If you’re wanting sandwiches, Aldi has a good selection of lunch meats, chicken salad, sliced cheese, bread, condiments, and veggies to put together the perfect lunch or snack. My family often packs Aldi lunch meat in a cooler for camping trips or road trips. We like the Castle Wood Reserve Lunch Meat at Aldi, which is not an Aldi-exclusive brand.
Sometimes we also buy some Aldi-branded lunch meat that comes in reusable, resealable plastic containers. Lunch Mate Deli Selected Finely Sliced Lunch Meats come in multiple varieties. I was able to pick up rotisserie seasoned chicken breast, honey uncured ham, and oven roasted turkey breast from my local store during a recent shopping trip. I saw signage indicating that this product line also includes roast beef (which I’m not sure I’ve ever seen at my local Aldi stores) and smoked uncured ham, but those weren’t in stock at the time of my shopping trip.
Lunch Mate Deli Selected Finely Sliced Lunch Meat is a Regular Buy, which means you should be able to find it at Aldi all year. You’ll find these in the refrigerated aisle alongside other lunch meats, cheeses, and dips.
This lunch meat cost between $4.75 and $5.29 for a 16-ounce tub at my local store at the time of writing. Exactly what price I paid depended on what type of lunch meat I bought. The honey uncured ham was $4.75 (about 30 cents an ounce), the rotisserie seasoned chicken breast was $5.19 (about 32 cents an ounce), and the oven roasted turkey breast was $5.29 (about 33 cents an ounce).
For comparison, the Castle Wood Reserve Lunch Meat I typically buy at Aldi cost about 34 cents an ounce.
These Lunch Mate lunch meats actually look like knockoffs of Hillshire Farm lunch meat. Aldi can be pretty bold about copying name-brand product packaging, and that certainly looks to be the case here. I found some one-pound family-sized reusable plastic tubs of Hillshire Farm lunch meat going for about 47 cents per ounce at Walmart at the time of writing. That makes the Aldi knockoff lunch meat a much better deal.
The labels describe these as 1-pound family-sized packages, with each tub containing two 8-ounce pouches. It is quite a lot of lunch meat, and these last my family a while despite the fact that, according to the nutrition panels, each tub only contains 3.5-4.5 servings. We get a lot more servings than that out of one tub.
These are advertised as containing no artificial preservatives, with no nitrites or nitrates added “except those naturally occurring in natural flavoring celery juice powder and sea salt.”
The packaging recommends using these within 7 days of opening. (I sometimes throw these in the freezer if I know we won’t be able to finish them soon.)
Clockwise from top: ham, turkey, and chicken.
Our taste testers liked these lunch meats just fine. We don’t really have a favorite and, in fact, we often like to put a little of each on our sandwiches for a somewhat deluxe deli experience. Are there higher-end lunch meats out there that cost more? Sure. But these are good for the price.
Of course, these do contain some processed ingredients, and they all have their share of sodium, so they’re best to enjoy in moderation.
Keep reading for more information about each of the lunch meat varieties I was able to purchase at my local Aldi.
Lunch Mate Deli Selected Rotisserie Seasoned Chicken Breast Finely Sliced Lunch Meat:
Chicken nutrition information and ingredients. (Click to enlarge.)
This is advertised as 97% fat free. The label also states the poultry used in this was raised with no added hormones or steroids, but be aware that federal regulations prohibit the use of hormones and steroids in poultry anyway.
Ingredients are chicken breast with rib meat, chicken broth, and 2% or less carrageenan, garlic powder, modified corn starch, natural flavoring (celery juice powder), onion powder, salt, sea salt, sodium phosphate, spice extractive, sugar, vinegar (to preserve quality), and yeast extract. The label states that caramel color was added, although Aldi house brands are free of artificial colors.
One package contains about 3.5 servings. One serving is three slices (63 grams), which has 70 calories, 2 grams of total fat (3% DV), 0.5 grams of saturated fat (3% DV), 640 mg of sodium (27% DV), 3 grams of total carbohydrates (1% DV), 1 gram of sugars, and 10 grams of protein.
Lunch Mate Deli Selected Honey Uncured Ham Finely Sliced Lunch Meat:
Ham nutrition information and ingredients. (Click to enlarge.)
This is advertised as 97% fat free. The label states the pork was raised with no added hormones, although federal regulations already prohibit the use of added hormones in pork.
Ingredients are ham, water, honey, vinegar (to preserve quality), and 2% or less of salt, sugar sodium phosphates, natural flavoring (celery juice powder), sea salt,
One package contains about 4.5 servings. One three-slice serving has 50 calories, 1.5 grams of total fat (2% DV), 0.5 grams of saturated fat (3% DV), 430 mg of sodium (18% DV), 3 grams of total carbohydrates (1% DV), 2 grams of sugars, and 8 grams of protein.
Lunch Mate Deli Selected Oven Roasted Turkey Breast Finely Sliced Lunch Meat:
Turkey nutrition information and ingredients. (Click to enlarge.)
This is advertised as 98% fat free. The label states the poultry was raised with no added hormones or steroids, although federal regulations already prohibit the use of added hormones or steroids in poultry.
Ingredients are turkey breast, turkey broth, vinegar (to preserve quality), and 2% or less of modified corn starch, salt, sugar, sodium phosphates, carrageenan, natural flavoring (celery juice powder), and sea salt.
One package contains about 4.5 servings. One three-slice serving has 50 calories, 1 gram of total fat (2% DV), no saturated fat, 500 mg of sodium (21% DV), 2 grams of total carbohydrates (1% DV), 1 gram of sugars, and 8 grams of protein.
The Verdict:
Lunch Mate Deli Selected Finely Sliced Lunch Meat comes in several varieties, including honey uncured ham, rotisserie seasoned chicken breast, and oven roasted turkey. This lunch meat is an imitation of name-brand Hillshire Farm lunch meat, and it comes in a classic reusable plastic container with a lid. We try to eat lunch meat in moderation because it’s processed and contains a bit of sodium, but when we do eat lunch meat, we like this just fine.
How strict is the use by date on the meat packages if you don;t freeze it? Can you wait a week and eat it if you don’t see any blue on the slices?
In my experience, lunch meat tends to get slimy when it gets older, so you’ll want to keep an eye out for that. You could trying freezing a package of lunch meat in multiple smaller portions so you don’t have to eat through the entire package so quickly.