By Nina Beyers

Ideas are like steak bakes. Sometimes they are meaty, piping hot and and you can’t wait to sink your teeth into them.

But when you pick up a reduced ‘on offer’ steak bake from Morrison’s for 49p it all goes wrong.

It resembles a quality pastry and requires much less effort. Just pop it in the microwave and it will be fine.

But no. It’s not fine.

It’s lukewarm.

That pastry that’s meant to be so simple and delicious is ruined, crumbling to bits, falling all over the place.

30 seconds in and you’re already wishing you had gone for that veggie samosa or those caramel profiteroles.

There’s no real chunks of meat. Only artificial scraps that resemble fleshy goodness.

You show other students who are loitering around the fridge. It’s met with ‘yeah it’ll do’ or worse, ‘it’s good’.

You put it in again and turn the heat up hoping this intense incineration will mask the blandness.

The meat juice drips out miserably, creating a pathetic mess.

You desperately squirt any coloured sauce over it to mask the chaotic mish mash.

Afterwards, all that’s left is a bitter taste of disappointment. Like you’ve wasted your time and calorie intake.

When a mentor asks you how it was, you cringe and reply that you would rather not talk about it.

You feel a sense of shame, how could you cop out? It was soggy not sticky.

I’ve learnt to mould and bake ideas with care and time. But most importantly, I should never cheat on Greggs again.