Lidl - Read the Ingredients!!

ecohouse1

Hi

I have just registered with the forum, after reading it for years and have picked up many money saving tips.

I have been shopping at Lidl since about 2000 and mix this with Asda for most of my shopping. I was introduced to Lidl initially by some Dutch and German neighbours who raved about it. I was initially very happy with them and still buy their fruit juices, toilet/kitchen roll, fruit & veg milk etc however I have been horrified to see how much of their food contains hydrogenated vegetable oils/fats, which as everyone knows is no good for most peoples well being. I have stopped buying most of their biscuits/cakes and pastries/pies etc for this reason and even noticed that their liquorice allsorts even have them in!!! Makes me think they are keeping their costs down with cheap ingredients!

I have also found that the difference in price between them and say Asda is a lot less recently than it used to be, plus with Asda's gaurantee that they have all but eliminated HVF from their ranges. I generally go for their Smart Price/non - branded stuff. I say to my kids, "this family doesn't do branded"!!

I would be interested if anyone else had noticed this.

Cheers

Alan

*onlyme*

You pay for what you get in my view....

Bongedone

I bought breakfast bars once from there and noticed the hydrogenated vegetable fat. In the bin they went.

1carminestocky

*onlyme* wrote: »

You pay for what you get in my view....

I used to subscribe to this view but we now buy predominantly Sainsburys basics and, on the whole, they contain less sugar/salt/fat than the brand names/premium own brands. Of course, they are also far far cheaper. Fact is, sugar/salt/fat often = 'taste' to our palettes, that's why the brand names tend to include a lot of these ingredients. I liken it to the first time someone used to plonking 2 cubes of sugar in every cup of tea decides to stop the practice - the tea tastes horrible at first. But it sure is better for you, lol!

*onlyme*

sammiedoodle wrote: »

didn't you see that doco on the telly a couple of weeks ago, its so not the case you get what you pay for!!!
A lot of stuff was filled with water and animal proteins to bulk them up and there is also a lot of "fake food" out there
parmazan, parma ham, balsamic vinegar to name a few all sold at inflated prices but completely fake and not from the regions they are supposed to be from.
British food that originated in Germany/Denmark etc but allowed to be called British as it was packaged here... totaly outragous and misleading.
Buyers beware!!

But none of that is new really... it is what people want tho...cheap food and they don't really care what goes in it.

I buy all my meat from our local butcher, yes you pay more then what you pay for 'meat' at the supermarket but you need less as such as there is no water and fat coming out of it.

Our butchers visits farms up in Scotland a few times a year and selects his meat. The beef is delivered every Monday. Chicken, lamb and pork is from local farms, again selected by him.

Veg and salady type products we grow ourselves on our allotment / greenhouse and same with a lot of fruit.

clutterydrawer

I'm pretty sure hydrogenated fats aren;t exclusive to lidl - they are in loads of stuff from various suppliers, including brands you would consider "reliable"...it's just inevitable that if you're buying biscuits etc there will be some in there.

stephen77

lots of own label brands in super markets have removed Hydrogenated fats etc in the last few years, The super markets are taking more and more out.