I Did a Blind Taste Test of 8 Aldi Products Versus Name Brands — Here’s How It Went

When I got the chance to visit Aldi’s U.S. headquarters in Illinois, I felt like I had scored a Golden Ticket. Not only can Aldi’s prices never be beat, but they also boast an incredible number of private label products that shoppers can’t find anywhere else. People love the grocery store so much it even has a Facebook group of more than 1.3 MILLION dedicated fans. (Hello, Aldi Nerds!)

Thanks to this invitation, finally I’d learn all the secrets this mystical store was harboring! The visit was packed full with a tour of one of the newly made-over stores, an amazing lunch, a wine tasting, a peek at the test kitchen, and… drumroll please… a blind taste test of Aldi items versus their name-brand counterparts. (That last part was what I was most excited about, to be honest.)

As a frequent Aldi shopper, however, I walked into this taste test with a ton of confidence. I thought I’d nail every single category, distinguishing Aldi’s products from the competition, but that was more confidence than I should have had, apparently. Here’s how I did.

The test was between Dr. Praeger’s Kale Burger (listed at $4.42) or Aldi’s Earth Grown Kale Veggie Burger (for $3.59). I could not tell the difference between the two. Like, at all. So why not go with the ones that are nearly a dollar cheaper?

I drink a lot of LaCroix, but usually it’s the regular stuff (grapefruit, please), so I wasn’t sure how I’d do trying the Curate kind. Once again, I couldn’t tell the difference between LaCroix Muré Pepino and Aldi’s Belle Vie Bold Cucumber Blackberry. The name-brand stuff was marked as $4.25, while Aldi’s version sells for $2.99.

Once again, I couldn’t differentiate between Aldi’s Simply Nature Juice ($2.99) and SmartJuice ($5.30). This was proving to be nearly impossible.

At last! I could taste a difference! One hummus had a distinctively better texture. We were told that one brand was Cedar’s Organic Original Hummus ($3.99) and the other was Aldi’s SimplyNature Organic Hummus ($2.29). I liked one so much better, so I figured it was the Cedar’s brand. But I was wrong! The Aldi version was definitely the better one.

Someone in the group said she was super sure that sample A was Aldi’s Elevation Peanut Butter High Protein Bar ($5.99). The rest of us jumped on board with her. We were all wrong. It was actually Cliff Builders chocolate Peanut Butter Protein Bar ($7.50). I was happy to hear it, because I actually liked B the best — and that was Aldi’s.

I wasn’t sure which cinnamon raisin sample was Aldi’s liveGfree Gluten Free Bagels ($3.99) or Udi’s Gluten Free Bagels ($5.24). But then an exec started talking about how they hold regular tastings to check in on the quality of the products they buy time and time again. They want to make sure a cinnamon raisin bagel has enough raisins and the trail mix has enough macadamia nuts. With that info, I correctly guessed that the bagel with more raisins was the Aldi brand.

My test of Maple Grove Farms Organic Pure Maple Syrup ($5.98) versus SimplyNature Organic Pure Maple Syrup ($4.99) proved inconclusive. When execs made me pick, I guessed the name brand was the Aldi product. I was wrong!

These samples looked very different, melted differently (sample A melted more slowly than sample B), and tasted very different. Knowing one was Halo Top ($4.18) and one was Aldi’s Sundae Shoppe Low fat Ice Cream ($2.99), I guessed that the better-tasting one (the one on the left) was Halo Top. It was not! Aldi for the win … again.

I was stumped a few times and wrong the rest of the times, inspiring me to shop at Aldi even more than I already do. While a few cents here and there don’t make a huge difference, the savings on these eight products add up to $10.14. On just eight items!

Note: All name-brand pricing comes from Aldi and might not reflect prices in your area or online.

How do you think you would have done in this taste test?