9 Land O'Frost Deli Meats, Ranked

Deli meat is certainly not the sexiest thing on your shopping list. It doesn't elicit the same level of excitement as, say, picking out a meaty steak or a sweet treat from the bakery. However, those thin slices of luncheon meat are a grocery-cart staple and something that's always nice to have on hand. When those cold cut sandwich cravings hit, you'll be glad you made that boring little pickup.

We all have our preferences when it comes to sandwich meat. Some of us take our needs to the deli counter to get it fresh-sliced. Others rely on premade bags from well-known brands. I tend to go with the containers from Hillshire Farm (Go Meat!) simply because it's a longtime family favorite. But there's another brand sitting right there in the meat aisle that I've somehow overlooked: Land O'Frost. The company has been around since 1941 and gets its name from its start as a frozen food storage enterprise. Clearly, it's taken a turn since then to focus on deli meat, and at this point, a name like Land O'Lunch or Land O'Cuts would be more fitting, but it's stuck with the original moniker.

To get a taste of the brand, I recently picked up several of its deli meat offerings. I evaluated the quality, taste, and texture — one of the most important elements of deli meat — to find out whether I've been missing out on a solid deli meat brand all these years and which of the brand's meats is best.

I love to see salami on a colorful charcuterie board. Stack it with a water cracker and a wedge of Gouda, and you've created the quintessential snack bite. However, if I came across this particular Land O'Frost Salami on a grazing table, I'd suddenly lose my appetite.

The stench was overwhelmingly strong when I opened the bag. This isn't inherently bad — when it comes to cured meats and cheese, oftentimes the smellier the better. But I could just tell something was off with this aroma, and the flavor proved me right. There's a sourness to these round slices, and even worse, a rancid chemical taste. It wasn't an ammonia note, like if it was spoiled, and there wasn't any kind of sliminess to indicate it had gone bad either. Instead, the unpleasantly artificial taste seems like the result of something going wrong in the curing process.

No cold cut can overcome a setback like that. And because of it, I didn't get to enjoy any of the savory, salty flavors that normally come with a standard pork-and-beef hard salami. I was willing to overlook the use of BHA and BHT — somewhat controversial additives. But when coupled with such an offensive taste, this salami quickly became my least favorite Land O'Frost deli meat.

When I want a no-frills deli sandwich, I turn to picks like this Oven Roasted Turkey Breast. Since it's oven-roasted, it's meant to have a straightforward, savory flavor without a lot of seasoning competing with the poultry. These turkey slices are also made with lean white meat and don't contain any artificial flavors or byproducts. Sounds perfect, right? In theory, yes, it does. But in reality, this is another Land O'Frost pouch I would likely skip.

I wasn't at all happy with the texture of this turkey. That's the core issue. At first glance, it just looks dry. But then it gets worse as I bit into it and discovered it was both dry and rubbery. Plus, there were hard, crunchy bits scattered throughout the slices. I'm not sure if they were gritty bits from the meat or a byproduct of other processing ingredients, but they're not what you want to encounter when you're chewing on what should be tender turkey.

The taste itself is pretty plain, though the other problems make it seem extra processed. In fact, I didn't even want to finish an entire slice, let alone fill a whole hoagie roll with it. It's a slight step up from the synthetic-tasting salami I tried, but that's not saying much.

This type of meat would never make it into an Arby's roast beef sandwich. And if it's not good by fast-food standards, that's when you know the quality is really lacking.

Let me back up a little, though, because this roast beef isn't that bad. It just doesn't have a lot of flavor or personality. It's about as drab as its brown color. The label reveals that it contains up to 23% solution, which means that nearly a quarter of the finished product can come from an added water-based solution containing things like salt and other flavoring ingredients. That's a fairly substantial amount and higher than some other deli roast beef products, although it's still within the range you can find in processed deli meats. Land O'Frost also tried to zhuzh things up a bit with beef flavor, beef stock, salt, and even a smidge of sugar, but to no avail. It's not overly beefy or umami-filled. It doesn't necessarily teeter on the line of becoming mystery meat, but I did find it mysterious how the strongest flavor here is a light tang of sourness. It's just a little bit off.

I'm not sure there's much we could do to revive this one. But then again, we should never underestimate the power of a boatload of Arby's Horsey Sauce, which our taster ranked as one of the best sauces at the fast-food chain.

Land O'Frost produces five different kinds of ham just in its premium line alone. I didn't even know there were that many different ways to make deli ham (and that count doesn't even include a few packs of Canadian bacon, which, let's face it, is essentially the same thing). The brand has created an entire hamiverse, and I was able to try four different varieties for this taste test.

The Natural Hickory Smoked Ham is my lowest-ranked ham, mostly because it's one of the simplest. But I'd still say that it's good quality, with a perfectly palatable natural flavor. You can actually see some of those ribbons of fat running through the slices, and it maintains a good amount of moisture. The fact that water is added to the ham certainly helps in that regard. It doesn't hit you over the head with smokiness, either. The flavor is far more subtle, and the saltiness is also subdued. The pork taste is fairly fresh, and the ham is consistently tender from slice to slice.

It's basically a thin version of the kind of ham you might serve on Thanksgiving or at Easter lunch. It's a very basic cold cut, but one that you really can't go wrong with — especially when it's piled onto a sandwich with plenty of other veggies and condiments.

This Honey Smoked Turkey Breast is infinitely better than the oven-roasted variety. It's still made up of lean white meat and comes with all of Land O'Frost's normal promises of no artificial flavors or added hormones. So essentially it's a very similar kind of thin-sliced turkey. But the preparation methods and sweet add-ins do wonders for the taste.

It's made with real honey — you can find it on the ingredient list and everything. A bit of brown sugar is additionally thrown in to emphasize that sweet flavor even more. I'd still say it only ends up at about a two or three out of 10 on the sweetness scale, and I personally think this flavor profile works better with ham than with turkey. But it still makes the turkey much more palatable. The texture is also an improvement — though it's not perfect. There's a lot more moisture here than there was in the oven-roasted turkey, yet there are still areas that feel gummy rather than soft and cohesive. A few of those rigid bits also popped up here and there.

Despite some of these small issues, I actually liked the flavor of this turkey a little better than the Hickory Smoked Ham. Plus, under the weight of bread, it would be hard to notice these smaller imperfections.

Honey ham has always been a favorite of mine. It's one of my cold cut go-tos when I'm whizzing through the grocery store. I also firmly believe you haven't lived until you've had a honey-baked ham straight from The Honey Baked Ham Company. From the sweet and crunchy caramelized crust to the juicy, salty pork underneath, it's the pinnacle of hams.

Now, I'm not saying the slices stuffed into this Land O'Frost package are on that same level. But as far as deli honey ham goes, it's actually quite good. It's amazing how much more naturally honey and brown sugar complement pork than turkey — it definitely has something to do with pork's innate sweetness. I thought the honey-smoked turkey was tasty until I tried this and realized that it really can't compare.

At first glance, the ham looks pretty plain, but don't let that fool you. That perfect sweet flavor is baked right in. It's just sweet enough to taste the honey and brown sugar without becoming cloying. The slices are also lightly wet and flexible, making them perfect for folding onto a sammie. Honestly, this is the kind of ham you could easily find yourself snacking on straight from the package when no one's watching. Land O'Frost also mentions that this one is kid-friendly, and I believe it. Out of all the deli options I tried, I think this is the flavor kiddos would be most likely to gravitate toward.

It's called Black Forest ham because it was first produced in the Black Forest region of Germany. The "Old World Style" designation simply means that Land O'Frost pays tribute to those traditions of hardwood smoking to create that signature blackened skin. Clearly, it pays off because the brand's version has the right look and is on track with the flavor as well.

It's hard to explain, but this just feels like a more grown-up deli ham. It has a bit more sophistication, and I wouldn't be surprised to learn it was aged for a short while (though the packaging does not confirm this). I actually found it a teensy bit fattier than the Natural Hickory Smoked Ham. But it's balanced and still has that natural pork flavor. It's also got a rich flavor with a bit of a woody quality on the nose. The actual taste is a little more subdued, though, with a milder smokiness that doesn't overpower the ham. It's not overly salted either, and the texture retains a good amount of moisture, making it easy to chew.

If I had to pick, I'd select the Black Forest over the Hickory Smoked or Honey Ham for its more refined taste. But there was one other Land O'Frost ham that managed to take things a step further.

I didn't want to like this pick. I mean, hasn't the hot honey trend gone far enough? Do we really need it baked into our deli meat too? It just seemed unnecessary. But then I tried it and was suddenly eating my words — as well as multiple slices of this stuff.

You can tell just by looking at it that it has a little bit of spice. It appears mostly around the edges where you'll find a reddish-orange outline. This is likely thanks to the red peppers and extractives of paprika added in, and it gives each slice a pleasant little kick. That little bit of heat matches nicely with the sweetness of the honey. And the front of the package doesn't tell you this, but the ham is also hardwood-smoked, with natural smoke flavor added in as well. So not only are you getting that swicy combo of sugar, spice, and everything nice, you're also getting an extra hit of smoky savoriness.

It may not be your everyday kind of cold cut, but it's one of the best ham products Land O'Frost has, and it's definitely the best one I tried. I can imagine really playing up the spice by pairing it with pepper Jack and pickled jalapeños, or cooling things down with a more classic combo of Swiss, lettuce, tomato, and mayo.

Once I got over the funky smell when I first opened it and the fact that it's deli chicken (I don't know why but I've had an aversion to it in the past), I was 100% on board with the Hot Honey Chicken Breast. It gets a similar treatment as the Hot Honey Ham, as it's smoked with hardwood chips and flavored with a mixture of real honey, natural smoke flavor, red pepper, and extractives of paprika bringing in the main flavor notes. You still get that light spice and sweetness, but I found the taste to be cleaner and of higher quality than the ham.

The texture is also exactly what I want from a good deli poultry — you know, the kind you get sliced fresh at the deli counter? The chicken slices almost peel apart rather than feel like they're packed too uniformly and in a tight shape. It is a bit drier than other Land O'Frost products (the hot honey ham was too) but I think that actually works in its favor.

It has all the flavor of the Hot Honey Ham and then some. Plus, it's on the lighter side with a bit less fat and more protein compared to the ham. Nutritional value is all relative when we're talking about processed deli meats, but I'll take every dietary boost I can get.

Land O'Frost makes a surprisingly large collection of deli meats, and I really only scratched the surface with the ones I tried for this taste test. These were just a small sample of the brand's Premium lineup that I was able to find at my local Meijer store. But Land O'Frost also has an entire line of DeliShaved meats, which are sliced even thinner and sold at a lower price point, as well as a collection of Bistro Favorites that are hand-seasoned and made in a more artisan style. So, there's a lot more to the brand than what I was able to fit into my shopping cart.

As I tasted each of these Premium options, I tried the meats by themselves and then again on top of plain white bread to see how they would stand up in a sandwich. From there, I took notes on taste and texture. Deli meat should never be rubbery or overly dry, so I looked for slices that were tender, flexible, and had a good amount of moisture.

When it came to flavor, I watched out for anything that tasted overly processed or seemed lower quality. The various cooking and smoking techniques gave each meat its own flavor profile, so I also took a closer look at how add-ins like honey, spices, and natural smoke flavor affected the overall taste. The best picks in the Land O'Frost lineup were good enough to eat straight from the package but would also make a killer sandwich.