I tried supermarkets’ own-brand Christmas cakes – the ‘stunning’ winner isn’t from Aldi

EVERYONE wants to save money this Christmas. But can you get a festive, show-stopping dessert for a bargain price?

We tested classic iced Christmas cakes from Tesco, Asda, Morrisons, Sainsbury’s, Aldi and Lidl to see which was the best value for money.

For each one, we gave it a score out of ten for taste and a score out of ten for value, based on the price per 100g and the cake’s fruit and sugar content.

Here’s how the Christmas cakes scored out of 20 overall…

Tesco Top Iced Fruit Cake, £6.75 for 907g

The Tesco cake was a decent product for the price. It held together well when sliced and had a sweet icing and marzipan topping.

It contained a decent amount of sultanas and cherries. but there wasn’t much festive spice flavour and overall the actual cake was a bit bland.

At 74p per 100g, this was roughly in the middle on price – and about the same on taste. 

Taste: 6/10

Value: 7/10

Total: 13/20

Asda Top Iced Fruit Cake, £7 for 907g

Getting this Asda cake from the box to the plate was a struggle – it was oily on the bottom and crumbled into pieces when it was sliced. 

There was an overpowering marzipan taste which made it very sweet. And its sugar content was the joint highest of all the cakes we tested, at a whopping 59% sugar. 

It cost more than the Tesco version, at 77p per 100g, but we felt it wasn’t as good.

Taste: 5/10

Value: 6/10

Total: 11/20

Morrisons Top Iced Christmas Cake, £7 for 800g 

At 88p per 100g, this Morrisons cake was the most expensive we tried, but it didn’t live up to expectations. 

The cake had a thick, gluey texture which made it claggy in the mouth and the marzipan taste was intensely strong.

There was plenty of spice, too – which may be too much for some Christmas guests. 

However, it looked good as it was nicely decorated with a holly and berries icing design and was presented on a silver board which made it easy to serve. 

Taste: 6/10

Value: 5/10

Total: 11/20

Sainsbury’s Top Iced Fruit Cake, £7 for 900g – WINNER

The Sainsbury’s cake was lighter in texture than most of the others but had a good mix of different fruits, including sultanas, raisins and cherries. 

The balance of crisp icing and soft marzipan was just right and complemented the fruity cake. 

Like the Morrisons cake, it was presented nicely on a silver board, but it cost significantly less at 78p per 100g – making it better value for money.

This was our top pick of the bunch.

Taste: 8/10

Value: 7/10

Total: 15/20

Aldi Holly Lane Top Iced Christmas Cake, £5.99 for 907g

This was the cheapest round cake we tried, costing just 66p per 100g – but unfortunately it tasted cheap too.

The cake was full of sultanas but there wasn’t much of any other type of fruit.

It held together well and had some Christmas spice taste, but there was an unpleasant aftertaste of burnt raisins.

And although the sweet topping tasted fine, the marzipan was grey in colour – which didn’t look good.

Taste: 5/10

Value: 8/10

Total: 13/20

Lidl Favorina Top Iced Christmas Bar, £2.49 for 400g 

This year, Lidl’s own-brand standard cake is only available in a bar form.

Almost a third of the cake bar was made up of sultanas and it had the lowest sugar content of all the cakes we tested.

It meant it was very dense with dark fruit, and far more bitter than the other cakes. 

For fans of very traditional, dark fruit cake, this could be a winner. But our testing team felt it had a burnt, acrid taste, which wasn’t offset by the sweet marzipan topping. 

At 62p per 100g, this was the cheapest option, but the plain iced bar was much less attractive to serve to guests than the decorated round cakes. 

Taste: 4/10

Value: 8/10

Total: 12/20

Overall findings