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Daily Mail
6 days ago
- Business
- Daily Mail
You're eating fake white chocolate! Popular brands sneakily swap sweet treat for oil-based alternatives
White chocolate is gradually fading from UK supermarket shelves, a new report has claimed. Manufacturers are ditching white chocolate in favour of an alternative product made from palm and shea oils. However, a subtle shift in packaging - for instance, changing 'white chocolate' to 'white' - means consumers might have a harder time distinguishing a genuine product from one with a similar flavour profile. White chocolate, traditionally made from cocoa butter, sugar and milk solids, must contain a minimum of 20 per cent cocoa butter to be labelled as white chocolate under UK law, according to The Grocer. However, manufacturers are failing to meet the requirement, and are instead trading cocoa butter for vegetable oils, necessitating a rebrand and packaging changes, the outlet found. For instance, when McVitie's swapped cocoa butter for oils in its white Digestives, the brand altered the packaging to read 'white' and not 'white chocolate'. Despite a recipe change, the price of the white biscuits remained steady at major UK supermarkets, including Sainsbury's, Morrisons, Asda, and Tesco. Nestle followed suit with its white chocolate KitKat Chunky. A spokesperson told The Grocer that the change in description from 'white chocolate' to 'white' was 'accurate and compliant' with the bar's ingredients of vegetable fats. The shift might be a result of rising cocoa prices, which reached new heights last year when dry weather struck West Africa, home to most the world's cocoa farms, and led to a below-par crop. White chocolate products might be undergoing the shift before milk and dark chocolates because it's typically made from cocoa butter, which is easier to replicate. However, the change has impacted some milk and dark chocolate offerings, such as McVitie's Hobnobs Oaty Cookies. The Milk Chocolate Flavour Chips and Dark Chocolate Flavour Chips products do not contain enough cocoa mass to be classified as chocolate. It comes after r eports claimed that the price of multiple popular chocolate bars could soon soar in the UK. KitKats, Yorkie bars, and Aeros are among the sweet treats made by Nestle that might cost consumers more in the near future. According to Nestle, the change is down to increasing commodity costs, making the production process more costly. The conglomerate revealed that while it has already raised its prices this year, further increases could be on the way. In the first quarter of 2025, price hikes in the cost of coffee beans and cocoa saw Nestle raise prices by 2.1 per cent overall. The price hikes were higher in some markets, according to the Swiss company, with the increases in the double digits. Because of these growing prices, its sales growth by volume was affected, Nestle said. Prices of chocolate has risen in general over recent years, with consumers facing an almost 50 per cent increase. The changes have led some chocolate manufacturers to explore other avenues, including lab-grown chocolate. Mondelez International, which makes Oreo, Chips Ahoy cookies and Cadbury chocolate bars, poured funding into start-up Celleste Bio earlier this year, according to The Financial Times. The company uses cell culture technology to grow 100 percent natural cocoa from just one or two beans. Its aim is to 'eliminate the industry's costly reliance on fragile rainforests,' the company said on its website. The cost of cocoa has continued to grow to dizzying heights, in a rally which started over a year ago. At its peak in April 2024, prices for the ingredient surpassed $12,000 per tonne, which was an almost threefold increase from January, the FT reported. Cocoa prices have soared due to poor climate and bean disease in West Africa - which is home to 70 percent of global cocoa production, which has, in turn, tightened supply. 'If we don't change how we source cocoa, we won't have chocolate in two decades,' Michal Beressi Golomb, chief executive of Celleste Bio, told the outlet. With cell-cultured cocoa, the industry 'won't need to be dependent on nature,' she added. According to Golomb, record prices and global shortages are driving a surge of interest in cocoa alternatives. 'They're really worried about having a sustainable, consistent supply of quality cocoa,' she said. 'Everybody wants to be part of the party.' The company, established in 2022, is one of several firms exploring how the industry can become less reliant on traditional cocoa production. British food ingredients company Tate & Lyle has also partnered with BioHarvest Sciences to develop sweeteners from synthetic plant-derived molecules, the outlet reported. Other companies are looking at how to create sweet treats with other, natural ingredients. Last year, confectioner Fazer, which is based in Finland, rolled out a limited edition cocoa-free 'chocolate' made from local malted rye and coconut oil. 'Nearly four years ago, research told us climate change would impact the availability and price of cocoa,' Annika Porr from Fazer Confectionery's Forward Lab, told the FT, adding, 'This year it has become a reality.' While cocoa prices may be soaring, lab-grown alternatives still face price pressures - and the challenge of making products appeal to consumers. Celleste Bio aims to reach cost parity with pre-2024 cocoa prices once they are in the market in 2027. Porr added: 'Consumers really expect it to taste and feel similar to traditional cocoa. There is still work to be done.' It comes as some confectioners responded to cocoa price rises earlier this year by pitching more non-chocolate treats. Hershey's shipped more non-cocoa treats to retailers last Easter in addition to its traditional Reese's chocolate bunnies and eggs. The brand introduced a new six-pack of cookies 'n' cream bunnies, offered full-sized Kit Kat lemon crisp bars and mixed Haribo gummy bears with chocolate bars in its assortment bags. But despite moves to pull back from a heavy reliance on cocoa, large scale confection-makers said they would not be willing to sacrifice taste in order to save money. 'Tinkering now with the recipes and flavor profiles simply because the input cost for cocoa has gone up, in my opinion, would be a mistake,' Nestlé Chief Executive Officer Mark Schneider said on call with journalists in February.
Local France
22-07-2025
- Health
- Local France
Why has the UK banned imports of French and Italian cheeses?
Bad news for UK residents who like iconic French cheeses such as artisan-produced brie, roquefort and reblochon or Italian classics such as pecorino ... these will no longer be available after the UK banned their imports from France or Italy. However if you are in those countries - or any other EU country - you can enjoy them to your heart's content. So what's going on? The UK's agriculture ministry Defra says that all imports of cheeses made in France or Italy with unpasturised milk are now banned. This affects any cheese made with raw milk or unpasturised milk - including some of France's most famous cheeses such as Vacherin, Roquefort, Mimolette and Tomme. Brie made by small artisan producers is likely to be unpasturised, although factory-produced brie can be made with pasturised milk. Advertisement It affects fewer Italian cheeses as the big names such as Parmesan are made with pasturised milk, but artisan-produced mozzarella is often made with raw milk, as is pecorino. You can find a full list of the affected cheeses here . Any cheeses produced before May 23rd are exempt, if the importer can produce the necessary paperwork - meaning that shortages will become apparent gradually, as some aged cheeses will continue to be imported over the next few months. The rules mostly affect commercial imports, but theoretically also apply to holidaymakers wanting to bring back a wheel of lovely, stinky European cheese. All of the above cheeses remain on sale throughout the EU. So why the UK ban? It's due to an outbreak of a cattle disease with the imaginative name of Lumpy Skin Disease (LSD) which, you will be surprised to hear, causes lumps on the skin of affected cattle. In France the disease is known as dermatose nodulaire contagieuse (DNC). It is spread by the bites of flies and mosquitoes. Italy confirmed its first case in Sardinia on June 21st, 2025, leading the UK to revoke Italy's LSD-free status and suspend unpasturised imports. France reported its first LSD case near Chambéry on June 29th. Quarantine zones are in place in the affected areas with a vaccination programme for the cattle, but cheese sales have not been suspended. The UK's import ban also affects the import of live cattle. Can Lumpy Skin Disease be spread by eating cheese? No, there is no risk to humans from eating cheese that has been produced by a cow suffering from LSD, and in fact humans cannot get LSD under any circumstances. The UK government says that it is acting to prevent the spread of the virus among British cattle - hence the ban on live cattle imports. It says that the virus can survive in raw milk, including cheese made with raw milk. So if a British cow ate a brie sandwich then it could get Lumpy Skin Disease. That sounds like a small risk? Frustrated cheese sellers in the UK say that the ban is disproportionate. Cheese-mongers told The Grocer magazine that the ban is "costly, illogical and deeply frustrating", saying there is no risk to people from these cheeses. Advertisement Shane Holland, a cheese retailer based in London, told UK newspaper The Independent : "The bigger question is, what is the ban for? "We completely understand restricting the movement of live cattle. LSD is an infectious disease from cattle to cattle. But if we're talking about from cattle to milk, there's no cattle-to-human transmission at all. Even if there was the tiniest risk, it's not being consumed by cattle anyway." A Defra spokesperson stood by the ban, saying: 'This government will do whatever it takes to protect British farmers and their herds from disease,' adding that most Italian cheeses, such as Parmesan, Mozzarella and Gorgonzola, should be unaffected as they are largely pasteurised. However the UK is not the only country to impose a ban - Canada has also banned imports of unpasturised cheese from France, Italy and Switzerland. Advertisement Is this why Eurostar is telling me I can't take a ham sandwich on my journey from Paris to London? No, that's a different issue, it's because of an outbreak of foot and mouth disease in continental Europe. Germany detected an outbreak in January but has since been declared FMD-free, however subsequent outbreaks in Hungary and Slovakia have persisted. In response, the UK recently announced that it has banned imports of meat or dairy products from European countries where the virus has been detected, as well as Austria due to the outbreak in neighbouring Hungary. However travellers are being advised that meat and dairy products from all EU countries are banned, which is why you may have received an email from Eurostar or ferry companies if you have recently travelled from France to the UK. Foot and mouth disease does not affect humans but is highly contagious among cattle. A major outbreak in the UK in 2001 led to the culling of more than six million animals and cost the economy billions, devastating the livestock industry and tourism.
South Wales Guardian
11-07-2025
- Business
- South Wales Guardian
Lidl trialling new 'VAR-style' self-service checkouts in UK
The new self-service checkout systems feature "non-scan technology", which detects when a shopper fails to scan an item. Playback clips, recorded by cameras at the till, will then be shown to shoppers on a screen if they scan items incorrectly. If the error is not rectified, an assistant will need to step in before customers can pay, according to The Grocer. The new checkout system is said to be Lidl's "latest bid to tackle theft". Lidl's customer privacy notice, according to The Grocer, says: "Some of our cameras may also use non-scan detection technologies as part of the checkout process. "Any cameras using non-scan detection technologies are only active at our store checkouts and self-checkouts.' It adds: "Any non-scan technologies used on our checkouts and self-checkouts cameras are only used to identify non-scanned items, prevent inventory loss and will always involve human intervention. "All facial images collected as part of our non-scan detection cameras are pixelated and no facial recognition technologies are used.' Currently, the new checkout systems are being trialled at two stores in London, and Lidl said "it has no current plans to roll out the non-scan detection technology more widely". .@LidlGB trialling 'non-scan detection' tech at self-checkouts Lidl has been contacted for further comment. Lidl is not the only major supermarket in the UK using what shoppers have labelled the "VAR-style" checkouts. Tesco rolled out the new technology back in May, just a few weeks after Sainsbury's. Home Bargains also uses similar technology to tackle so-called "skip-scanning", The Grocer reported. The new self-service checkout systems have not gone down well with shoppers, with some taking to social media to share their thoughts. One Tesco customer, posting on X (formerly Twitter), commented: "Shouldn't have to do these sort of things today in society." While another added: "Just bring back staffed tills - simple option." just bring back staffed tills - simple option. While this Sainsbury's customer said: "What a 's**t' way to treat customers. I won't use a self checkout again!" Another posted: "This is the most ridiculous thing they have ever done they never learn people don't want to use self checkouts and it discriminates against the elderly and vulnerable when we they learn." The new self-service checkouts are not the only change coming to Lidl, with the supermarket giant also launching a new self-scanning feature integrated into the Lidl Plus app. From September, the new feature will be tested across four UK stores, ahead of a phased rollout next year. This will enable customers to scan products as they shop, track their spending and savings in real-time, and complete their purchases quickly at a self-checkout terminal—all through the existing Lidl Plus app. Chief Executive Officer at Lidl GB, Ryan McDonnell, said: 'This marks a significant leap forward in our digital evolution. "Integrated into Lidl Plus, it's designed to offer customers a smarter, faster, and more flexible way to shop. RECOMMENDED READING: How to claim free items at Lidl with little-known trick discovered by shoppers Aldi confirms 'addictive' discontinued crisps labelled 'best ever' will return Tesco scraps '5-star' Clubcard offer leaving customers 'disappointed' Sainsbury's discontinues coffee described by shoppers as 'the best' "We're investing heavily in technologies that simplify everyday life, while always offering our customers different options to suit their shopping preferences. "Whether customers prefer the traditional checkout, self-service or self scanning, at Lidl, they are always in control of how they shop.' This latest innovation follows the successful pilot of Lidl GB's Click, Reserve & Collect service through Lidl Plus earlier this year, along with the rollout of self-checkouts across its stores.
South Wales Argus
10-07-2025
- Business
- South Wales Argus
Lidl trialling new 'VAR-style' self-service checkouts in UK
The new self-service checkout systems feature "non-scan technology", which detects when a shopper fails to scan an item. Playback clips, recorded by cameras at the till, will then be shown to shoppers on a screen if they scan items incorrectly. If the error is not rectified, an assistant will need to step in before customers can pay, according to The Grocer. The new checkout system is said to be Lidl's "latest bid to tackle theft". Five ways to save money on your weekly food shop Lidl's customer privacy notice, according to The Grocer, says: "Some of our cameras may also use non-scan detection technologies as part of the checkout process. "Any cameras using non-scan detection technologies are only active at our store checkouts and self-checkouts.' It adds: "Any non-scan technologies used on our checkouts and self-checkouts cameras are only used to identify non-scanned items, prevent inventory loss and will always involve human intervention. "All facial images collected as part of our non-scan detection cameras are pixelated and no facial recognition technologies are used.' Currently, the new checkout systems are being trialled at two stores in London, and Lidl said "it has no current plans to roll out the non-scan detection technology more widely". Lidl has been contacted for further comment. Tesco and Sainsbury's among other supermarkets using "VAR-style" checkouts Lidl is not the only major supermarket in the UK using what shoppers have labelled the "VAR-style" checkouts. Tesco rolled out the new technology back in May, just a few weeks after Sainsbury's. Home Bargains also uses similar technology to tackle so-called "skip-scanning", The Grocer reported. UK supermarket rankings 2025 The new self-service checkout systems have not gone down well with shoppers, with some taking to social media to share their thoughts. One Tesco customer, posting on X (formerly Twitter), commented: "Shouldn't have to do these sort of things today in society." While another added: "Just bring back staffed tills - simple option." just bring back staffed tills - simple option. — HHUK (@Hosieryhangeruk) May 25, 2025 While this Sainsbury's customer said: "What a 's**t' way to treat customers. I won't use a self checkout again!" Another posted: "This is the most ridiculous thing they have ever done they never learn people don't want to use self checkouts and it discriminates against the elderly and vulnerable when we they learn." More changes coming to Lidl The new self-service checkouts are not the only change coming to Lidl, with the supermarket giant also launching a new self-scanning feature integrated into the Lidl Plus app. From September, the new feature will be tested across four UK stores, ahead of a phased rollout next year. This will enable customers to scan products as they shop, track their spending and savings in real-time, and complete their purchases quickly at a self-checkout terminal—all through the existing Lidl Plus app. Chief Executive Officer at Lidl GB, Ryan McDonnell, said: 'This marks a significant leap forward in our digital evolution. "Integrated into Lidl Plus, it's designed to offer customers a smarter, faster, and more flexible way to shop. RECOMMENDED READING: "We're investing heavily in technologies that simplify everyday life, while always offering our customers different options to suit their shopping preferences. "Whether customers prefer the traditional checkout, self-service or self scanning, at Lidl, they are always in control of how they shop.' This latest innovation follows the successful pilot of Lidl GB's Click, Reserve & Collect service through Lidl Plus earlier this year, along with the rollout of self-checkouts across its stores.
Daily Mirror
08-07-2025
- Business
- Daily Mirror
Lidl makes major change at self-checkouts to help stop shoplifters
If a Lidl customer is caught not scanning an item, the cameras will play back the footage on a screen - then if they continue to not scan the product, a member of staff will be directed over Lidl is trialling cameras at self-checkouts to help deter shoplifters. The technology is designed to record when a shopper doesn't scan an item. If a Lidl customer is caught not scanning an item, the cameras will play back the footage on a screen - then if they continue to not scan the product, a member of staff will be directed over before the shopper can pay for their shopping. The cameras are being trialled in two London stores, according to The Grocer. Lidl has not revealed which stores are taking part in the trial, but told The Grocer it does not currently have plans to roll out the cameras more widely. Lidl's latest customer privacy notice says: 'Some of our cameras may also use non-scan detection technologies as part of the checkout process. Any cameras using non-scan detection technologies are only active at our store checkouts and self-checkouts.' It also says: 'Any non-scan technologies used on our checkouts and self-checkouts cameras are only used to identify non-scanned items, prevent inventory loss and will always involve human intervention. 'All facial images collected as part of our non-scan detection cameras are pixelated and no facial recognition technologies are used.' Home Bargains recently installed similar cameras that are also used to detect unscanned items at self-service tills. The cameras are being used in the Home Bargains Speke store, which is only one of four branches where self-checkout tills have been installed. Home Bargains has more than 600 stores in total. The bargain retailer is working with tech firm SAI (Storewide Active Intelligence) and Everseen as part of a trial. Home Bargains operations director Paul Rowland told The Grocer the retailer found technology more effective than security guards. The latest figures from industry body the British Retail Consortium (BRC) show retailers reported a staggering 20.4 million customer thefts in the 12 months to September last year. The amount spent on crime prevention is also at a record high, with retailers investing £1.8billion on measures such as CCTV, more security personnel, anti-theft devices and body worn cameras, up from £1.2billion the previous year. The BRC says this added cost for businesses, filters down to higher prices for customers. The Government introduced a new Crime and Policing Bill in February this year, which features a range of measures including removing the £200 low value limit for shoplifting, meaning the maximum sentence for shop theft will be seven years regardless of value. It also includes making it a standalone offence for assaulting a retail worker. Helen Dickinson, Chief Executive of the British Retail Consortium, previously said: 'Retail crime is spiralling out of control. People in retail have been spat on, racially abused, and threatened with machetes. "Every day this continues, criminals are getting bolder and more aggressive. We owe it to the three million hardworking people working in retail to bring the epidemic of crime to heel."
