Best supplier of ready meals.

Dh loves Waitrose ready meal Nasi Goreng, which he first became addicted to while based in Jakarta for a year.

Towards the end of a long car journey we often stop at a petrol station with an M&S Food, and pick up a couple of ready meals. I usually go for a SE Asian noodle-y thing, but one we both really enjoyed in winter was the outsize Yorkshire pudding with beef, veg and gravy.
I could just fancy one now TBH, but we still have a lot of 🎄gammon to eat up.

Small meals maybe, but WFF doesn’t advertise small meals. We tried 3 different ones, on special offer just in case we may ever need them.
Roast beef, veg and roast potatoes with gravy. Potatoes had multiple black patches on, the beef was OK but what gravy? It didn’t fill a tablespoon. Sausage and mash, with gravy. Sausage OK, just about a tablespoon of mash, but not enough gravy to make it enjoyable so I made some more.
I know illustrations of food are meant to show what it could be like, but the WFF meals we had didn’t match the pictures. This looks good and generous, but wasn’t what arrived in quantity or quality.

WFF provide mini meals, ordinary sized meals and even hearty meals. They advertise them as such.

The mini meals are, unsurprisingly, mini.

The others aren't.

VD, we ordered ordinary meals like the one shown. That wasn’t what arrived in terms of quantity, although, to be fair, it did say one dumpling and that was accurate.

My MIL liked the mini meals as her appetite decreased as she aged. As others have said, there’s different sizes to choose from. MiL liked traditional fayre such as roasts, cottage pie, fish n chips etc. she never complained about the quality, ever. Maybe she was lucky?

COOK, meals are lovely and varied they do portion sizes for 1 or more if you are entertaining .....yum

Another vote here for Wiltshire. Good variety of size meals, something to cater for most tastes. Having a disability that limits things that I can do, cooking a meal from scratch some days, means buying & having delivered Wiltshire Farm Foods is good! Much better than sloppy or dried up ready meals full of all the wrong things! Would recommend!

"Cook" meals are absolutely delicious. They're available online or from their own shops in some towns, Cirencester & Stamford for example. Our local Co Ops have also started selling them recently so that's probably a nationwide thing now. Excellent quality, lots of different options, tasty puddings as well as mains and starters. I have been known to serve one of their family sized meals to guests....sssh!

My elderly relative (aged 95) alternates between WFF and Oakhouse. She prefers Oakhouse.

I don't actually dislike M&S meals, but I DO find them pretty tasteless.

And irrelevant , I suppose, but I remember when COOK started up ( in the 70s, I think)- it sold mostly delicious cakes/gateaux/traybakes at first and was a hot favourite with young mothers who were entertaining, as it was quite easy to pretend they were homemade. Have always thought it a shame that they moved on to concentrating mostly on ready meals.

M&S meals tasteless!! Can only assume you've not tasted many.

My mum disliked Wiltshire farm foods. She liked home cooking and complained about the lack of pieces of meat in the stew from WFF.

Wrong, Axeline. I like a lot of things about M&S but every time I'm tempted by one of their ready meals, I'm disappointed. That's my experience over many decades!!

I find any M and S meal tasteless, the Lasagne is the worst I think. Only tried about 6 but didn’t enjoy any.

I wonder if these manufacturers of foods are trying too hard to be 'healthy'?
Parsley Box were tasteless until my Dad in law started adding salt(!) and pepper, and found them quite palatable. Wiltshire also lack taste.
You can buy something called 'LoSalt' so I got some, and you can't tell the difference.
M&S are the best in this area, but I dare say Waitrose might be better still if you've a shop near you. Cost seems to be the deciding factor.

I may be wrong, but can you get M&S through Ocado?

brazenp75 yes there’s an extensive collection of M& food on the Ocado website.

My parents had Wiltshire Farm Foods. They found that the ones that were a little more expensive were better but they did think there was a lot of potato. M & S meals are good and some of Sainsbury’s. Good luck.

A friend who is alone buys a selection of Gousto every couple of weeks. You do the cooking yourself, so if that is a problem it is not for you. She uses them to make herself have 'a proper meal from scratch' and to try things she otherwise wouldn't. Pricey BUT includes every last pinch of herbs so you do not need to buy a whole packet of something you will only use once. (The quantities are often for 2 but she manages to use the 2nd soon enough there is no waste).

My Mum was a very fussy eater and also a vegetarian. She really enjoyed the Wiltshire Farm frozen meals which she just microwaved. I used to place the orders, they’d deliver and even put them in her freezer. I felt it was such a good service.

Have been Home Instead care giver for ages and Wiltshire farm are popular say they are well balanced meals, lots of choices, can cook from frozen so no need to plan and are thin in size not bulky so good storage
Oak house was the other are they still available ? and Marks yes, more expensive than other supermarkets but is nice food ! Gut feeling to read packaging the cheaper supermarket bargains can be more unhealthy salt & sugar etc

"COOK" without a doubt, you pay for the privilege but they definitely are the best - home cooked, properly !

Further down the line M&S, and Waitrose, steer clear of most of the others!!

agree found parsley box pretty tasteless, even the grandkids would not eat them and they usually demolish anything thats food!!

Just adding air fryer is marvellous rather than oven if cooking from scratch Iv got 3 trays in mineso can cook the whole meal with ease for two days I got it from the kettle & toaster website it came in battered box may have a blemish on but great and half priced goods!

Tried WFF for my mother. She hated them (she was v fussy) I was surprised to find they worked out more expensive than M&S small ready meals, which she mainly liked.
She’s gone beyond ready meals now and hardly eats anything at all now just surviving only on cups of tea.
The Cook range sounds good. Will bear in my mind for when I reach the “ready meal stage”.