12 Products You Should Never Buy At Aldi, Based On Online Reviews

Aldi can be a fun place to shop with many unique products at lower prices. Because of this, Aldi has its share of fans. There are even sub Reddits and Facebook pages dedicated to shopping at the discount retailer. Among Aldi shoppers, you will find many fan favorite products at Aldi, such as its Street Corn Dip, cheesecake sampler, or Park Street Deli Hummus. However, nobody is perfect, including Aldi. We’ve scoured the internet for the products even Aldi fans tend to skip.

Although Aldi does carry some name-brand products, it’s known for its quirky and cheaper knock-off brands. Aldi store brands may include Specially Selected, Simply Nature, and LiveGFree. These brands can only be found on Aldi store shelves. However, the brands are not separate companies, but come from various suppliers. While some of these generic versions make excellent products that get rave reviews online, others miss the mark. According to online reviews, you are probably better off avoiding the following products.

Aldi doesn’t have a deli counter, which means you can’t get fresh sliced deli meat during your Aldi shopping trip. Deli counters add to a grocery store’s bottom line. Deli counters require equipment and employees, which increases costs. By removing the deli, Aldi saves money, which can then be passed on to customers by offering lower prices. Aldi still offers deli meat, but it’s the prepackaged kind.

Unfortunately, prepackaged deli meat is often not the same high quality as the freshly sliced variety. We found many shoppers complaining about the quality of Aldi’s packaged deli meats. Shoppers on Reddit described the lunch meat as slimy. One Redditor even commented, “It’s slimy and sticky at the same time. Has a flavor like you are eating something rotten.” If you’re at Aldi and you need lunch meat, but you’d rather not head to a second grocery store, there may be some brands that are better than others. One customer on Reddit suggested the packages in containers with a red lid made by Lunch Mate were of a higher quality than the deli meat that comes in the zippered pouches.

Another of Aldi’s products that misses the mark is its Tuscan Garden Deli-Sliced Banana Pepper Rings. Banana pepper rings are similar to pepperoncini. The best ones should be crunchy with a little zing and can be added to sandwiches, hamburgers, hot dogs, or thrown into salads. Unfortunately, Aldi’s banana pepper rings are soft without a satisfying crunch.

Reviewers state that the Aldi pepper rings are mushy and soft. It could be that Aldi has changed the recipe in recent years. One shopper noticed the jars of pepper rings have changed in color, looking pale and unappealing. If you’d like to try your hand at pickling your own banana peppers, it is fairly easy to make them at home. The ingredients are simple. You will only need the peppers, sugar, salt, vinegar, and water. Otherwise, you can always grab a jar of Vlasic Deli Style Mild Banana Pepper Rings from most grocery stores, which are much higher rated than Aldi’s version.

Aldi’s Specially Selected Wood-Fired Garlic Provola Flatbread sounds like it should be an amazing product. Provola is a soft, white or yellow cheese made with either a combination of buffalo milk and cow’s milk, or cow’s milk solo. It melts easily, offering a strong and flavorful taste. When you combine provola with garlic and add it on top of a flatbread, you should get a tasty meal. However, Aldi’s provola flatbread is not getting rave reviews.

Reviewers complain the dough is either too hard or too wet. We have also tried this one before and found it was challenging to get the right cooking balance. You either pull it out too soon for a soggy crust. Sadly, giving it extra cooking time causes the crust to get hard and difficult to cut and chew.

Shoppers who enjoyed the flatbread didn’t just cook it as specified but added some ingredients for improvement. One Redditor drizzled it with a balsamic glaze and said it was “rich and filling.” However, they thought the crust was “meh.” Finally, a reviewer on Facebook had the idea to dip the slices in marinara sauce. If you try this one, you may need to consider livening it up with an extra drizzle of oil or serving it with a dipping sauce.

Aldi’s Specially Selected Lobster Mac and Cheese sounds like it might be a decadent, yet convenient meal. This is a frozen entrée meal that comes in a plastic container covered in plastic film. You can either bake it in the oven (which takes longer) or microwave it. While some Aldi shoppers swear by the Aldi brand boxed mac and cheese, even over Kraft’s popular brand, the frozen version with lobster is definitely not a fan favorite.

When a Redditor asked the Aldi shopping community the question, “What is the most disgusting item you’ve bought from Aldi?” more than one person agreed that, for them, it was the Specially Selected Lobster Mac and Cheese. One person responded, “I knew it wasn’t going to be amazing but it’s… lobster, cheese and pasta. How bad can it be? Oh SO bad. Straight in the trash it went.” Many agreed with one person saying, “The smell of the lobster mac and cheese haunts me.” Don’t let it haunt you, too.

You would think chicken broth is a relatively simple product that would be hard to get wrong. You also might expect an organic chicken bone broth to have a rich flavor and be excellent for soup and other recipes. But you may want to steer clear of Aldi’s Simply Nature Organic Chicken Bone Broth. A Redditor asked r/Aldi, “Gave a carton a sip and it was so bitter and disgusting. I shook it up and tried it again and it was still really bad. Is that normal? Does it get better if I add stuff to it? Or should it start tasting good to begin with. I know people drink bone broth, is it ones that are better than this? Is it supposed to be good and I got a bad batch? Really disappointed.”

The responses agreed with the original poster that Aldi’s bone broth is not good. Others commented that the broth ruined recipes they had added it to. Although shoppers liked the high amount of protein in this broth, many felt it wasn’t worth the bitter taste. You can always try making your own bone broth, which involves simmering chicken meat and bones, spices, vegetables, and herbs on a stovetop. For added flavor, try roasting the chicken bones first.

Aldi’s Summit Cola and Diet Summit Cola are the retailer’s generic knock-offs of Coke and Diet Coke. Although you can get them for a cheaper price than the brand version, is it worth cutting costs for, or should true soda lovers stick to the original?

We found talk online that Aldi’s Diet Summit Cola was not only good, but even better than the original Diet Coke. Although some people enjoy Aldi’s Diet Cola, we found the vast majority of reviews for both Summit and Diet Summit Cola were negative. Although Summit does have its fans, the general online consensus appears to be that neither the diet nor the full sugar version compares to brand-name sodas, either in flavor or carbonation levels.

One of the perks of Aldi is the variety of pre-made foods that can easily be heated up when you don’t have the time to cook. Although Aldi shoppers have many pre-made items they love from Aldi, the Specially Selected Slow Cooked Broccoli and Cheddar Soup is not one of them. Aldi’s version is much cheaper than the Panera Bread brand of microwavable tubs of soup sold in grocery stores, but it just does not hold up to the Panera version, according to reviewers.

The consensus online is that the Aldi soup is nothing like Panera Bread, or even other store-brand broccoli cheddar soups. One person commented on Reddit, “I was hoping it was a Panera dupe, but sadly it was not. A swing and a miss.” Another person agreed, saying, ” I love broccoli cheddar soup! I was excited to try the Aldi one and it was gawdawful and went straight into the compost.”

You would expect bananas to be a safe bet regardless of where you buy them. However, that may not be the case, because something strange has been reported by shoppers who buy Aldi’s bananas. Multiple online reviewers reported their bananas from Aldi never ripen, but stay green for weeks. Some say their Aldi bananas stay hard and then suddenly turn mushy. People who tried eating the green bananas reported that they tasted bitter. One shopper said, “I bought bananas about 2 weeks ago there as well. One of the bananas ripened of the bunch. The others are still green and I’m just hoping for the best.”

Bananas are grown in tropical climates such as Southeast Asia, Central and South America, and Africa. Because they come from so far away, they are picked when they are unripe and still green. The bananas are then shipped in refrigerated containers to halt the ripening process. Once the bananas reach their destination, they are put in chambers filled with ethylene gas, which helps them ripen. We can only speculate that something somewhere along the line is going wrong with Aldi’s banana supplier, and Aldi bananas are never ripening.

Aldi has plenty of snack food that gets rave reviews online. However, you may want to pass on the Savortz Baked Cheese Crackers, Aldi’s knock-off of Cheez-It crackers. Reviewers complain the Aldi brand doesn’t compare to the name brand. One shopper on Reddit said the Aldi crackers, “straight up tastes like a saltine cracker. There’s barely any cheesy flavor.” Another commenter agreed, saying the Aldi generic version of crackers, “are all trash.”

Aldi may have changed their recipe at some point, because some shoppers remember enjoying the cheese crackers almost as much as Cheez-Its in the past. Another person shopper thinks the same thing may have happened to Aldi’s jalapeño flavor of the cheese crackers, with one Redditor saying, “I bought these a couple of months ago, and they were absolutely flavorless. You’re not alone.” The good news is, Aldi sells name-brand Cheez-Its on the same shelf as the Savortz brand. If you love Cheez-Its, you may be better off buying the original version (and even using them for s’mores).

To be fair, jarred Alfredo sauce can be difficult to get right for any company. If you’re craving a creamy, flavorful Alfredo, you’re almost always better off ordering it from a restaurant or making your own. While you may be able to find some decent store-bought jars of Alfredo sauce, the consensus online is to avoid Aldi’s Priano Creamy Alfredo.  Although homemade is always better, there are some fairly decent shelf-stable marinara sauces out there. Alfredo sauce is another matter. It often ends up gloopy, thick, and flavorless when it comes out of a jar.

While there are a few positive comments online regarding Aldi’s version, there are many more against the sauce. This shopper summed it up by saying, “I’m shocked people like this. I used it once and thought it was so bad I washed it off my noodles!” Another Redditor suggested making your own rather than buying jarred sauce, “Do yourself a favor and buy cream, butter, and Parm, and make it yourself. It’s pretty easy to make.”

Aluminum foil is one item that’s probably best left to name brands. However, the name brand for aluminum foil can get pretty costly, making it worth it to experiment with different generic or store brands to save a little money. Aldi makes a generic version of aluminum foil with the store brand, Boulder. Unfortunately, the Boulder brand does not get high ratings from shoppers.

When asked if the Boulder foil was worth it, this Redditor complained, “No. You waste the first 10 feet shredding and tearing attempting to get a cut. It is a waste of money.” They also said the foil “sticks to the food and tears really easily.” Another person addeds, “This is one of those rare products where the Aldi version is clearly inferior.” Another complaint from consumers is that the box always falls apart. However, Aldi does make a heavy-duty version of the Boulder brand, which gets better reviews.

Aldi offers a pre-made brownie from Baker’s Treat that looks very similar to the name-brand Little Debbie’s Cosmic Brownies. Unfortunately, Aldi’s version, called Confetti Brownies, do not hold up to Little Debbie’s, according to reviews. One shopper said, “These had a really gross flavor to them,” and “this made little Debbie taste like homemade.”

Other reviewers had even worse things to say, including, “I didn’t think a brownie could taste this bad. It has the texture of waxy chalk and just tasted wrong. I can’t even put it into words how awful they are.” Another person commented, “I was truly shocked at how awful they were. Inedible. Couldn’t even finish one.” If you’re craving brownies, but don’t want to make them from scratch, rather than pick up the pre-made version, you may want to grab a box of Aldi’s brownie mix. The Specially Selected Double Chocolate Brownie Mix gets much better online comments than Aldi’s pre-made Confetti Brownies.