Twelfth day of Christmas - champagne!

So, we've made it to 12! The 12 days of Lidl middle class Christmas, with many thanks to Sara Dorman.

Price: £11.99

Score (out of five): 3

Review: So, every year either Aldi or Lidl come out top on a pre-Christmas blind champagne tasting. I can't remember who voted Lidl top this year, but someone did, someone alerted me and a bottle was bought. Adoring blog fans, the things I do for you...

We were invited to a very middle class pre-Christmas dinner by the rector of our church, so I figured that'd be the perfect place to road-test it. Look at those glasses! I was impressed.

Not that impressed by the champagne, though. I like my champagne dry and crisp. If you like your champagne sweeter, then you'll really like this Lidl champagne. Alas it didn't float my boat, however I can imagine you could easily swig back loads of it at a party without really noticing.

Oh, and over dinner I got a top-tip on Lidl cava. It seems what to buy from Lidl is the middle class dinner party conversation this season.

Eleventh day of Christmas - Candy Canes

So far, Lidl have been doing a brilliant Christmas for us. And because Sara reviewed the mini-stollen, I've not got room in the 12 days of Lidl Christmas to do a review of the full-size stollen. But suffice to say, it's much better than Tesco's Finest stollen.

But, as we know to our cost, not everything is brilliant in Lidl, so our 11th day of Lidl Christmas, courtesy of guest-blogger Sara Dorman, is a bum note.

Price: 99p

Score (out of 5): 1 

Review: If you're just looking for canes to decorate your tree then by all means choose these, but if you are actually thinking of consuming them, stay well away.

These candy canes lack all but the tiniest hint of minty-ness.  Candy canes are meant to be sweet, but intensely flavoured. These are sweet and bland. It's not even that they have - heretically - been flavoured cherry or strawberry. There is a hint of mint, but only a hint.


And look out tomorrow for the twelth day of Lidl Christmas!

Tenth day of Christmas - Favorina Marzipan Log

On the tenth day of Christmas my true love gave to me, ten lords a leaping. Well, if my partner were a lord he'd be leaping with joy that the Favorina Marzipan Logs have turned up in our local Lidl.

Price: 99p

Score (out of five): 4

Review: my partner likes Lidl Christmas because it's when they start selling their Favorina Marzipan Log. 

Now, I've tried to get him to write a post, but he's having none of it. I'm not a fan of marzipan, so I'm not best-placed to review this product. I have tried a little bit of one in the past, and it's not as sweet as most marzipan, so if I had to eat it I'd like it.

I've managed to get the above score out of my partner. Questioning him some more (no one expects the Lidl inquisition) I managed to get "they're ok", "nice marzipan, nice chocolate". Inspirational prose, I'm sure you'll all agree. Anyway, on the basis of his words, if you like marzipan, I can recommend the Favorina Marzipan Log. And if you don't like marzipan, and want to put a smile on the face of that marzipan-lover in your life, then this is the one for you.

Ninth day of Christmas - A Lidl Christmas Party

On the ninth day of Christmas my true love gave to me, nine ladies dancing. Well, no, he didn't. I had a bunch of choristers singing Nine Lessons and Carols. As I've talked about in my other blog, I attending evensong almost every Sunday at the Church of St John's, Princes Street, Edinburgh. On the last Sunday before Christmas they do a service of Nine Lessons and Carols, followed by mulled wine to go with the choir Secret Santa present opening. As top hanger-on of the choir, this year I agreed to do the mulled wine and nibbles, and I thought what better way to cater than a Lidl party.

Price: c £45

Score (out of 5): 3 1/2

Review: so, my shopping list consisted of:

• Favorina gingerbread assortment (lebkuchen)
• Favorina mini spekulatius
• Favorina cherry and marzipan chocolates
• Deluxe sea salt and crushed black peppercorn crisps
• Deluxe mature cheddar and red onion crisps
• Deluxe gravadlax salmon with dried tomatoes
• Multiseed bloomer bread
• Oatlands oranges
• Oatlands lemons
• Favorina mini spekulatius
• Favorina gingerbread assortment
• 8 mini Christmas crackers
• Bourdeaux Supérieur
• Crabbies Ginger Wine (doesn't really count as I can buy it anywhere)
• Snowy lodge sugared almonds

The wines, lemons and oranges went into mulled wine using the Guardian’s perfect mulled wine recipe and the food was served as was. It was just an experiment really to see if I could cater for a wee Christmas party from Lidl. First off, I should’ve heeded Sara Dorman’s advice on the seventh day of Christmas to make sure you get to Lidl as soon as the Christmas stuff starts appearing; because once it’s gone it’s gone. So, if you’re looking at my shopping list above and thinking “that’s a bit random”, well it is. That’s what was left on the shelves, pretty much. No mince pies; no more stollen; and I’m glad I had bought the lebkuchen a month ago to bulk it out.

But, what I had was very nice indeed. Particular highlights were the marzipan, cherry, chocolate bites. As I will describe in one of tomorrow’s two posts, I’m not a marzipan fan, but these were really very nice indeed. The gravadlax was very nice as well, with half-decent farmed salmon. The cheese and onion crisps were good too – I like odd flavour combinations, so I thought these went well with the lebkuchen. The sea salt and pepper crisps were a bit too peppery for my tastes. Overall though, I would strongly recommend Lidl for catering for your Christmas party.

And as a Christmas treat, you can enjoy this phone recording of the choir singing The Holly and the Ivy (or the last two verses anyway):

Eighth day of Christmas - Favorina Mini Panettone

Price: 99p

Score (out of five): 3

Review: I've come to think that panettone is a bit like limoncello and other odd liqueurs - its a gift you're given and thank the giver profusely and then think "what do I do with this?". Now, I know you're supposed to slice it and serve it with apricot jam, but if you're not Italian do you really have time, or the stomach space to eat one over Christmas?

For this reason in our house they sit around in their box until the summer when I get sick of the sight of it and put it in the food waste bin. One year I made a very nice bread and butter pudding with one, adding brandy to the custard, but my partner didn't like it so that's never been made again.

So, I was quite excited that Lidl sold mini pannetone. I went for the chocolate one. It was alright. Nice flavour, but not as light and fluffy, like a fine butter brioche, as the pricey ones from Edinburgh's finest deli Valvona & Crolla. They'll do for an elevenses snack over the festive season, but I wouldn't give them as a gift.

Seventh day of Christmas - Mini Marzipan Butter Stollen

Another guest post kindly created by Sara Dorman.

Price: £1.99

Score (out of 5): 4

Review: These bite-size stollen morsels are perfect with a cup of coffee half-way though the morning. 

Studded with sultanas, filled with marzipan, and lightly covered with icing sugar, everyone in our family loves them. We devoured them last Christmas and took a package to the Highlands over half-term to celebrate their return in October. 

They're okay straight out of the package, but reach truly great heights when heated for about 5 minutes in a warm oven. Normally I wouldn't put anything sugar-covered in the oven, but this works. Just make sure they don't get too hot, as marzipan burns can be painful. 

Distinctly more-ish, if a bit pricier than the rest of the range. 

Sixth day of Christmas - frozen goose

UPDATE - they're back in stock!

On the sixth day of Christmas my true love gave to me, six geese-a-laying. Alas, the subject of this post's laying days are long gone. This is another post that's based on past-experience, I'm afraid. And I don't even have a photo to go with this one. I was going to try and take a sneaky snap in the freezer aisle, but my local Lidl has already sold out.

Price: £17.99

Score (out of five): 3.5

Review: two years' ago we hosted Christmas with my mum and a friend at ours. I thought I'd go with a Lidl goose as they were selling slowly so I managed to get one, and I don't like turkey. Due to our small fridge, it was impossible to do what Lidl suggest and defrost it in the fridge, so it ended up being sat on the kitchen window sill overnight on a day when the temperature hit 16 degrees. It survived though.

We had goose for Christmas a couple of times when I was growing up - I particularly recall the year of walking into the kitchen to find a guilty-looking cat, a gnawed cold goose joint and little piles of cat sick around the place. It was a bit too rich for the wee thing. 

One thing to note about Goose, generally, is that like most waterfowl, it's all fat, wing and chest cavity. This very much applies to the Lidl goose. If you're feeding four it'll just about stretch. If you're feeding your extended family of twenty, then you'll be starving or eating a lot of sprouts. If you want that sort of goose then you are going to have to go to a butcher and get a much bigger, and more expensive one.

But for £17.99 it was fine. Just enough fat came off it for the roasties. The meat was moist and succulent and it went very well with an apricot stuffing from Sainsbury's.