crafted from the mash.

Mashed potato moulded into square castle walls with a hollow centre on a dinner plate

The Baked Beans (post-nuke) were tipped into the walls of the Castle. Further mash was then delicately dumped on top of the beans to make the roof. The last of the potato was then sculpted into turrets.

Baked beans poured into the well inside the mashed potato walls

Sausages were removed from the oven without incident. The large sausages were placed around the base of the castle walls for stability and effect. Two made the castle doors; one the flag pole. The cocktail sausages were used to further define the turrets.

Sausages stood upright around the mash castle like ramparts, minifigure at the base

The new owner, Toby, was very happy and waved me farewell…..

Close-up of the Lego minifigure waving beneath two sausages leaning together over the mashed potato

Postscript:

Following a Big Bad Wolf-style tragedy, the Castle fell. I was left with four meals as that in the picture below. Not sure what happened to the Lego man. Think I ate him.

An ordinary plateful of sausage, mash and baked beans sitting on the hob

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