“Life’s too short to shop there.” I suspect my wife’s
attitude to Lidl, though said in jest, is not untypical of
farmers’-market-going types. But you can’t knock its variety. At this budget
supermarket, you’ll find a family computer for under £300, alongside
cornflakes for 99p.
Where I live, near Burgess Hill in West Sussex, the Lidl store sits only a few
hundred yards away from Waitrose. It may as well be a mile as far as
thousands of shoppers are concerned – you shop at Waitrose or you shop at
Lidl, and never the twain shall meet.
But a growing band of foodies is discovering that Lidl has it joys, too. They
swear that Lidl is the source not only of bargains but some tasty and
nutritious treats, if you know how to shop there. It’s a subtle social shift
that Lidl – a German company with 7,000 branches around Europe – is aware
of. It has just launched a new Fairtrade product range, and is now putting
an emphasis on healthy eating in its customers’ magazine.
It was time, the Body&Soul office told me, to put Lidl to the test. Could
I really buy enough healthy food in Lidl for a delicious family meal, which
would keep my bank manager, doctor and family happy? Was it possible that I
was missing a trick? Would I find what I bought in Waitrose at much cheaper
prices?
My mission: to trawl my local Lidl, backed up by nutritionist Amanda Ursell
and chef and food writer Thomasina Miers, who would guide me through the
aisles and tell me what I should be buying. What we found made us sometimes
gasp in amazement. By the end of our foray, I knew I’d be plain stupid if I
never went to Lidl again.
No frills doesn’t begin to describe the Lidl shopping experience. Put a pound
in the trolley to unchain it. Down the aisles flanked by pile upon pile of
unfamiliarly branded goods. No deli. No fresh bread. No piped music or
announcements. No staff to speak of.
“It’s like a cash and carry,” says Amanda. It took me back to my first visit
to a supermarket on the Continent in my teens – all that subtly different
packaging with garish paintings and curly lettering.
Once you start looking at the labels closely, it gets more confusing. Most of
the products in the store are manufactured for Lidl, but they create their
own brands for everything (this takes a while to work out) and these brands
have unfamiliar names: from the continental-like Linessa cheese and Solevita
orange juice, to the mundane Sunny Glade Baked Beans and Parkside Digestive
Biscuits. It’s difficult to overcome the prejudice that unknown brands mean
rubbish products. It’s hard to find the English version of the ingredients
lists, and even harder to find a country of origin.
And then we realise that things aren’t as bad as they seem. There’s real
Italian extra-virgin olive oil at £2.49 for 500ml (Thomasina assures me that
“obtained by mechanical means” on the label should not put me off buying –
“There’s not much difference between that and cold-pressing,” she says.)
Organic carrots, British pak choi, Italian fennel and rocket of
indeterminate origin. “They’re really fresh and look as if they have come
straight from the greengrocer,” says Thomasina.
Melons are £1.25 each – most are not ripe but I’m told that putting it in the
airing cupboard for a day or two will do the trick. They have free-range
organic eggs. I get excited about finding a packet of wholemeal pitta.
Amanda, on the hunt for healthy gems, points to the tortilla wraps (69p for
six) – “They have a low GI and are filling,” she says. And we get excited
about some of the less obviously healthy stuff, too. There’s chocolate from
Equador that is 74 per cent cocoa (lots of flavanols, not much fat, good for
the heart) at just 89p a slab, and a 40 per cent version at the same price.
“I’d come here and stock up on that,” says Amanda. I try it later in a
chocolate sauce and can vouch for its quality.
Then there’s the bottled water, which is clearly labelled “natural mineral
water” which, Amanda tells me, is a protected term and means that it must
come from a source of consistent quality. It’s 25p for 2l (at Tesco, a 2l
bottle of Evi-an is 75p).
But it’s not all good news. The range of products on offer is limited: we
could find no brown rice or brown pasta, and having planned a stir-fry, we
found there was only one soya sauce on offer, and not a very good one at
that (not naturally brewed). Other cavils: it’s hard to tell the country of
origin on the majority of vegetables, including some fabulous radishes with
the tops still on. Some of the biscuits and cakes contain unhealthy trans
fats, if you look at the labels closely. And the meat and fish isn’t worth
bothering with if you’re a farmers’-market type – badly labelled, none of it
organic or free-range, and most of it in horrible vacuum packaging.
But, after an hour in the shop, we have got the hang of it, and are glowing
with pride when we are packing our goodies in our 3p carrier bags. I fill
three bags with a quantity of food that would have cost me about £35 in
Waitrose. My Lidl bill is £21.
This isn’t a place that many of us would go for our weekly stock-up, but the
Lidl press officer assures us that people do. There are weekly specials –
goods shipped in for a short time only, at ridiculously low prices. As I
write this, you can buy a 12-piece steak cutlery set for £3.99.
How does Lidl achieve its low prices? The company is cautious about explaining
this, not wanting to reveal too much about its buying policies to rivals.
But nearly all of its less perishable products are the same in every
European store – bought in from specialised producers around Europe, and
made into Lidl brands. That means massive economies of scale.
The company says that it tries to buy in products from the countries that
specialise in their production – its excellent prosciutto ham, for example,
is made by certified Italian Parma ham producers. Lidl also says most of its
fruit, vegetables and meat are from each store’s home country,but this
wasn’t particularly obvious on our visit.
Lidl claims that most of its savings are achieved by simplicity: having the
minimum staff, having each staff member trained in various roles, cutting
down on all the other costly extras that supermarkets have that make people
feel “special”. It’s German efficiency.
In a world where shoppers feel increasingly commercially mugged, I like that.
What I like less is stories I’ve heard about how Lidl treats some of its
workers. Last year, a German trade union published a dossier detailing
complaints from some of its 170,000 staff about working conditions and
employment terms of workers for the store. Lidl disputes the reports. The
company says that there will always be disgruntled employees in any large
organisation and that its labour policies are good.
I’m also aware that shopping for food isn’t just about value for money. Many
people go shopping at the places that make them feel good, or make a
statement about what they believe – and I suspect that’s why many of us shop
at Waitrose or farmers’ markets, even though equivalent products are
available much cheaper elsewhere.
But my wife may have to put up with me making the occasional trip across the
precinct to those chained-up trolleys from now on. When I served up the
family feast that Thomasina had planned (see left), there wasn’t a single
complaint about quality. In fact, my children aged 7 and 4, loved it. I
think they’re all sufficiently intrigued to come along to Lidl at least
once. If nothing else, it might just prove a bit of fun. Where else in the
UK would you find a pallet full of “Jet Gum with Guarana and caffeine”?
Thomasina Miers’s two-course Lidl feast
Stir-fried vegetables with egg-fried rice
Get all hands on deck to prepare the veg
2 tbsp olive oil
4 organic carrots, peeled and shaved into strips with a potato peeler
2 peppers (1 red, 1 yellow), thinly sliced
2 pak choi
1 small packet radishes
1 small packet sugar snaps
2 onions, sliced finely
6 spring onions
200g basmati rice
1 litre chicken stock
3 organic eggs
Soya sauce (to taste)
Preparation time 15 minutes, cooking time 20 minutes
Melt the oil in a pan and sweat half the onion for five mins before adding the
rice. Stir-fry for a few minutes before covering with 600ml of stock. Cook
until the rice starts to go tender but still retains a bite to it. Cover and
leave for ten minutes to cool.
Wash and prepare all the veg. Core the pak choi, arrange the leaves on top of
each other and cut into thin shreds. Top and tail the spring onions and
shred. Top and tail radishes and slice thinly.
Whisk the eggs up with a splash of soya sauce. Melt a little oil in a pan and
add the remaining onion. Cook for five minutes before adding the rice. Heat
the rice through and then add the egg, stirring all the time. Add a dash of
soya sauce to flavour.
Meanwhile heat the wok until extremely hot before adding a tablespoon of
groundnut oil. Add the peppers and cook for a few minutes then add the sugar
snaps and radishes. After a few minutes add the pak choi, spring onions and
carrots. Stir-fry for a few minutes more and serve with the rice.
Tuck in . . . for a low-calorie meal
This is bursting with supernutrients and just 388 calories per serving.
Steer clear . . . if you’ve high blood pressure
The combination of both stock and soya sauce can push the salt content of this
meal up giving almost 4g of salt per serving. Daily maximum for adults is 6g
Caramelised bananas with chocolate sauce and ice-cream
These caramelised bananas are seriously good. You’ll always wish you’d made
more.
4 bananas
100g chocolate (milk or dark)
A splash of milk or cream
80g butter
60g demerara sugar (we found Fairtrade)
Good-quality vanilla ice-cream ½ lemon (see above)
Preparation time 5 minutes, cooking time 10 minutes
To make the chocolate sauce, melt the chocolate in a bowl suspended over a pan
of gently simmering water or melt in the microwave in short bursts stirring
in between. Stir in 25g of butter and a splash of milk. Keep warm over the
water while you cook the bananas. Slice the bananas into long, diagonal
slices about 0.75cm thick and dip them into the sugar. Melt half the rest of
the butter in a very hot frying pan until foaming and add half the banana
slices. Cook for 1 minute a side, sprinkling the slices with the leftover
sugar. They should turn a lovely golden colour. Squeeze with lemon juice to
lighten the flavour. Repeat with the second batch of bananas. Serve with
ice-cream and chocolate sauce.
Tuck in . . . to give your kids more fruit
Bananas are rich in potassium, which helps lower blood pressure. They contain
two important antioxidant supernutrients.
Steer clear . . . if you want to stay thin
This is a rich pudding – but you can be clever and just have a small serving.
How to shop at Lidl . . .
THOMASINA’S TOP TIPS
Look where the fruit and vegetables have come from. If they have English
carrots or asparagus, make the most of it
Bulk buy home essentials. Lidl is magic for kitchen staples such as washing-up
liquid, clingfilm, kitchen paper not to mention pasta, rice and beans.
Read the label – Lidl is international so it can be hard to find the English
version but it is usually there – try to avoid foods that are full of
additives and preservatives. Buy for the freezer. Foods such as frozen
pitta bread and croissants or peas and broad beans will be great for a rainy
day.
AMANDA’S ADVICE
Head straight for its bottled water section. It is incredibly good value at
12.5p a litre. Keep it chilled in the fridge at home and serve with ice and
a slice of lemon and there will be no excuse for the kids drinking fizzy,
sugar-laden drinks this summer.
Lidl has a new range of Fairtrade foods including some good-quality,
70-per-cent cocoa chocolate. Opt for this instead of the usual bumper,
family-sized bars of milk chocolate.
Seek out the pure orange juice. It is good value and full of immune-boosting
vitamin C. Don’t buy “orange juice drinks” these are full of sugar and
additives.
Lidl has some very good-value fruit and vegetables to make it easy for
families to reach their “five a day” target and eat more vitamins, minerals
and supernutrients.
While the choice of fresh fish is limited, there are plenty of canned options.
It is worth remembering that sardines and pilchards canned with their bones
are particularly rich in the vital bone-building mineral calcium and these
fish are great mixed with balsamic vinegar and black pepper and served on
toast as a quick light meal or snack.
Thomasina Miers is a cook and author, Amanda Ursell is a nutritionist: they
both write a column each week for Body&Soul
Many of us have known for years that there are indeed some very good bargains to be found at Lidl, Aldi and similar, just as you indeed point out that equally well some of their products are sadly best steered well clear of. It's just a case of being careful what you pick: purchase the good stuff at Lidl, and use the other supermarkets as 'top-up' for the rest.
However, upon stumbling around the web, it would seem that Lidl's olive oil isn't actually quite as virginal as it claims to be:
http://www.masdesbories.com/html/fraud_alert.html
David, Edinburgh, Scotland
"Head straight for its bottled water section. It is incredibly good value ... Keep it chilled in the fridge at home .."
How about an even more radical suggestion: use your own kitchen tap! The cold tap!!
hellesbelles, Oxford,
No wonder Times journalists are always moaning about how poor they are if their attitudes are those that come across in this article. There's nothing amazing about doing your week's shop at Lidl and not buying from farmers' markets is not actually a crime. At Waitrose you pay for the snob value of being seen there as much as for the goods. The only drawback about this sort of article is that my local Lidl may become even more crowded with people like Simon Crompton slumming it for a laugh.
Jean Jones, Edinburgh,