A Colliers Wood woman was left more than a little annoyed when she opened up her Boxing Day turkey to prepare a family feast.

Like many around the country, Kathryn Hubbard was ready to dig in to a second helping of the festive food on December 26, but instead was left disgusted by what she found.

"We were planning to cook it Boxing Day morning for a family get together for nine people in the afternoon," she said of the turkey.

"But when I opened it, the smell made me immediately dry heave and it had to go straight in the bin. You could see it had gone rotten."

Kathryn had bought the bird - which had a 'use by' date of December 26 - from Aldi in the Priory Retail Park.

She was disappointed to say the least, but then saw she wasn't the only one who had been affected.

"I was annoyed to find out that this case is not a one off and it has happened across the country," she added.

"Also there have been other reports of 'off' meat at this Aldi so there is obviously a problem that needs to be addressed.

An Aldi spokesman apologised for the incident.

"We are sorry that, in a small number of instances, we did not meet our usual high-quality standards," he said.

"Customers can return any product that they are not satisfied with to their nearest store for a full refund, or alternatively contact our customer services department.”

In the end, Kathryn did see the funny side of things.

"My brother-in-law had to bring his leftover turkey around and we used that instead, Boxing Day is all about leftovers," she joked.

"Although I'm not sure anyone will accept a dinner invite around here for a while now, I'm just glad it wasn't our main Christmas turkey."