iceland chicken - am I just being fussy

u751904

I saw this post recently on another board - a mom managed to feed 7 with £276 a month. She shopped monthly and in a few different places. One was iceland. She bought her meat eg chicken and mince from iceland.

Aldi used to do frozen chicken breast - great value, chicken was fine nothing added just chicken. They haven't done it for a few months now.:(

So Iceland do frozen chicken but it states they add extra water for extra succulence ? There were a few other items in the list other than chicken. I don't suppose anything major. I am sure if we ate the chicken it would taste fine etc.

But I didn't buy it. It's put me off to be honest. Am I being too fussy.

I am someone who cooks everything or at least most things from scratch and I don't go for things I don't think are natural.

Anyone had iceland chicken / mince etc any comments please? thanks

soozywooz

I used Iceland chicken breasts for years. It is by far the cheapest. It says best cooked from frozen but as we tended to cook currys etc we tended to defrost it. It definitely shrinks lots and has a slightly spongy texture - not so noticeable in a curry but more so in a drier meal (like stirfry). we switched to the co-op brand 3 for £10 offer for chicken it is noticeably better but the Iceland stuff is definitely cheaper - we've just opted to eat less chicken and have the slightly better quality. It was all right though. I didn't like the frozen mince I found it went too mushy (I tended to buy the lidl mince). i bought the pork steaks and slow cooked them with cider - they were quite nice like that.

bramble1

I refuse to buy any chicken thats pumped with water - what a waste of money. I prefer to buy chicken breasts from butchers if possible as they fill you up more therefore you need to eat less which cancels out the high price you pay.

quintwins

i've used iceland chicken fillets before there fine in casaraoles and currys, i olso buy there fresh ones when there reduced which i don't think ahve anything added, i don't like any frozen mince tbh i find it tends to greasy and fatty and you get a nasty scum if you boil it, i use value mince and never have that problem

MrsBartolozzi

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2002/jul/08/bse.foodanddrink

I remember reading this a few years ago and was appalled by the lengths companies go to to make our food as cheaply as possible. Much of the article is all about chicken nuggets and is not entirely relevant here, but I found one line startling and felt the need to investigate further after reading it:

If a manufacturer does anything to the chicken in this country, it can be legally labelled "produced in England".

this includes injecting it with water, salt, dextrose etc. So the "made in Britain" label on the chicken bag may just mean that it's cheap, imported from Thailand or China, chicken that was "plumped up" in Britain. Another good reason not to buy the stuff IMO.

MrsBartolozzi

I think Lidl still do their frozen chicken breasts on the bone. Once defrosted it only takes a minute to de -bone them for a curry etc, and the added bonus of bones for stock! There's no added water, (at least there didn't use to be).

recovering_spendaholic

MrsBartolozzi wrote: »

I think Lidl still do their frozen chicken breasts on the bone. Once defrosted it only takes a minute to de -bone them for a curry etc, and the added bonus of bones for stock! There's no added water, (at least there didn't use to be).

Do the Lidl on the bone breasts have skin on? I don't like skinless fillets, much preferring to cook on the bone skin on chicken breasts. The only place I can get them at the moment is from Ocado and they are £8.95 for a bag of about 7. how much are the Lidl ones?

u751904

ok so I am not alone with this... interesting that aldi had stopped doing their frozen chicken though, too good to be true.. I'll check out lidl. thanks

Stompa

u751904 wrote: »

ok so I am not alone with this... interesting that aldi had stopped doing their frozen chicken though, too good to be true.. I'll check out lidl. thanks

Our Aldi still sells frozen chicken breast, I buy it quite often, and saw some in there this morning.

http://www.aldi.co.uk/uk/html/product_range/product_range_17657.htm

Hmmm, just noticed the ingredients list on the pack: Chicken (80%), Water, Salt, ... Not so good after all.

Update: Just bought some of the premium version (£3.99 for 700g), no added water or additives.

Emuchops

Our Aldi also sells the frozen chicken breasts...

julietiff

bramble1 wrote: »

I refuse to buy any chicken thats pumped with water - what a waste of money. I prefer to buy chicken breasts from butchers if possible as they fill you up more therefore you need to eat less which cancels out the high price you pay.

Same here. We only buy Costco frozen chicken breast that has
nothing added, just over 2kg for 10.99 but very high quality.