The 12 mince pies of Christmas

Thursday, 21 November 2019 at 09:00

It wouldn’t be Christmas without mince pies. But with so many on offer these days, how do you choose which ones to go for? 

While there will be plenty of Islanders who will enjoy making their own, for many, convenience matters.

But to save you the time of trying to work out whose are the best, the Consumer Council has done the hard (and tasty) work for you, rating all the supermarket own-brand mince pies in the Island. 

Council Members blind-tested and scored each pie on appearance, on the amount of filling and, of course, on taste. We gave each one a score and added them up at the end.

You will see in the table that although Morrisons topped the table overall, Tesco’s cheaper range were actually the tastiest. That contrasts with Waitrose’s luxury brand which scored lowest on taste, but the highest in terms of appearance. 

We didn’t tell any of the supermarkets that we were doing this and gave all our uneaten mince pies to a very grateful Salvation Army the following day for others to enjoy. 

We will be doing some more surveys – which don’t all have to be about food – so if you have something that you would like the Consumer Council to independently test for you, get in touch with your suggestions. 

 

Ranking  

Mince pie name 

Price           

Appearance (/66) 

Taste (/66) 

Fruit content (/66) 

Overall score (/198) 

1st 

Morrisons Best deep filled 

£2.15 

54 

59 

56 

169 

2nd 

Tesco butter enriched 

£1.37 

37 

  

66 

47 

150 

3rd 

Tesco finest 

£2.40 

51 

54 

30 

135 

4th 

Iceland standard 

£1.05 

25 

60 

46 

131 

5th 

Co-op standard 

£1.05 

42 

48 

33 

123 

6th 

M&S food collection 

£3.00 

40 

36 

42 

118 

7th 

M&S all butter 

£2.20 

37 

42 

34 

113 

8th 

Iceland luxury 

£2.05 

34 

24 

46 

104 

9th 

Co-op irresistible all butter 

£2.09 

33 

18 

37 

88 

10th 

Waitrose butter enriched 

£2.00 

27 

30 

26 

83 

11th 

Waitrose all butter 

£2.63 

49 

6 

26 

81 

12th 

Waitrose essential shortcrust 

£1.05 

21 

12 

37 

70 

 

 

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