Forget the turkey and roast beef, premium cooked meats and fish were the big winners with major retailers over the Christmas period.

Latest reports from Kantar Worldpanel, highlighted the top tier lines, including own label fresh and smoked fish, cooked meats, such as ham, and wine performed particularly well during this time.

Sales were also bolstered by the fact that shoppers had more time to do their food shop with Christmas Eve falling on a Saturday.

Grocery sales also showed the fastest recorded growth in the past 12 weeks to January 1, since June, 2014, with overall supermarket sales having risen by 1.8%, which represents an additional £480m spent during this time, compared to the same period last year.

Comparing the past 12 weeks to last year, Aldi sales grew the most by 11.8%, followed by Iceland, by 9.6%; Lidl by 7.5%; Waitrose by 3.0%; the Co-op by 2.4%; Tesco by 1.3% and Morrisons, 1.2%.

Sales in Asda fell by 2.4%, with Sainsbury’s noting a 0.1% reduction.

Kantar also noted that inflation had returned to the grocery market with like for like prices up 0.2% on the year.

Looking at the dairy sector, despite a 3.8% increase in retail sales of cheese in the year ending November 6, 2016, lower average prices, particularly for cheddar, offset the higher sales, preventing any growth in the value of the market.

While prices fell year on year for all types of cheese, the 5.1% drop in the average price for Cheddar meant the value of this segment slipped by more than £50m over the period.

And, while average cheese prices fell across the board, it was only the top five multiples (Asda, The Co-Op, Morrisons, Sainsbury’s and Tesco) that showed a drop in sales volumes, losing market share to the hard discounters. The combined impact of a 3.1% drop in average prices and lower sales meant the top five saw total cheese values drop by almost £78m or -3.7%.