The Taste Test Restaurant | Preview (5)

Get your knives and forks ready as Tom Read Wilson opens up the Taste Test Restaurant. He’ll find out what the nation really thinks of supermarket food, discovering which products should fill our trolleys and which are best left on the supermarket shelves.

At the Taste Test Restaurant, diners get to try before they buy so you know exactly which foods to get for yourself, and to serve to loved ones. There are plenty of laughs in the restaurant as the diners dig in, share honest opinions and vote for their favourites.

In this new series the diners get stuck into some of the nation’s best-loved foods and cuisines: Italian, posh food, Chinese, and Fakeaways. And in the kitchen, chef Mike Reid reveals the trade secrets that make these foods lip-smackingly good, gives tips on how to prepare these dishes at home, and shares his own recipes.

In the first episode, The Taste Test Restaurant is transformed into the Taste Test Trattoria. Tom Read Wilson serves up la dolce vita when he invites diners to sample foods from one of the nation’s favourite cuisines – Italian. Our taste testers tuck into everything from spaghetti carbonara to tiramisu; arancini to garlic bread, to see which deliver on taste and texture.

The diners are a discerning bunch: a trio of Italian nonnas (grandmothers) searching for an authentic taste of home, an engaged couple passionate about this cuisine, Neapolitan brothers who make pizza for a living, best friends who love Italian holidays, veteran footballers who stoke up with pasta before matches and a chorus of opera singers.

They’re not afraid to tell Tom their feisty opinions and might even sing for their supper! There are surprises in store when premium supermarkets lose out to a mid-market one, and one product receives a less than rapturous response.

In the kitchen, super-chef Mike Reid is pulling out the stops to deliver a delicious dining experience to the taste testers. He reveals a not-so-Italian ingredient used to make arancini appeal to Brits, how to make a perfect carbonara at home and the secrets of a good tiramisu.

The Taste Test Restaurant opens Thursday 9th October at 7pm on 5.