Easy Christmas Entertaining with the help of Lidl
On November 8th last, I was delighted to attend Lidl’s Christmas event to view and taste their range of goodies for Christmas. It was a lovely evening as I partook of some delicious treasures. On display was food from the Lidl’s Christmas fayre that offered an unbelievably wide selection to see you through the season. Wine, champagne and cordials were also available for tasting.
Well, I was in heaven from the offset! We started at the Christmas Market display where the Matured Christmas Pudding was the big surprise of the evening. This is flavoured with cinnamon, coriander and fennel so it had a real curry kick that was so completely unexpected and different to the traditional pudding we all grew up with. The pudding is on my Christmas list this year for sure and at €5.99 you’d be hard pressed to bake it yourself for the same price by the time you gather ingredients and pay the electricity bill for the hours needed to cook a pudding. So, go and buy and add a jar of brandy butter while you’re at it! A steal at €1.99!
Next we moved onto the Little Nibbles which was an assortment of gourmet crisps, chocolates and nuts. I couldn’t stop tasting the caramelised onion and sweet balsamico crisps. I have to admit that I usually detest salt and vinegar crisps as they’re typically over-the-top on the vinegar stakes but this one wasn’t. Sweet balsamic vinegar is so different that these were definitely more-ish. As for the honey and salt macadamias, I wanted to bring the bowl with me as we continued our tasting but I guess that would have been a little bit rude let alone sheer greedy 😉
Onto Gourmet Delights! A selection of dips, paté, chanterelle mushrooms, cheeses, prawn cocktail, antipasti and Capelin Caviar. Perfect for a drinks party! I never tasted caviar before so this was interesting. The roe is TINY but the flavour is not overpowering like I expected it would be nor was it salty. If you’ve never tried it, give it a go as it’s only €1.99. Eat on crisp bread or plain crackers but it’s also ideal for adding to sushi and Asian dishes.
The Seasonal Banquet was a range of Deluxe frozen foods that will certainly make for easy entertaining. Scallops with garlic and parsley butter, lobster, beef wellington, quails, sea bass fillets, duck breast with garlic and butter. The quails were something that again were new to me and I liked them so much, I bought them for dinner during the week. Simply cut them in half and gently fry so they’re very quick to cook.
A very entertaining chef, Paul Flynn delighted us with a three course taster meal of crab claws with clementine, pomegranate and rosemary butter, roast duck with orange whiskey glaze served with sweet potato gratin and pears poached with mulled wine and gingerbread cream. Recipe cards are available in store if you wish to try yourself.
We were really impressed with Lidl’s Christmas food range and will be heading to our local store to stock up on goodies to share with friends and family this year and at such amazingly good value, we won’t need to break the bank either! Go check out the range at your local store and prepare for an easy Christmas.
Xx Paula
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Salt, Pepper and a Dollop of Cream 
Reblogged this on Annette J Dunlea Irish Author's Literary Blog.
Thanks for the reblog, Annette; I much appreciate it! Regards, Paula