This week, Value for Money compares five varieties of feta cheese

* * * * * Excellent * * * * Great * * * Fine * * Below Par * Awful

Marks & Spencer Greek Feta

€2.99 for 90g, €33.22 per kg

Highs: This very fresh-tasting feta, made from ewe's milk, is new in M&S and very welcome it is too. It is made for the retail giant at a family dairy in central Greece and marinated in oregano and extra virgin olive oil from Crete – where many foodies claim the best olive oil in the world comes from, incidentally. The oil is very good – strong and pungent without dominating proceedings. The cheese is given added complexity through the herbs and extra richness from the olive oil. It is pleasingly sharp-flavoured and not excessively salty.

Lows: At 90g, you don't get whole lot of it and we were not sure of the best way to eat it – it seems like a pity to waste it on a sandwich and it disappears in a salad of any decent size, so we just ate it straight out of the packet.

Verdict: Great-tasting

Star rating: * * * *

Milbona Greek Style Salad Cheese from Lidl

€1.99 for 250g, €7.96 per kg

Highs: To be fair to Lidl, they don't actually say this is feta, but given its name and its look and feel, we reckon they're going for the same market. It's made with cow's milk rather than sheep or goat's milk so lacks a certain sharpness, something which might appeal to more delicate palates. The makers have divided up the cheese into two individually sealed 125g packets. The most notable thing about it, however, is the cheap price.

Lows: Unfortunately, it tastes cheap. We expect a product presented like this to taste a little like the most commonly found cheese in a Greek salad, but while it might be done in a "Greek style", it is a long, long way from Greece in terms of flavour. It is very salty and the texture is more rubbery than crumbly.

Verdict: Cheap, but not in a good way

Star rating: * *

The Cheese Emporium Greek Feta from Aldi

€1.79 for 200g, €8.95 per kg

Highs: This is more like it – a proper feta, from Greece, that is absolutely bursting with intensely sharp flavour. And it's pretty cheap to boot. It is made with both goat and sheep's milk, which lends it a nice authenticity, with the goat's milk just about shading it in the flavour stakes. The salt balance is spot-on and the texture is surprisingly good – chalky without being excessively dry and nice and crumbly. It could quite handily grace the finest of Greek salads.

Lows: It's hard to fault it in sheer value for money terms but people who don't like goat's cheese – and there are many – might be caught unawares by the strong flavours in this cheese. The packaging, was a tiny bit irksome – hard to open and impossible to reseal.

Verdict: Excellent value

Star rating: * * * *

St Tola Feta

€4.65 for 150g, €31 per kg

Highs: This artisan cheese comes from a small Irish producer and is made entirely with organic ingredients, including raw milk goat's cheese. We expected a rough, earthy product but were surprised by how mild it was. While the texture of it when it came directly out of the fridge wasn't great, it softened up nicely when left to warm up. It has a nice lingering aftertaste.

Lows: It is to be found in many fine dishes prepared in some excellent restaurants around the country so has a pedigree that we would not question. Okay, so, we might. One man's mild is another man's bland, and this comes a little too close to the latter for our tastes. It is also undeniably on the expensive side, although we would be inclined to make allowances for the price given its provenance.

Verdict: Nice but pricey

Star rating: * * *

Dunnes Feta

€1.79 for 200g, €8.95 per kg

Highs: "Ideal for cooking", says the front of the packaging, which alarmed us ever so slightly as we had no plans to cook with it and thought that might be an excuse from Dunnes for selling us an inferior product. It wasn't. This is a fine cheese, fresh with a fairly decent edge to it. It crumbles well into salads and a single packet will go a long way. It is made in Greece and was as cheap as the Aldi option, although perhaps not quite as nice..

Lows: Compared with some of its rivals, it is a little dull. It lacks the real sharpness or complexity of flavours found elsewhere; moments after we'd tried it we'd all but completely forgotten what it tasted like.

Verdict: Very cheap and pretty good

Star rating: * * *