To think that there can't be that much difference between a Waitrose turkey and a Lidl turkey..?

[spanishwardrobe]

I've put in my Christmas shopping order at Waitrose and picked a turkey, the cheapest one I could find on the site, which was £55!

I've since been to Lidl and seen a same sized turkey for about £17!

Can they really be that different? And if so how!?

Has anyone ever taste tested turkeys? Am I just paying for a brand?

Breed counts too. A Bronze will be more expensive no matter which shop.
And you're wrong @Auburngal - my mum stuffed both ends and it was juicy - people generally cook for too long and don't let it rest long enough (at least an hour, two better).

I don't know about turkeys but Waitrose legs of lambs are incredible and so much nicer than Tesco/ Aldi/ local butcher.

DH has bought a small frozen turkey crown from Lidl . Apparently it has come top in some taste test, above a similar one from M&S.

We don’t eat turkey but a Booths local farm reared chicken is a thing of beauty - tastes amazing and keeps much longer
This year we are having lamb as well

Aye. My mum did work in a cake factory about 30 years ago and there was a very obvious change between each supermarket, right up to ramping up the hygiene measures for M&S.

Animal welfare aside (because I'm definitely on that page), I am seriously lol at the rampant snobbery on this thread.
😂

If it wasn’t being raised for food it wouldn’t exist at all 😭😭😭

Aldi turkeys have always been v good when I've had them.

We buy a very large (4.8kg) free range chicken (cockerel) instead from a local butchers - it's pricey at about £48 - but is always lovely and great for making sandwiches and pies or stew or stir fry in following few days - to be honest we all prefer it. This followed on from back in 2017 having a Turkey from Tescos that was actually in my opinion 'off' by Xmas day with a sell by date of 27th

I did my fill of Aldi and Lidl shopping when we lived in Denmark and if something wasn't very nice first thing H asked was 'is this from Lidl ' etc and invariably it was- I had very little from there that was remotely the standard of Waitrose or M&S - it was quite cheap but wasn't good 'in both mine and Hs opinion' eventually we latched onto Meny - which is a chain there- much better but still to me just 'ok' - I guess it is just a matter of taste and I can definitely tell the difference on certain products . I do spend more on food maybe than others but I'm not paying childcare and we rarely do take aways etc

It does my head in when people claim that because different supermarkets' foods are made or prepared in the same factory, they are all the same. Every meal I make is made in the same kitchen, but it doesn't make them the same! Why should the same building and the same production line mean the same recipe?!

People's lack of logic frustrates me every day. Anyone who's tasted a Weetabix and a Tesco basic wheat biscuit cereal knows they're not the same!

Sorry but I don't think this post makes a great deal of sense.

Youre being naive.

a lot of us know people who've worked in food factories.

They didn't "think" that the food products were the same.

They saw that the products were the EXACT same as each other.

My mum said that a food product came down the belt in the factory. They were all the exact same as each other.

Some of it was shipped of to one supermarket for a low price.

The other ones were shipped off to a more luxury supermarket to be marketed as a "luxury superior item".

They were the exact same as each other.

I disagree. Fresh cod and sea bass are line caught in the sea and are half the price of same at Sainsbury’s. Skinless and boneless for the cod.

Tastes very fresh and no fishy smell.

I haven't read the whole thread but have noticed a lot of questions about welfare. Unless you specifically buy a better welfare turkey then there probably isn't a difference.
At uni I worked I food production line all the supermarkets ordered m&s waitress to aldi..
All we did is change the lable and possibly the quality. So m&s v aldi. M&s have slightly denser weetabix. However a whole chicken the biggest difference is probably the wrapper

I am not sure tbh. I did hear a woman on a cooking program say that when a holiday is looming and frozen turkeys are on sale, try to avoid buying one and wait for the next batch as they generally mark down the year before leftover birds and sell them first.
We order a fresh one from a local butcher and the birds are from a local farm. We think it's better fresh. Going to use a roasting bag to cook it in. I just ordered our turkey today, it is all white meat as we still have frozen dark meat in the freezer. Mostly we use the dark meat for soup, pies or chili.

One supermarket had a sign saying that the meat on their shelves could be traced back to the actual cow that it came from, so I asked the manager which cow the meat in my trolley came from. He couldn't tell me and the next time I was in the shop the sign was gone.

I ordered a fresh turkey from a butcher one year. I ordered one about 12-13lbs and when I sent DH to collect it he brought it home with a tag with our name on it but it weighed 18.5 lbs. It was huge, very expensive and we all got sick of it. Now I like to pick one where I can see it's about 12-13lbs. Plenty for Xmas lunch, a few sandwiches on Boxing day and enough meat to make a stew or a curry then day after. I don't want to be eating it for more days than that.

I've only bought turkey once from Lidl and thankfully it wasn't at Christmas. I can only assume the poor crater died of old age or voluntary euthanasia as the meat was the most bizarre texture ever. It wasn't off nor cooked incorrectly it was stringy, sinewy and chewy.

I was told that Turkey at Christmas came from the Victorian era - it took over from the traditional goose as it was larger, so it fed larger families and was a show of wealth. My Spanish Spanish teacher at school commented that it was considered down market in Spain!

Quality absolutely varies between supermarkets. I shop between Waitrose and Lidl and after a couple of experiments I don't really buy fresh meat in Lidl. I've had some ok but slightly shrunken chicken from there that we had the same day in fajitas but I've also had some very nothingy haddock and some sad sausages. Nice deli meats though. I'm quite picky about what I pick up in there in general, some of it is brilliant, some is not.

I must say that a couple of years ago, lidl was the only skate I could find a Turkey left and it was the best one I'd had in a long time! I was planning on going to lidl again this year.

Ours always comes from the local butcher. Last years cost £90, we spend about £300 on meat over the festive season.
We use the local butchers because I would rather he had the £300 than a massive supermarket chain, I know which one appreciates our business more!
Even if you genuinely can't tell the difference in taste between lidl/aldi meat and the butchers just remember the money you spend at the butchers is keeping a family afloat not going towards a fat cats bonus!

Would never spend £300 on meat! 🤯

I got the worst turkey crown we'd ever had last year from Sainsbury's. Pre-ordered and it was not cheap, supposed to be free range, high quality etc. I've never tried one from Lidl.

Every bird we've had from Waitrose has been excellent. The Sainsbury's one just didn't cut up the same, the meat was all weird and "tight" and it was pretty bland, even though I did my usual stuffing, streaky bacon etc.

I used to get a whole turkey from the local farm for many years but they were all enormous and there was much more waste.

I'm not cooking this year but next time I'll go back to Waitrose as they have always been so reliable.

£300 is probably what I spend all year on meat, as we eat a lot of veggie meals and fish.