ALDI & LIDL Food and Drink Worth Trying?

[Trustmeimadoctor]

the lidl red fox cheese is superb

[IanA2]

Trustmeimadoctor said:

the lidl red fox cheese is superb

Agreed, excellent. Also very nice toasted.

[ambuletz]

are lidl now doing the french selection of foods? i went in on wednesday wanting to get the french salami but it wasnt there.

[V8mate]

ambuletz said:

are lidl now doing the french selection of foods? i went in on wednesday wanting to get the french salami but it wasnt there.

I think the French week was Thursday 10 days ago. Thursday three days ago was French wine.

[davek_964]

VAGLover said:

So, question to the Aldi (and Lidl) crew.
Is the consensus that Aldi stuff is really good, or is it just cheap/novelty and good for the price?

The Aldi chilled sourdough pizzas are better than any other supermarket by some margin.
Their steaks are pretty good - not as good as the farm shop ones I buy occasionally, but as good as stuff from other supermarkets which cost more.
Wine is pretty good - the 'expensive' reds at ~£7 a bottle are way better than stuff costing twice that on other places.

Their expensive orange juice (that only lasts a few days) is also excellent.

Some stuff isn't great - their BBQ ribs are crap compared to Waitrose.

I don't buy everything from there, but the stuff I do buy is good.

[VAGLover]

davek_964 said:

VAGLover said:

So, question to the Aldi (and Lidl) crew.
Is the consensus that Aldi stuff is really good, or is it just cheap/novelty and good for the price?

The Aldi chilled sourdough pizzas are better than any other supermarket by some margin.
Their steaks are pretty good - not as good as the farm shop ones I buy occasionally, but as good as stuff from other supermarkets which cost more.
Wine is pretty good - the 'expensive' reds at ~£7 a bottle are way better than stuff costing twice that on other places.

Their expensive orange juice (that only lasts a few days) is also excellent.

Some stuff isn't great - their BBQ ribs are crap compared to Waitrose.

I don't buy everything from there, but the stuff I do buy is good.

Cool. Sounds like you have to be selective but can get good stuff.
Might give it ago.

[ajprice]

Christmas Aldi special buy on December 5th, a 2 metre pig in blanket for £4.99 https://www.ladbible.com/news/latest-aldi-is-launc...

[louiebaby]

The Christmas Crack is back...

[Fermit and Sexy Sarah]

A re-post from the breakfast thread. This mornings brunch was a home made double sausage and egg mcmuffin, using an Aldi oven bottom muffin, and a couple of these. It was bloody lovely, every bit as tasty as the real thing. In the freezer section, £1.30something IIRC.

[V8mate]

Had one of these today. Oven cooked (microwave optional), served with a blob of vanilla ice cream.

Absolutely ace; sharpness of the apple countered the stickiness of the toffee perfectly.

[Jim on the hill]

VAGLover said:

So, question to the Aldi (and Lidl) crew.
Is the consensus that Aldi stuff is really good, or is it just cheap/novelty and good for the price?

It's a supermarket. The quality is as good if not better than most of the other supermarkets. It's cheaper because in general you aren't buying brands.

Personally I love the fact that if you want spaghetti you have one option, milk the same one option makes shopping much faster.

[ElectricSoup]

Every autumn I stock up with Lidl's Christkindl Gluhwein. It makes a stonking cooking wine and gravy base. Looking forward to seeing it in stock soon, as I've just finished last year's batch this weekend!

[IanA2]

ElectricSoup said:

Every autumn I stock up with Lidl's Christkindl Gluhwein. It makes a stonking cooking wine and gravy base. Looking forward to seeing it in stock soon, as I've just finished last year's batch this weekend!

Christkindl Gluhwein is a wine infused with cinnamon, cloves, oranges, lemons and sugar. We prefer to make our own as it is very very simple to do, and the quality of wine used [not Petrus of course] :-) is a wee bit better than the commercially "pre-mixed" stuff. Whilst we regularly use a variety of wines in cooking, we've never tried Gluhwein in cooking.

ETA: typos

Edited by IanA2 on Monday 30th September 10:27

[ElectricSoup]

IanA2 said:

ElectricSoup said:

Every autumn I stock up with Lidl's Christkindl Gluhwein. It makes a stonking cooking wine and gravy base. Looking forward to seeing it in stock soon, as I've just finished last year's batch this weekend!

Christkindl Gluhwein is a wine is infused with cinnamon, cloves, oranges, lemons and a sugar. We prefer to make our own as it is very very simple to do, and the quality of wine used [not Petrus of course] :-) is a wee bit better than the commercially "pre-mixed" stuff. Whilst we regularly use a variety of wines in cooking, we've never tried Gluhwein in cooking.

Neither had I until I did :-). Makes for brilliant red wine gravy in particular, but good in mince dishes like spag bol too. Gives an extra warmth and depth.

YMMV but I like it.

[IanA2]

ElectricSoup said:

IanA2 said:

ElectricSoup said:

Every autumn I stock up with Lidl's Christkindl Gluhwein. It makes a stonking cooking wine and gravy base. Looking forward to seeing it in stock soon, as I've just finished last year's batch this weekend!

Christkindl Gluhwein is a wine is infused with cinnamon, cloves, oranges, lemons and a sugar. We prefer to make our own as it is very very simple to do, and the quality of wine used [not Petrus of course] :-) is a wee bit better than the commercially "pre-mixed" stuff. Whilst we regularly use a variety of wines in cooking, we've never tried Gluhwein in cooking.

Neither had I until I did :-). Makes for brilliant red wine gravy in particular, but good in mince dishes like spag bol too. Gives an extra warmth and depth.

YMMV but I like it.

Each to their own, but serious question, why not make your own? It's a bit like mixing a cocktail, so simple.

[ElectricSoup]

IanA2 said:

ElectricSoup said:

IanA2 said:

ElectricSoup said:

Every autumn I stock up with Lidl's Christkindl Gluhwein. It makes a stonking cooking wine and gravy base. Looking forward to seeing it in stock soon, as I've just finished last year's batch this weekend!

Christkindl Gluhwein is a wine is infused with cinnamon, cloves, oranges, lemons and a sugar. We prefer to make our own as it is very very simple to do, and the quality of wine used [not Petrus of course] :-) is a wee bit better than the commercially "pre-mixed" stuff. Whilst we regularly use a variety of wines in cooking, we've never tried Gluhwein in cooking.

Neither had I until I did :-). Makes for brilliant red wine gravy in particular, but good in mince dishes like spag bol too. Gives an extra warmth and depth.

YMMV but I like it.

Each to their own, but serious question, why not make your own? It's a bit like mixing a cocktail, so simple.

Because the Lidl one is so cheap and I like it - actually when I do use it as a drink at Christmas, I tend to put more spices and some oranges in it to rev it up. And at Christmas I'm the head chef (well I am year round), so it's a nice shortcut to get a ready made one to glug whilst I'm busy with the food. But mainly I like it as a cooking wine and I'm not going to bother making and re-bottling a mulled wine for that purpose when this one is so good at it off the shelf.

I do not have particularly sophisticated tastes when it comes to wine - sub-£5 bottles do the trick for me.

[V8mate]

IanA2 said:

Each to their own, but serious question, why not make your own? It's a bit like mixing a cocktail, so simple.

Because it's so much cheaper and he's only using it to make gravy?

Using 'decent' wine to make Gluhwein is beyond bonkers anyway. And too alcoholic too; Gluhwein is in the 8-9% range.

[IanA2]

V8mate said:

IanA2 said:

Each to their own, but serious question, why not make your own? It's a bit like mixing a cocktail, so simple.

Because it's so much cheaper and he's only using it to make gravy?

Using 'decent' wine to make Gluhwein is beyond bonkers anyway. And too alcoholic too; Gluhwein is in the 8-9% range.

As I originally stated "good wine" is not needed for mulled wine.

Mulled wine can be pretty much any percentage you wish. If you start with 12%, you can cook it down to 5, 6, or 7 or whatever percentage you wish. My personal preference is around 10%

Cheap? Some may say you get what you pay for.

BTW, read OP's post, he doesn't just use it for gravy.

[IanA2]

ElectricSoup said:

IanA2 said:

ElectricSoup said:

IanA2 said:

ElectricSoup said:

Every autumn I stock up with Lidl's Christkindl Gluhwein. It makes a stonking cooking wine and gravy base. Looking forward to seeing it in stock soon, as I've just finished last year's batch this weekend!

Christkindl Gluhwein is a wine is infused with cinnamon, cloves, oranges, lemons and a sugar. We prefer to make our own as it is very very simple to do, and the quality of wine used [not Petrus of course] :-) is a wee bit better than the commercially "pre-mixed" stuff. Whilst we regularly use a variety of wines in cooking, we've never tried Gluhwein in cooking.

Neither had I until I did :-). Makes for brilliant red wine gravy in particular, but good in mince dishes like spag bol too. Gives an extra warmth and depth.

YMMV but I like it.

Each to their own, but serious question, why not make your own? It's a bit like mixing a cocktail, so simple.

Because the Lidl one is so cheap and I like it - actually when I do use it as a drink at Christmas, I tend to put more spices and some oranges in it to rev it up. And at Christmas I'm the head chef (well I am year round), so it's a nice shortcut to get a ready made one to glug whilst I'm busy with the food. But mainly I like it as a cooking wine and I'm not going to bother making and re-bottling a mulled wine for that purpose when this one is so good at it off the shelf.

I do not have particularly sophisticated tastes when it comes to wine - sub-£5 bottles do the trick for me.

Fair points. When I'm thinking about food, I tend to think of the ingredients in a dish as constituent lines and colours of a painting. Some ingredients conjure up the works of Vermeer, others Van Gogh and some Jackson bks, if you see what I mean.

[21TonyK]

Anyone tried the Albacore tuna?