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Nando’s fans, brace yourselves. The beloved chicken chain has revealed it’s giving away free meals for the next four weeks via giant gift cards dotted around the UK.
Giant gift cards? Yes. Giant, peel-able gift cards, actually, that measure three by two metres in size.
The idea is that they'll be stuck onto three billboards in London and Manchester this weekend and fans who walk past them and fancy some free chicken will be greeted by an on-site brand representative who will help them peel one of the giant cards off (they’ve been attached with a Velcro material) and take it to the nearest Nando’s.
The cards entitle people to 10 free meals.
The restaurant chain has told fans the first billboards will be up in London’s Bethnal Green and Manchester’s Printworks between 29th March and 31st March.
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Moviestore/Rex
The 20 best food scenes in film Babette's Feast Gabriel Axel’s Oscar-winning 1987 Danish film is a visual treat for any self-confessed gourmand. The story sees two pious Protestant sisters offer refuge to a French woman fleeing the political tumult in Paris after the collapse of the Second Empire in 1871. They agree to hire her as a housekeeper, discovering later that she’s the former chef of one of Paris’s best restaurants. When she wins the lottery, she uses the funds to whip a meal to remember for her kindly hosts.
The 20 best food scenes in film Hook All the very best chefs know that a dash of pure imagination is key to creating a true culinary wonder. It’s a lesson well-taught in Steven Spielberg’s 1991 classic, Hook, as a grown-up Peter Pan (Robin Williams) looks on in disbelief as the Lost Boys tuck into what appears to be nothing at all. It’s only when he truly believes that he can see the brightly colour feast laid out before him. And what childish feast would be complete without an old fashioned food fight?
Sony
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Keystone Features/Getty Images
The 20 best food scenes in film The Godfather It’s a classic scene that proves to be surprisingly instructional. Francis Ford Coppola’s 1972 film has a full-blown recipe tucked within its elegant drama, as Vito Corleone’s close associate, Peter Clemenza (Richard Castellano), offers his version of the perfect pasta sauce. As he explains: “You start out with a little bit of oil. Then you fry some garlic. Then you throw in some tomatoes, tomato paste, you fry it; you make sure it doesn't stick. You get it to a boil; you shove in all your sausage and your meatballs. And a little bit of wine, and a little bit of sugar—that's my trick."
Rex Features
The 20 best food scenes in film Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory Although the 1971 musical is, as a whole, a sugary delight, it’s hardest to resist the temptation of Willy Wonka’s Fizzy Lifting Drinks, a soda described as so bubbly that it lifts anyone who drinks it right off the ground. It’s no wonder that it was the one stop on the tour that ended up tempting the pure-hearted Charlie Bucket (Peter Ostrum) and his grandfather (Jack Albertson). Now, the real question is: does it come in different flavours?
Getty
The 20 best food scenes in film Eat Pray Love For anyone who considers pizza to be the true love of their life, Ryan Murphy’s 2010 romcom is a perfect cinematic match. It’s hard not to relate to the moment Liz Gilbert (Julia Roberts) bites into a piece of authentic Italian pizza, during the Naples stop on her global adventure of self-discovery, and declares: “I’m in love. I’m in a relationship with my pizza.”
Rex Features
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Disney
The 20 best food scenes in film Steel Magnolias While there’s been a growing fad of ambitious, unusually themed cakes – you need only look at the success of the TLC reality series Cake Boss – there are few cinematic cakes that quite stick in the memory like Jackson (Dylan McDermott)’s armadillo-shaped groom cake from 1989 comedy-drama Steel Magnolias, a spin on the tradition from the American South of having another cake separate to the main wedding cake. And did we mention that it’s red velvet on the inside?
REX FEATURES
The 20 best food scenes in film Marie Antoinette When it came to director Sofia Coppola conjuring the ultimate image of decadence for her 2006 biopic on the French queen, there was no more perfect treat than Ladurée’s famous macarons. Delicate and pastel-toned, the meringue-based confection has long been the speciality of the French bakery, first established in 1862. A new flavour was even created in honour of the film, with the Marie Antoinette offering a combination of rose and anise flavours.
Columbia Pictures
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AP
The 20 best food scenes in film Pulp Fiction In a world where people seem more than happy to fork out £15 for some mushy avocado on toast, $5 for a milkshake doesn’t seem too unreasonable. Vincent Vega (John Travolta) takes his boss’ wife Mia (Uma Thurman) out to Jack Rabbit Slim’s for a burger, where she decides she wants the “$5 dollar shake”. “You don’t put bourbon in it or nothing?” a bewildered Vincent asks the waiter. When it arrives, Mia takes a long sip: “Yummy.” “I gotta know what a $5 shake tastes like,” Vincent says. He takes a sip. Then another. “Goddamn, that’s a pretty f***ing good milkshake.”
Miramax/YouTube
The 20 best food scenes in film Julie & Julia Nora Ephron’s feature film based on the intertwining stories of chef Julia Child and Julie Powell, the blogger who rose to fame after documenting her pledge to cook all 524 recipes in Child’s cookbook, is all about the joy one can find in food. It is some of the earlier scenes that capture this best, like when Julia (Meryl Streep) and her husband Paul (Stanley Tucci) arrive in Paris and stop at a French restaurant, where Julia is served a sizzling platter of sole. It looked so mouth-watering in the final edit that Ephron “wanted to call up Martin Scorcese and say, ‘you’ve never shot a fish like that before’”.
Rex
The 20 best food scenes in film Ratatouille Fearsome critic Anton Ego takes a bite of ratatouille and is transported back to his childhood, where it was a favourite comfort food, in the best scene from Pixar’s wonderful animated film. The detail is superb, from the process of Remy the rat preparing the dish to the moment Ego’s pen falls to the ground as he remembers the power of a favourite meal in evoking memories we thought were lost.
YouTube screengrab / Jeugos para ninos / Disney Pixar
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Embassy Pictures
The 20 best food scenes in film The Help After all the trauma she has been through – at the hands of her abusive husband and a racist ex-employer – Minny (Octavia Spencer) arrives at her employer Celia Foote to find a beautiful dinner cooked for her as a thank you for everything she has done for Celia and her husband. You see the care that has gone into it as Celia lays everything out on the table, from a “mile high meringue” to the fried chicken Minny taught her how to make. “That table of food gave Minny the strength she needed,” the narration explains. “She took her babies out from under Leroy and never went back.”
AP Photo/Disney DreamWorks II, Dale Robinette
The 20 best food scenes in film Five Easy Pieces Robert Dupea (Jack Nicholson) just wants some toast to go with his omelette, but the waitress is stubbornly sticking to the diner’s “no substitutions” rule. “I’ll make it as easy for you as I can,” goes the famous order. “I’d like an omelette, plain, and a chicken salad sandwich on wheat toast. No mayonnaise, no butter, no lettuce… and hold the chicken.”
Columbia Pictures
The 20 best food scenes in film Big Night It was a scene that helped propel a revolution in American dining. Il Timpano, a dish inspired by the notoriously tricky-to-make Italian meal, is the star of a moment in Big Night where chef brothers Primo (Tony Shalhoub) and Secondo (Stanley Tucci) prepares it as the centrepiece for a feast attended by their rival, Pascal. “Goddamit, I should kill you,” he screams, throwing his fork down after tasting Il Timpano. “This is so f***ing good, I should kill you.”
While the billboards will only be up for limited amounts of time, there’ll be an unlimited number of cards available during that period.
The first billboards will go up in London and Manchester this weekend (Nando's) If you don't manage to find the billboards in time this weekend, chicken fans should look alive in London's White City between 4th and 6th April, when another billboard will be up between the hours of 12noon and 7pm.
After this, Nando's will put up billboards with gift cards in cities all around the UK, with ones in Birmingham, Sheffield, Cardiff, Glasgow and Bristol.
Keep an eye out on the chain's social media accounts for teasers of exactly where and when the next billboards will be cropping up.
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