Category: Reviews

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The Taste Test: Feta Cheese

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After last week’s taste test post, I’m going back to human food. For now, at least. If anyone has a puppy they want to lend me to help out with a dog food taste test, just let me know. Today though, feta cheese. One of the very first taste test blogs I did was on cheddar cheese, but really, why stop there? Now I think about it, there are dozens – hundreds, even – of cheese related taste tests I could do. Halloumi? Parmesan? Stilton? If you are particularly curious about any specific cheeses, then let me know in the comments and I will make it happen.

I also keep meaning to get round to posting a recipe for a baked vegan feta cheese substitute. I had some at a class I was helping with a couple of months ago and, my god, it was a revelation. I’ve absolutely no need (in dietary terms) to eat vegan cheese rather than normal cheese, but this stuff was stupidly delicious. Again, if you’d be interested, then let me know.

For now though, feta. I try to keep some feta cheese in the fridge most of the time, because it’s wonderful versatile and delicious. Whether you’re crumbling it on top of a salad, stirring it into a pasta dish, or having it in fritters, it will always give you a satisfying kick of salty flavour.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. These are the opinions of one person – that said, one person who has been trained to taste for quality. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously each supermarket has, say, eight or nine different types of feta cheese or whatever the product may be, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

Finally, I should highlight that I tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting and making my notes I didn’t know which product came from which shop. I sat in one room while my glamorous assistant (er, my husband), prepared the samples in another. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after blind tasting, when I learned which supermarket had made A, B, C, D, or E.

The Blind Taste Test: Feta Cheese

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Feta
per 100g
£*
kcal
fat
carb
fibre
protein
salt
Lidl – Eridanous
0.50
278
23
0.7
0
17
2.2
 Totally Greek Feta Attis
1.00
276
23.0
0.7
0
16.5
2.25
Sainsbury’s
1.30
284
24.3
0.5
0.5
16.0
3.0
Tesco
0.60
279
23.0
1.0
0.0
16.9
1.9
Waitrose
1.25
283
24.2
0.2
0.3
15.9
3.15

A – Attis Totally Greek Feta – 4/10

  • Fair amount of water coming off it. Very smooth and soft, rather than crumbly. Tasted kind of like set cottage cheese – not particularly salty. Fine, but not great.

B – Tesco – 6/10

  • Less water coming off than A – firmer, and more crumbly – more pleasant to eat. Decent flavour, reasonably salty. Good, but not amazing.

C – Lidl – Eridanous – 8/10

  • Another firm and crumbly feta – what I would expect from feta texture. Well-flavoured, quite sharp with a lemony taste, good level of saltiness.

D – Waitrose – 7/10

  • Fairly firm, and somewhere in the middle regarding crumbliness. Saltty, rather than lemony. Not as flavoursome as C, but pleasant to eat.

E – Sainsbury’s – 6/10

  • Firm, no water coming off. Not crumbly like some others. Not overly salty, quite lemony, with a stronger cheese flavour.

Conclusion

Sample A seemed notably different to the other four samples, and it was my least favourite. It wasn’t necessarily bad, but did seem like a different kind of product, and less suited to my personal taste. Generally, any of the other four feta samples would do me just fine, although once again the Lidl cheese was my favourite. Turns out, Lidl do good cheese.

That said, none of these samples were anything like as good as the feta from Blackwoods Cheese Company that I brought from 2 North Parade a few weeks after doing this taste test. It’s not a day-to-day supermarket purchase, and it’s pretty extravagant, so it doesn’t really belong here. But if you’re looking for something special then go and buy it – you won’t regret it.

Otherwise, go to Lidl!

*Prices correct at time of writing.

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The Taste Test: Cat Food

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Week after week, Freddie watches me make and photograph recipes for this blog. She’s stared at us plaintively while we’ve done taste tests, protesting vociferously with her accusing eyes and surprisingly loud and expressive yowls at the unfairness of it all. Here we are, cooking and tasting and enjoying all this food. And what does she get? The same boring old cat food. Just out of a pouch, day after day. Well, except yesterday, when she caught a weasel and brought it proudly to us. (True story. It was mildly horrifying.)

So, to lessen her ire and to help protect the lives of the small woodland creatures dwelling around us, we’ve finally, just this once, let her in on the fun. Welcome to the cat food taste test.

(By the way, this is obviously a joke blog post, but it does have a slightly serious kernel – have you read the ingredients list on any cat food product lately!? For the standard brands – Felix and so on – it is literally 4% chicken or whatever meat flavour it’s supposed to be, 82% water and 2.5% crude ash! Among other things.)

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As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, Freddie is doing this in our kitchen and not in a lab and she is not a scientist. These are the opinions of one cat– that said, one cat who is used to the freshly killed mice and weasels of Oxfordshire and expects high quality. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously each supermarket has, say, eight or nine different types of cat food or whatever the product may be, and Freddie isn’t going to try every single one because her humans are cruel and didn’t buy them all.

Finally, I should highlight that Freddie tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting she didn’t know which product was which. She sat in one room while her slaves prepared the samples. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after tasting, when she learned which brand had made A, B, C, D, E, or F.

The Blind Taste Test: Cat Food

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A – Sheba Fine Flakes with Chicken – £5.88 per kg – 8/10

  • A contender from the start: this is the food I immediately gravitated towards. Strong and meaty. Would definitely eat again.

B – Sainsbury’s ‘The Delicious Collection’ Chicken Breast – £7.06 per kg – 7/10

  • A bit too heavy on the jelly and light on the chicken for my taste, but a good flavour and decent quality meat.

C – Gourmet Perle Tuna and Whole Shrimps in Gravy – £6.47 per kg – 6/10

  • I question the wisdom of putting tuna and shrimp in gravy. Surely gravy is for meat rather than fish? But I did enjoy the whole shrimps.

D – Encore Pacific Tuna & Whitebait – £14.28 per kg – 9/10

  • Delicious. I can’t resist a good fish dish. (Hannah’s note: I am not saying I would eat cat food but if I had to it would be this one. Here are the ingredients: Tuna Fillet 65%, Fish Broth 24%, Whitebait 10%, Rice 1%, Additives: None. No ash in sight.)

E – Gourmet Classic Soup – £22.50 per kg – 1/10

  • This is apparently a ‘delicately refined broth’. I’m not buying it. I’m a cat and we don’t eat soup.(Hannah’s note: she literally would not touch this, even after I took all the other food away.)

F – Felix with Tuna – £5 per kg – 5/10

  • I feel like that cat on the packet is watching me and I do not appreciate it.

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Conclusion

Cats will eat live mice. They don’t really care what cat food you feed them, as long as it kind of looks like some sort of meat.

They do draw the line at cat soup, though.

By the way, technically Freddie isn’t our cat.

*Prices correct at time of writing.

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The Taste Test: Milk Chocolate

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If you’ve read my dark chocolate post or, er, met me, you will know that I am a chocolate person. There are so many chocolate related posts on this blog that I couldn’t even begin to link to them all. I started with the dark chocolate taste test because it’s seen as the complex and sophisticated older sister to milk chocolate, and because I use it so much in baking. But for eating, I do love good milk chocolate. Or, sometimes, bad milk chocolate. Depending on how the day is going.

With dark chocolate, it was fairly easy to find products with 70% cocoa solids for a direct comparison. With milk chocolate, it was much trickier to find samples that were so directly comparable, and so I’ve got a bit more of a range. You can quite clearly see even from the picture below that some of the chocolate samples are darker, but I didn’t get the information from the packaging regarding which products had which levels of cocoa solids until after the taste test, in an effort to keep the tasting as blind as possible.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. These are the opinions of one person – that said, one person who has been trained to taste for quality. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously each supermarket has, say, eight or nine different types of milk chocolate or whatever the product may be, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

Finally, I should highlight that I tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting and making my notes I didn’t know which product came from which shop. I sat in one room while my glamorous assistant (er, my husband), prepared the samples in another. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after blind tasting, when I learned which supermarket had made A, B, C, D, or E.

The Blind Taste Test: Milk Chocolate

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Milk Chocolate
per 100g
£*
kcal
fat
carb
fibre
protein
salt
Aldi – Moser Roth (32%)
1.03
563
36
52
2.8
6.8
0.19
Lidl – Bellarom (33%)
0.60
568
36.5
52.7
1.9
6.2
0.25
Sainsbury’s – (31%)
1.45
558
35.2
50.6
2.3
8.5
0.25
Chocologic (36%)
1.50
484
36.2
33.7
17
7.9
0.62
Waitrose (49%)
1.88
618
47.0
39.0
3.4
8.0
0.17
Green & Black’s (37%)
2.00
565
36.0
48.0
3.0
9.8
0.23

A – Chocologic – 3/10

  • Visually one of the darkest. Breaks nicely with a good snap. Smells fine but not a great taste or texture – a bit chalky and bitter, with a particularly unpleasant aftertaste. Not sweet at all. No creaminess. Wouldn’t eat again.

B – Aldi – Moser Roth – 4/10

  • Light in colour. Very creamy, and notably sweeter than A – possibly too sweet. Nothing terrible, but nothing interesting. Just a sweet milk chocolate.

C – Sainsbury’s – 8/10

  • Creamy and smooth, with a hint of hazelnut. Immediately much nicer than A or B, with more flavour. Not too sweet, but not bitter. Really enjoyed this.

D – Green & Black’s – 9/10

  • Firm, with a good snap. Dark in colour. Full and rich in flavour. Creamy and smooth. Tastes like it’s good quality. Sweet, as you’d expect milk chocolate to be, but not overly so. My clear favourite.

E – Waitrose – 6/10

  • Initially looks similar to D, but not as nice. Certainly not bad, but not as enjoyable as D. A slight bitterness, especially in the aftertaste, which I didn’t really like, and less creaminess.

F – Lidl – Bellarom – 4/10

  • Light in colour. Sweet, rather than rich or complex in flavour. Tastes like cheap milk chocolate: not terrible but nothing special in terms of flavour.

Conclusion

This time, I tested a brand leader (Green & Black’s) against supermarket brands, to see how it compared. I have to say, before I started I was quietly confident that I could pick out Green & Black’s in a blind taste test, and I turned out to be right. Once I’d finished the actual tasting of the milk chocolate, I tried my hand at guessing which blind sample was which, and I got full marks.

This is partly because I’m a bit of a crazy chocolate freak, and partly because there weren’t really any surprises here. The Chocologic ‘no added sugar’ chocolate really didn’t taste sweet enough to be enjoyable. The cheapest options did taste less luxurious and complex than the more expensive products. My favourite milk chocolate here was the most expensive of the bunch.

So, I guess I can’t go subverting expectations every week.

*Prices correct at time of writing.

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The Taste Test: Extra Virgin Olive Oil

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Have you guys ever done shots of extra virgin olive oil? I’m going to guess not, because really, who does that? I’ve got to be honest: this was not the tastiest taste test ever. I kind of preferred chocolate week.

That said, this was actually not my first time drinking straight olive oil from a shot glass. At culinary school, you do a range of slightly odd things, and one of those things is olive oil tasting. Honestly, before I had to actually taste olive oil as one would taste wine, I didn’t really consider it to be a particularly interesting and complex product.

But I was so wrong! Olive oil is actually fairly analogous to wine in lots of ways. I mean, you’re talking about olives instead of grapes, but all the concerns of origin, climate, method of making, quality, price and so on do also come into play. There are professional olive oil tasters, and olive oil tasting events. It’s a whole new world.

Many of you probably don’t know (or perhaps care) about the difference between olive oil and extra virgin olive oil. I was once like this. It was a cheaper time. Now I have been educated (actually, we probably drank more straight olive oil at culinary school than humans should). Basically, olive oil is graded by its level of acidity. The level of acid in olive oil tells you how much the fat has broken down into fatty acids. If you want the good stuff, you’re looking for an unrefined oil. Extra virgin olive oil is unrefined, has lower levels of acid compared to blended oils (no more than 1%), and higher levels of the vitamins and minerals from the olive. It also has far more flavour than blended oils.

The whole issue of whether or not oil is healthy and which oils are evil and which will save your life is so stupid and complicated and confusing, and I’m not going into it. Personally, for standard cooking (unless I am deep frying or know I’m going to be working at a very high heat, in which case I will go for sunflower or vegetable) I use a cheap extra virgin olive oil. For eating cold, drizzling over dishes, finishing salads, dipping bread, making dressings, or blending into dips or pestos, I use a better quality extra virgin olive oil.

For baking, I sometimes use extra virgin olive oil if I want its flavour in the finished product, but I’ll often use flavourless oils if the taste doesn’t belong in that particular baked good. I don’t much go in for flavoured oils, but I do have sesame oil and truffle oil (I know, I know) around. I keep a few different bottles of extra virgin olive oil in  the kitchen, and am not particularly loyal to one brand: there are so many to try and I like to mix it up.

But this is just me. If you prefer everything to be cooked in organic cold pressed coconut oil, or only buy vegetable oil and eschew all this fancy oil stuff, go on doing you.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. These are the opinions of one person – that said, one person who has been trained to taste for quality. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously there are, say, eight or nine different types of olive oil or whatever the product may be in each supermarket, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

Finally, I should highlight that I tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting and making my notes I didn’t know which product came from which shop. I sat in one room while my glamorous assistant (er, my husband), prepared the samples in another. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after blind tasting, when I learned which supermarket had made A, B, C, D, E, or F.

The Blind Taste Test: Extra Virgin Olive Oil

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Extra Virgin Olive Oil
per 100g
£*
kcal
fat
carb
fibre
protein
salt
Aldi
0.76
824
92
0
0
0
0
Tesco
0.52
900
100
0
0
0
0
Iliada
1.2
823
91
0
0
0
0
Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference
1.2
823
91.4
0
0
0
0
Filippo Berio
0.85
822
91.3
0
0
0
0
Waitrose
2.4
823
91.4
0
0
0
0

A – Filippo Berio – 5/10

  • Smells grassy, herbaceous, and reasonably pleasant. The smell doesn’t really come through in the tasting. There’s a nice bitterness to it, but otherwise it’s a bit bland. Fine for cooking, but I probably wouldn’t use it for eating cold.

B – Waitrose – 7/10

  • Smells grassy, a bit spicy, and a little floral. An interesting taste and good flavour – a real kick of pepper on the finish, which is enjoyable, and a bit of fruitiness. I would use it for eating cold, dipping and so on.

C – Iliada – 5/10

  • Nothing particularly interesting in the scent. Tastes fairly bland. No peppery kick on the aftertaste. Not unpleasant but not going to set the world alight.

D – Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference – 8/10

  • Smells lighter than many of the other samples. A herbaceous, grassy tastes carries though in the flavour. A pleasant spiciness on its finish. Would use for salad dressings and so on.

E – Aldi – 7/10

  • No real notable scent, and initially doesn’t seem very interesting, but actually has a very nice flavour and a complex, strong, spicy finish when you taste it properly.

F – Tesco – 6/10

  • The only really visually different oil, looking much lighter and more golden than the others. Smells pleasant. Less body than the others and kind of disappears in the mouth, but has the pepper finish and quite a strong flavour – surprisingly not too bad.

Conclusion

I am not a professional olive oil taster, and it’s a whole skill that people specialise in. I am not one of those people. It’s quite possible that I am missing intricacies and subtleties here, so do remember this is a layman’s opinion. It would have been much nicer to dip bread into the olive oil, to be honest, but I wanted to have the best chance of just tasting the product.

I think what we have here is kind of a triumph of packaging. The Iliada oil, in it’s little can, looked interesting and pretty and very different to the other offerings, but the product didn’t really impress me. The basic Tesco packaging, though pretty uninspiring in and of itself, held an olive oil that had more of a unique taste than some of the other samples.

My favourite extra virgin olive oil from these six was the Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference product, but the Waitrose, Aldi, and even budget Tesco options were all nice enough to use in dishes where you’d actually notice the flavour of the oil. The others were also fine, but I’d use them for cooking rather than eating. Please can I stop drinking straight oil now?

*Prices correct at time of writing.

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The Taste Test: Vegetarian Sausages

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Vegetarian sausages are going to be a bit easier to rank than eggs, guys. It’s not a big spoiler for me to tell you that now.

It might seem odd for me to be doing a taste test for vegetarian sausages, as I eat everything, including meat. However, partly inspired by two lovely friends of mine who have been practising six-day-a-week vegetarianism, I have been eating far less meat than I used to. I definitely do still eat meat (and fish), but when I do it’s the happiest, highest quality meat I can afford. It’s now more of a treat than a staple. Thus, I found myself buying vegetarian sausages for the first time at the beginning of this year.

You know what, though? Vegetarian sausages are kind of hard to find. That’s probably no news to vegetarians, but to a meat-eater, it was a bit of a surprise. A few supermarkets I tried didn’t sell them at all. There were only a couple of supermarket own brands that I could see – and I had to head to the frozen section for those – so there are a few brand name vegetarian sausages in here too.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. These are the opinions of one person – that said, one person who has been trained to taste for quality. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously there are, say, eight or nine different types of vegetarian sausages or whatever the product may be, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

Finally, I should highlight that I tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting and making my notes I didn’t know which product came from which shop. I sat in one room while my glamorous assistant (er, my husband), prepared the samples in another. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after blind tasting, when I learned which supermarket had made A, B, C, D, or E.

The Blind Taste Test: Vegetarian Sausages

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Veggie Sausages
per 100g
£*
kcal
fat
carb
fibre
protein
salt
Linda McCartney
0.87
168
6.0
8.7
3.0
18.2
1.3
Cauldron Lincolnshire
0.91
182
9.8
5.5
3.6
16.1
1.3
Sainsbury’s
0.57
181
10.7
3.7
2.3
16.3
1.0
Tesco
0.65
222
15.8
1.6
2.2
17.1
1.0
Quorn
 1.0
155
5.2
15.1
5.5
8.9
1.1

A – Linda McCartney – 4/10

  • A slightly odd orange colour, but crisped up well in the oven, and a nice texture on the exterior. Smells okay – a bit unusual, but not bad. Doesn’t smell or taste like a sausage though. Not an awful texture, and perfectly edible, but very bland and no particular flavour.

B – Sainsbury’s – 6/10

  • Looks more like a real sausage than A: a good colour. Smells nice, and kind of like a real sausage. Texture is actually reminiscent of meat. A bit bland but not bad – a bit of spiciness and flavour, but it doesn’t taste like meat.

C – Quorn – 5/10

  • A bit pale, but has a skin like a sausage and smells quite nice. Very soft and smooth texture, not really like meat. Doesn’t taste bad, but again, quite bland and lacking in real flavour.

D – Tesco – 3/10

  • Pink, thin, with a rubbery texture. The oddest looking of the bunch. Weird, and quite unpleasant, texture and taste. However, does taste quite like one of the fake hot dog sausages you get at theme parks or whatever.

E – Cauldron – Lincolnshire – 8/10

  • Looks the best of the bunch – a nice colour and size, cuts nicely. Smells good. The meatiest texture of the lot. Certainly more flavour than any of the others. Doesn’t taste exactly like meat, but a reasonable meat alternative, and perfectly pleasant to eat.

Conclusion

All the vegetarian sausages looked really different when the samples came out, and it was interesting to see how much variation there was between products. Initially, I wondered how I was going to rank this. Should I score the vegetarian sausages based on how much they taste like real meat, or on how good they are to eat in and of themselves? In the end, however, that wasn’t really a problem. The sausage that tasted the most like real meat was also the most pleasant thing to eat. The Cauldron sausages were the clear winner. That said, the Sainsbury’s own-brand frozen option were surprisingly nice, and much cheaper if you’re on a budget. I wouldn’t buy any of the other three options again, but I do have a pack of the Cauldron sausages in the fridge. Next to the bacon.

*Prices correct at time of writing.

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The Taste Test: Eggs

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A couple of you asked that I put eggs to the test for this series, and I was only too happy to oblige. It’s actually turned out to be a particularly interesting experience. This taste test has been unique so far among all those that I’ve done: you can see why in my conclusions below.

Firstly though, an introduction. It’s basically my dream to own my own chickens (simple pleasures for simple minds and so on). The idea of having pets that actually produce beautiful, fresh eggs for us to eat is stupidly appealing. However, we don’t have a garden, so it’s a dream I have had to put on hold. Also, I’d need a lot of chickens. I go through a lot of eggs. I am a baker, so it comes with the territory.

I think a lot of people buy free range eggs nowadays, knowing vaguely that it’s a good thing. In the UK, 2% of eggs purchased are organic, 47% of them come from free range hens, 48% are from caged birds and the rest are from barn hens.

Sadly, though, ‘free range’ isn’t such a high welfare standard as it sounds. In the EU (sob, let’s not get into it right now), free range hens have constant daytime access to the outdoors. Standards also dictate a maximum stocking density of 9 hens per square metre of ‘usable’ space. There are a few other requirements, which you can check out on good old Wikipedia if you’re interested.

However, organic eggs must meet all the basic free range requirements, and then many more. Here’s a handy summary from the Soil Association (the whole article is very useful):

‘Organic chickens are raised to organic standards, which not only means free-range but a whole lot more. Organic standards cover not only the animals housing and the amount of space they have, but also the way they are treated, what they are fed and how they are transported and eventually slaughtered. They are not allowed to be fed on GM feed (which is common in free-range and non-organic hens). Chickens must not have their beaks trimmed to try and prevent feather pecking and are given plenty of opportunities to express their natural behaviours such as – foraging, bathing in the dust outside and pecking at insects and worms on grass fields.’

In summary: organic eggs come from happier chickens. With that in mind, I set out to taste test some of the happiest eggs I could find, to see if budget versions that conformed to high standards were any different from the fanciest of them all.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. These are the opinions of one person – that said, one person who has been trained to taste for quality. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously each supermarket has, say, eight or nine different types of eggs or whatever the product may be, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

Finally, I should highlight that I tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting and making my notes I didn’t know which product came from which shop. I sat in one room while my glamorous assistant (er, my husband), prepared the samples in another. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after blind tasting, when I learned which supermarket had made A, B, C, D, or E.

The Blind Taste Test: Eggs

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Eggs
£ (6 eggs/328g)*
General Info
Aldi – Merevale
1.39 (328)
Organic, RSPCA Assured, Lion, Class A
Lidl – Woodcote
1.39 (328)
Organic, RSPCA Assured, Lion, Class A
Sainsbury’s – TTD
1.85 (328g)
RSPCA Assured, Free Range, Lion, Class A
Tesco
1.80 (328g)
Organic, Free Range, Lion, Class A
Waitrose – Duchy
2.75 (6 large)
Organic, Free Range, Lion, Class A

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Now, I haven’t done all of the usual nutritional information this week because they’re eggs and it doesn’t really work like that. I have, though, noted what the packaging states about the eggs’ standards. You’ll also see from the photos that the sizes of the eggs vary quite a bit. That’s because some of the half dozens I purchased were of mixed sizes and some were large. All had to meet a minimum weight of 328g though.

You’re also not getting any tasting notes this week. You know why? They all tasted like decent boiled eggs. Really, pretty much exactly the same – or so close to it that I couldn’t taste a difference.

A – Sainsbury’s – Taste the Difference

B – Lidl – Woodcote

C – Tesco

D – Aldi – Merevale

E – Waitrose – Duchy

I’m far from an expert, but here’s a very basic guide to the classifications.

  • Class A simply means the eggs meet the basic standards for retail in the UK – size, cleanliness, basic quality and so on.
  • The Lion mark is about food safety and legal requirements, not hen welfare.
  • RSPCA assured means the farms where the eggs were produced meet the RSPCA’s welfare standards. These are less stringent than organic standards, but still higher than basic free range (and the products are often cheaper than organic options).
  • Organic and/or a Soil Association mark represents the gold standard of welfare.

Conclusion

The conclusion this week is pretty simple. All the eggs taste pretty much the same, so if you’re going to buy high welfare eggs, you may as well buy the cheapest ones that meet the standards you are happy with. The Aldi and Lidl eggs were marked organic and thus met the welfare standard, but are almost less than half the price of the Waitrose eggs.

Although if I have to pick a winner, I pick Aldi. You can just about see in the picture above that the Aldi egg I tried (D) has a double yolk. I’m pretty sure that means I get to be lucky forever or something like that.

*Prices correct at time of writing.

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Review: Nadiya’s British Food Adventure, by Nadiya Hussain

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Nadiya’s personality shines through her latest cookbook, Nadiya’s British Food Adventure: you can’t help but love her. I saw her interviewed by Barney Desmazery in Oxford a couple of weeks ago, and ‘charming’ doesn’t cover it. Nadiya is warm, candid, bright, and very funny in person – expressive and quick-witted, with a natural comic’s timing.

It’s unsurprising that Nadiya’s been back on our television screens once again for Nadiya’s British Food Adventure. This follows last year’s The Chronicles of Nadiya and, of course, her Bake Off win. She’s a natural food presenter, friendly and casual, seemingly at ease and knowledgeable without being condescending. Having interviewed her last year, I always feel particular interest whenever she pops up in the public eye. Even though she has no chance of remembering the five minutes we spent chatting, I like to think that somehow our brief meeting made us best mates. Hey, it could happen.

Her latest book is accessible and welcoming, packed with little stories and anecdotes about her family and friends. There are also over 120 new recipes. The general idea is that the recipes are Nadiya’s takes on British classics, or new ways with traditional British ingredients. The book shows us a culinary landscape where tradition is turned on its head. Eggy bread is updated with masala. A classic steak and kidney pie marries with the North African spice mix, ras el hanout. A rice pudding meets caradamom, mango, coconut, and lime.

On an initial flick-through of the book, I could see lots of recipes that I was keen to try out – always a good sign. The photography is pretty clean and modern, and the dishes pictured look enticing. Though Nadiya is probably still best known for winning Bake Off, the book is packed with mostly savoury recipes. Never fear though – there’s a sweet section at the end! It’s organised roughly into meal times and occasions – breakfast, lunch, dinner, parties and so on – and is easy to navigate.

The Recipes

The first recipe I tried was the Crab Cakes with Lemon Mayo, a recipe for pretty classic crab cakes spiced up with coriander, chilli, and ginger. I love crab, hence my eagerness to try this, although I did baulk slightly at the amount called for because 850g crabmeat is expensive. In fairness, the recipe does specify that either tinned or fresh crab can be used. However, although I tried three supermarkets, I couldn’t find any tinned crab, so I had to go with fresh in the end.

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The recipe was easy to follow. I particularly appreciated the tip for making mashed potato. Nadiya suggests you simply microwave a large potato for 15 minutes. This saved me from automatically going down my normal, and far more time consuming, mashed potato making route. I did find the crab cakes spectacularly hard to fry, as they kept falling apart in the pan. I suspect my mixture was somehow too wet, although I followed the ingredients and method to the letter for the sake of testing. The finished result was undeniably delicious. Even though the recipe made 24 little cakes, they didn’t last for very long at all in our two person household.

Next up was the Lamb Bhuna with Garlic Naan. I am by no means a curry expert, but the recipe was generally simple to follow and didn’t include any hard-to-find ingredients. The finished curry was delicious, with a gorgeous warm and complex spiced flavour. However, mine had a lot more sauce than the fairly dry curry shown in the book’s picture. When making it again, I will cook it for at least half an hour more than suggested in the recipe, and add less liquid.

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There was what I’d consider to be a pretty serious flaw in the recipe, though, and that was in the method for the naan. The recipe instructs you to add water to the dough without telling you how much to add, or even how soft a dough you are aiming for. There’s no water listed in the ingredients for the bread, and there are no instructions to measure any for the naan at another point in the recipe. I make bread a lot, so I made an educated guess, and the naan turned out fine. For someone less familiar with the process, though, I think it would be a bit of an issue.

The Caramelised Onion Soup with Cayenne Croutons was a simple twist on a classic recipe. The flavours of cayenne and thyme enhance the old favourite. It’s the sort of recipe which takes a bit of time, but it’s mostly passive time – waiting for the onions to brown and then simmer and so on. It’s well worth the wait for the end result. I made it looking for a simple lunch option, and wasn’t disappointed.

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The last recipe I tested was the Apple, Fig, Brie, & Honey Strudel. It’s from the ‘Pudding’ section of the book, but it’s actually an interesting hybrid, because it’s not massively sweet. I went for it because it seemed unusual, and it definitely was. I really loved the combinations of flavours. I’d be tempted to serve it with ice cream or something else to up the sweetness if I was doing it for a proper dessert, but actually, if you leave off the icing sugar it’s almost savoury enough to pass for lunch.

My strudel was not nearly as pretty as the one pictured in the book: I’d personally recommend popping the puff pastry in the fridge for at least half an hour (rather than the fifteen minutes specified) before plaiting. I also found the brie leaked out of the strudel fairly drastically in the oven, probably due to my poor plaiting leaving gaps from which it could escape. Nonetheless, I’d recommend freezing the brie for ten or fifteen minutes after slicing and before putting in the strudel, so that it’s cooked but not melted in a puddle by the time the strudel is done.

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The conclusion?

There’s a lot to like about this book. Nadiya’s writing is clear, warm, and very readable: the book has character. It’s full of tempting recipes, and there are plenty more I’d like to cook. I’m particularly pleased to see offal popping up a couple of times, and there’s a chicken liver salad I am very keen to try. There’s a good balance struck between adventurous and accessible dishes. Really, the book has something for everyone, regardless of preferences or skill level.

Having worked my way though a couple of the recipes, I do feel like there are a couple of adjustments that could be made. For the sake of testing, I followed the recipes, but had I been cooking casually I would have instinctively made some changes going along. I think some of the recipes I tried would benefit from minor changes that illustrate the end goals. For example, ‘leave the bhuna to simmer gently for 30 minutes with the lid on’ could be ‘simmer the bhuna for around 30 minutes, or until the majority of the liquid has evaporated and you’re left with a thick, clinging sauce’, or an instruction to chill pastry for 15 minutes could specify instead that you should chill the pastry until firm and easy to work with. This is basically just me being picky, though.

The main thing to note is that James and I really enjoyed all the food I have cooked using recipes from Nadiya’s British Food Adventure this week. The ultimate compliment is that there haven’t been any leftovers. I’m really quite sad that there is no more strudel.

Taste-Test-Chocolate

The Taste Test: Dark Chocolate

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Anyone who has spent any time with me will know that I am a chocolate person. I know it’s a stereotype (women and chocolate, blah blah blah), but I love it. There are so many chocolate related posts on this blog that I couldn’t even begin to link to them all.

I’m the person who will always gravitate towards chocolate as a treat rather than crisps or pizza. I will always choose the chocolate dessert in a restaurant. I make brownies upon brownies upon brownies. To truly mark the obsession, I just did a chocolate workshop. This is my bag, basically.

Now, I will very happily eat white, milk, or dark chocolate. I know white chocolate isn’t technically chocolate and so on, but a very good quality white chocolate is a thing of beauty, and don’t even get me started on caramelised white chocolate, which is the food of the gods (I will do a post on how to make it, if you are interested). But, for the sake of fairness here, I had to go for something simple, so that I could get equivalent samples. Hence, five types of plain 70% dark chocolate.

70% dark chocolate is what I use in baking all the time, so I am pretty attached to it, and always have a few bars in the cupboard for short-notice baking emergencies (happens more often than you might think). Usually, though, I go for whichever name-brand is on offer at the supermarket. Often, I end up with Lindt 70%. So I was curious to see how other 70% dark chocolates measured up.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. These are the opinions of one person – that said, one person who has been trained to taste for quality. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously each supermarket has, say, eight or nine different types of dark chocolate or whatever the product may be, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

Finally, I should highlight that I tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting and making my notes I didn’t know which product came from which shop. I sat in one room while my glamorous assistant (er, my husband), prepared the samples in another. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after blind tasting, when I learned which supermarket had made A, B, C, D, or E.

The Blind Taste Test: Dark Chocolate

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Chocolate
per 100g
£*
kcal
fat
carb
fibre
protein
salt
Aldi
1.03
574
43.0
30.0
14.0
9.8
0.01
Lidl
1.03
547
40
33
12
7.8
0.03
Sainsburys
1.45
547
40.2
31.9
12.2
8.4
0.02
Tesco
1.50
577
41.9
37.0
9.7
8.1
0.01
Waitrose
2.19
565
41.0
34.0
12.0
9.0
0.02

A – Lidl – J.D. Gross – 6/10

  • Good texture – a nice snap when broken. Creamy when eaten. A fairly sharp, bitter flavour with hints of coffee. A decent dark chocolate I’d happily eat, but not surprising or very special.

B – Aldi – Moser Roth – 7/10

  • Slightly softer and less bitter than the first sample, but still strong. A hint of fruitiness in the taste. A bold and dark flavour, and a velvety texture when eaten.

C – Tesco – 7/10

  • Another good texture. Tasted sweeter and softer than either A or B, with a less obvious bitterness. A slight orange/fruity taste in the background, and fairly creamy when eaten.

D – Waitrose – 8/10

  • Tasted somehow more chocolatey than the first three samples (sounds silly, but it did). Fruity and soft, and not too bitter – very mellow, especially in comparison to A and B. Tasted definitely different to the others, with a distinctive fruitiness.

E – Sainsbury’s – 5/10

  • Very distinctive flavour: maybe a hint of coconut. Hard to describe, but not as pleasing as the first four samples. Not too bitter, and quite soft and sweet in flavour. For me, the least appealing.

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Conclusion

This was an interesting taste test, and somewhat different to any of the others I have done so far. I don’t think any of the products I tried were bad. Even the offering from Sainsbury’s, which I liked the least on balance, was perfectly fine. Whether or not you like each type of chocolate will depend very much on personal taste and what you are looking for. Aldi and Lidl’s offerings were of a different style to the others. Neither supermarket did their own named-brand, and instead stocked J.D. Gross (made for Lidl) and Moser Roth (made for Aldi).

Even though Aldi and Lidl’s products were 70% cocoa dark chocolates, as were the rest, they were notably darker and tasted more bitter. You could even see visually that they looked darker. So, for those who like their dark chocolate to be pretty strong and not too sweet, these would be perfect. The others were all mellower, sweeter, and tasted like they were a lower cocoa percentage than the first two, even though they weren’t.

Personally, I would eat or use any of these products. Now that I have more experience of the range available, I might use the Aldi or Lidl darker chocolates for baking something rich and with a distinctive dark chocolate flavour.  The others might do better in something designed to be more accessible; perhaps for people who don’t have such a taste for serious dark chocolate.

So, for the first time, I am not going to pick an official winner this week. If I was just eating the chocolate, unadorned, I’d probably go with the Waitrose offering. However, I don’t think it’s necessarily better than the others. The Aldi and Lidl products were clearly of a different genre, and trying to do a different thing. Which chocolate would be best of the bunch would be entirely dependent on your personal taste, and what you wanted to use it for.

*Prices correct at time of writing.

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Review: Yutaka Soybean Noodles

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I really love Japanese food, so I was pretty excited when Yutaka sent me a couple of boxes of their new soybean noodles to play with. Japanese food is vibrant, flavoursome, and usually very healthy, full of fresh vegetables and lean protein. These noodles have the added benefits of being gluten free and organic. As someone who doesn’t have to eat gluten free, I was interested to see how these noodles would compare to more standard offerings. Would I notice a difference?

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I was sent a box of the regular soybean noodles and a box of the edamame soybean noodles. I decided to make the recipes by Ching He Huang on the back of each box, rather than coming up with some wild creation of my own. This time, I wanted to be sure I was cooking with the noodles as intended, because I definitely don’t claim to be an expert in Asian cuisine.

The noodles themselves couldn’t be easier to cook – just pop them into boiling water and simmer for six minutes – and would be a great base for lots of dishes. I had a taste of them simply cooked, drained, and tossed with some sesame oil before continuing on with the recipes. They were flavoursome and substantial, and fairly robust. They would stand up well to bold ingredients and spices, and didn’t fall apart, overcook, or become clumpy.

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The recipes on the noodle boxes were fairly simple and easy to follow. They would be a good starting point for anyone unaccustomed to Asian cuisine. I found myself upping the quantities of the seasoning ingredients and spices to give the dishes more of a depth of flavour, but that’s down to personal taste.

Pictured are the edamame noodles, with which I made Chicken Edamame Noodle Soup. It was a lovely, light, and fairly mild dish, that involved poaching chicken thighs in a flavoured broth that formed the base of the soup. Chicken breasts tend to be more popular than chicken thighs, but I’ve always preferred the latter. They are far more succulent and flavoursome, and less prone to drying out, so I was glad to see them in this recipe. Finished with beansprouts and spinach, the soup was nutritious as well as tasty. The leftovers were also great the next day.

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In summary…

These noodles would be a great option for anyone who is following a gluten free diet, but are delicious in their own right and would be enjoyed by all, regardless of dietary restrictions. You could feed these to a group of mixed eaters – in a big platter of sharing noodle stir-fry or cold noodle salad, for instance – and satisfy everyone without having to make a separate gluten free option. I doubt anyone would notice these were gluten free without being told, so everyone would be happy.

I’m looking forward to buying this new offering from Yutaka and adding them to my ‘cupboard of carbs’ (which is stuffed with various types of rice and pasta), and using them as a base for simple and healthy dishes. Or maybe I’ll fry them, when I don’t feel like doing anything simple or healthy. One or the other.

*I was sent these products free of charge for review purposes, but all opinions are my own.
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The Taste Test: Pesto

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Unsurprisingly, eating spoonfuls of straight pesto is less enjoyable than eating chunks of Cheddar cheese, as I discovered in this week’s taste test. Nevertheless, I do really love pesto. Even the student existence of pasta-pesto-repeat didn’t put me off the stuff. I love it stirred through pasta, spread on toast, mixed into sauces, drizzled over salads… sorry, what were we talking about?

Since I’ve started doing this taste test series, I’ve been getting a bit of ‘I’d never buy XYZ from a supermarket, I always make it myself!’ Mostly regarding houmous, in fairness, but I know people who make their own cheese too. So yes, of course, you could make pesto yourself, and houmous too. Let’s be realistic though: we are all busy people, and sometimes you don’t have access to a kitchen, or you’re missing a few ingredients, or you’ve had a long day at work and you’re tired and good God, you just want some pasta and if you have to get out a food processor and make pesto yourself then you’re going to kill someone. Yes, homemade pesto is delicious. But I do buy the stuff in jars too.

As before, I feel I need a rambling disclaimer: obviously, I am doing this in my kitchen and not in a lab and I am not a scientist. These are the opinions of one person – that said, one person who has been trained to taste for quality. Also, the products used in this series are just examples – obviously each supermarket has, say, five or six different types of pesto or whatever the product may be, and I’m not going to try every single one because what am I, made of money?

Finally, I should highlight that I tasted all the products blind, and at the time of tasting and making my notes I didn’t know which product came from which shop. I sat in one room while my glamorous assistant (er, my husband), prepared the samples in another. Any notes added regarding packaging and so on were only done after blind tasting, when I learned which supermarket had made A, B, C, D, or E.

The Blind Taste Test: Pesto

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Pesto
per 100g
£*
kcal
fat
carb
fibre
protein
salt
Aldi
0.52
345
32
9.0
3.5
4.2
1.4
Lidl
0.52
364
35.9
4.8
2.6
4.1
1.92
Sainsbury’s
0.53
347
35.1
1.9
2.0
4.8
1.43
Tesco
0.53
331
31.9
4.5
3.7
4.7
2.0
Waitrose
1.31
380
38.2
3.1
2.1
5.0
1.1

A – Waitrose – 7/10

  • The least separated, the firmest and most cohesive pesto. A vivid green, rather than being grey or sludgy. A herbaceous, almost grassy taste. Fairly good texture, able to taste Parmesan, but no obvious chunks of pine nut.

B – Tesco – 3/10

  • Quite minimal oil separation, thick pesto. A pale beige green, not as vivid as some of the others. Not a great flavour – a bit bland, quite salty.

C – Lidl – 3/10

  • Medium in composition, a little oil separation, soft but not too liquid. Very smooth. Less of a herb-y flavour than the others, no obvious basil or Parmesan, and a slightly odd aftertaste.

D – Aldi – 8/10

  • Strong green, a decent colour. A fair amount of oil coming off it. Good texture, decent flavour. Chunks of pine nut and a definite taste of Parmesan, as well as strong basil.

E – Sainsbury’s – 7/10

  • The most separated of all the pesto with a lot of oil coming off it. Quite green, not lacklustre and beige. Good strong taste of basil, pine nut, and Parmesan.

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Conclusion

There was obvious variation and a lot of visual differences between the various pestos. Tesco and Lidl’s offerings were both beige and lacking in colour, and both of these samples had less flavour than the others – you can actually see a difference between them and the other three if you look at the pictures showing all five jars. You wouldn’t normally eat straight pesto on its own, and doing so was interesting (if not necessarily totally enjoyable), because unless I was making pesto from scratch I wouldn’t normally eat it like that and I’d probably miss out on really thinking about the flavour. Although the Aldi pesto was my favourite, the Waitrose and Sainsbury’s offerings were a close joint second and I’d happily buy any of the three.

*Prices correct at time of writing.

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