It’s a sad sign of the times that fresh pasta maker Rana has reformulated in a new recipe rejig that, without fanfare, has cut a number of premium ingredients from its UK SKUs.

Goodbye parmigiano reggiano; goodbye sorrento lemons, porcini mushrooms and burrata. Hello, a 34.3% reduction in beef content in one pasta, a 9.1% reduction in prawns in another, and 25.6% reduction in champignon mushrooms in a third. 

Rana protests that “special cooking techniques” have masked the fact “the amount of braised beef and shrimp used in the recipes has actually increased”, but no mention is made as to what happened to those expensive cheeses, lemons and porcini mushrooms.

What makes the move more disappointing is that this is a UK-only relaunch. It’s as if the brand has decided UK tastes don’t warrant better-quality ingredients: it would rather cut product quality than increase prices.

Not going out

The UK is not necessarily famed for its culinary arts – but do they really think shoppers won’t notice? Never mind houmous, halloumi and harissa. Never mind the endless TikToks explaining which Italian ingredients are authentic, telling us how nonna always buys the expensive tinned tomatoes. And never mind the ever-increasing premiumisation by supermarkets and other brands looking to satisfy shoppers who would prefer to treat themselves rather than go out. 

The fact is British tastes have changed. Google searches for ‘porcini’ have roughly doubled compared with a decade ago. Nobody had ever even heard of guanciale before 2013 – now it is stocked in Lidl.

Look at the explosion of authentic Italian staples like Rummo or Mutti on UK shelves in the past few years – even Barilla, the standard-issue pasta of Italian supermarket shelves, took until 2014 to really land. So you can understand why Rana has taken off in the UK. 

There’s a huge appetite for genuine, authentic flavours from abroad, and demand for world foods is higher than it’s ever been. So why on earth would we want “new” recipes “specifically developed for the UK market, with the collaboration of British chefs”? Just give us the real stuff!

And it’s a puzzling move because Rana seemed to understand its strength lay in its authenticity: marketing campaigns have boasted of its status as “Italy’s best-kept secret”, and now as “Italy’s favourite fresh pasta”. 

Rana would clearly rather cut input costs than raise prices beyond its current £3-£4 mark for a 250g pack. It’s laudable not to raise prices, but shoppers are forking out for premium meals. 

When you’ve got Tesco Finest Chef meal deals at up to £20 each, Morrisons Best Signature meals for £6 plus £3 sides, and even Charlie Bigham’s specialist Brasserie meals of up to £29.95 – a £3-£4 premium pasta dish seems cheap as chips. Cheaper, in fact, than a cup of coffee. 

Maybe us Brits will never beat our reputation for terrible cooking – but Italians need to understand one truth: if we can’t make it, we’ll buy it!

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