The MSE Victoria sponge cake taste test – which supermarket takes the crown?
September is the most common month for birthdays, and that means... lots of birthday cake! It gave us a great excuse to blind-test supermarket own-brand Victoria sponges to determine which gives maximum indulgence for minimum cost. Whether you're buying for a birthday, a party, or just fancy a slice with your afternoon tea, let's see which jam-and-cream contender is truly Victorious.
We bought own-brand Victoria sponge cake from nine major supermarkets and roped in 48 taste testers at MSE Towers – unsurprisingly, finding volunteers wasn't difficult.
Supermarket | Price per box | Price per 100g¹ | Serving size (according to the box) |
|---|---|---|---|
Aldi | £2.99 | 82p | 6 |
Asda | £4 (sometimes £2 on offer) | £1.01 | 6 |
Co-op | £4.20 | £1.20 | 6 |
Lidl | £2.99 | 71p | 6 |
M&S | £4.26 | 87p | 6 |
Morrisons | £4 | £1.17 | 6 |
Tesco | £4 (sometimes £2 with Clubcard) | 99p | 6 |
Sainsbury's | £4 (sometimes £2 with Nectar) | £1.09 | 6 |
Waitrose | £6.50 (sometimes £5.20 on offer) | £1.11 | 12 |
¹ Not all weights were listed on the box or online. To make things fair, we weighed all cakes ourselves and are basing weight calculations on this.
Each tester rated the cakes blind in a randomised order to avoid bias and sugar fatigue.
Waitrose scored highest for flavour...
However, Lidl wins for value when considering both flavour AND price
See the full scores and rankings below.
The top performers: What testers said
1. Overall winner: Lidl (16/18 points)
Lidl takes the overall crown by landing in the top three for both flavour and price per 100g (just 71p). Testers praised the soft texture of the sponge and the well-balanced jam-to-cream ratio.
2. Flavour champion: Waitrose (12/18 points)
If you're able and willing to spend a bit more for pure taste, Waitrose is the clear winner. Testers raved about the quality of the jam and the sugar crust topping – even after nine slices, people came back for seconds!
While it's the only cake labelled for 12 servings rather than six, cutting it into 12 dainty slices requires precision. In practice, expect around 10 realistic slices – that's all we managed.
3. Best all-rounder: Sainsbury's (12/18 points)
Sainsbury's scored second-highest on taste, making it a great bet when it's on a £2 Nectar price offer.
While the packaging lacked a protective cardboard liner (making it look a bit cheap out of the box), the cake itself won over the testers. One person commented: "Good all-rounder – like Ian Botham!"
How we scored the cakes
-
Taste points: We took the testers' scores and then ranked each cake from 9 (highest scoring) to 1 (lowest scoring).
-
Price points: Ranked from 9 (cheapest per 100g) to 1 (most expensive per 100g).
Supermarket | Taste score out of 10 (from our testers) | Taste points awarded | Price per 100g | Price points awarded | Combined score (out of 18) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Aldi | 4.7 | 2 | 82p | 8 | 10 |
Asda | 5.7 | 6 | £1.01 | 5 | 11 |
Co-op | 5.6 | 5 | £1.20 | 1 | 6 |
Lidl | 5.8 | 7 | 71p | 9 | 16 |
M&S | 5.3 | 4 | 87p | 7 | 11 |
Morrisons | 5.2 | 3 | £1.17 | 2 | 5 |
Tesco | 4.4 | 1 | 99p | 6 | 7 |
Sainsbury's | 5.9 | 8 | £1.09 | 4 | 12 |
Waitrose | 6.9 | 9 | £1.11 | 3 | 12 |
The great jam debate: Raspberry vs strawberry
Only three of the cakes opted for raspberry jam – Co-op, Sainsbury's and Waitrose.
We polled our 48 testers on their preference:
-
Raspberry jam: 27 votes (56%)
-
Strawberry jam: 21 votes (44%)
With two of the top three cakes using raspberry, supermarkets take note... swapping to raspberry jam might be the secret to a higher score!
Hosting an Afternoon Tea? Take a look at our supermarket prosecco taste test to find your perfect pairing.
Please be Drinkaware.
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