Tesco Real Food Sets SOS Helpline To Save Christmas Dinner Nightmares

Released on: December 15, 2011, 12:22 pm
Author: Tesco Real Food
Industry: Retail

Tesco Real Food has set up a unique Christmas dinner SOS helpline to rescue Brits from kitchen disasters as they prepare their festive feasts.

The supermarket has pulled together a crack team of expert chefs who will be on hand to offer personalised first rate advice on how to create the perfect Christmas dinner and avoid any potential nightmares.

Anyone running into difficulties on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day will be able to contact the team via the supermarket's Twitter site to get immediate solutions to their culinary problems.

Tesco senior marketing manager Breige Donaghy said: "Imagine the scenario - your guests are due to arrive for the most celebrated meal of the year and to your horror your turkey is undercooked, your bread sauce too thick and your roasties aren’t crispy enough.

"But instead of panicking, cooks will now be able to speak to our team of expert chefs who have cooked thousands of meals between them and who know all the tricks of the trade for putting on a fabulous Christmas feast with as little stress as possible.

"We think the helpline will prove especially useful to those embarking on cooking their first ever Christmas dinner. And our experts will also be around on Christmas Eve in case anyone needs help planning the big meal."

The team will include Cordon Bleu standard chefs as well as others who have been trained by top London cooking school Leiths and other top restaurants plus those who work with Tesco to develop recipes and inspire new dishes. Their combined experience totals nearly 100 years in the food business.

The team will run two help sessions. One will offer planning and preparation tips between 10am and 8pm on Christmas Eve and the other will help solve actual cooking dilemmas on Christmas Day, between 8am and 4pm.

Anyone wanting to contact the team will need to log onto Twitter on those days and then navigate to Tesco's Real Food Online Twitter page (@tescorealfood), and send off their question. They will then be sent a tweet with a solution to their problem.

Breige Donaghy added: "This is the first time that any supermarket has ever tried anything like this and if it’s a success then we will look at running similar kitchen helplines for Easter and other big occasions."

ENDS

Note to editors:
On the Real Food website Tesco has developed a Christmas zone to help customers with everything they will need in the run up to Christmas. The tools on the site include:
- Easy-to-follow cooking videos
- Working out the right cooking times with a turkey timer. The timer can also work out the cooking times for salmon, gammon, chicken and beef.
- How to carve a turkey
- How to steam a Christmas pudding
- Cocktail recipe
tool: users type in their preferred spirit or ask for suggestions based on taste and/or glass type.
- Advent calendar on the site for daily helpful tips on getting ready for Christmas.

About Tesco Real Food:
The Tesco Real Food website is packed with hundreds of healthy recipes to suit any occasion including vegetarian recipes and a recipe for strawberry yoghurt jellies. Whether customers are looking for a quick mid-week meal for the family or something for a special event, visitors are sure to find exactly what they're looking for. In addition, a range of step-by-step cooking tips and videos to help improve kitchen skills can be found, as well as healthy eating and cooking with kids sections. To make shopping even easier, every recipe has a ready-made shopping list that can be used to add all the ingredients to the shopping basket in just a few clicks.

For more information please contact:
Mike Baess
Tesco Corporate & Legal Affairs
New Tesco House
Delamare Road
Cheshunt
Herts
EN8 9SL
01992 646079
www.tesco.com/food

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