Community Chat

[Sooner]

Lots of people around here have practically lived on beans and cornbread or beans and rice.  Chicken can be cooked for a meal, small portions eaten then the bones and broth make soup.  You can buy 25 pounds of rice for less than $15, and a huge bag of dried beans very cheap too.

Beans make soup, a little ground beef and lots of beans make chili.  Frozen cheap veggies work fine to supplement meals, sale meats, no chips and snacks, cooked carrots are cheap, etc.  Pot pies and creamed leftover meats (canned soup and veggies cooked up over toast) are a mainstay of easy and cheap.

Peanut butter sandwiches, cheap bread and lunch meat makes a meal, probably not a lot of fruit, and potatoes and onions sauteed are a great filler and cheap.  Eggs?  Great and cheap, so is inexpensive cheese.  Big jugs of milk and you don't just drink it all the time, mostly for breakfast and a glass here and there with a sandwich.

People I know have lived that way for generations and lived as long and often longer than health foodies I know.

I still contend it's junk food, snack and convenience food, and non-food items that hike up the food bill for a lot of people.  And when people talk about Aldies they will often tell you about the non-food items they scored.  Which sort of negates some of the food "savings."

[violann]

My fabulous DIL lives within walking distance of an Aldi’s and does very well there. She’s a wonderful cook.

[x Hedge]

   Wait for it, @bonnielu .

One by one they are completely remodelling all the Aldi's in my area.

The number 1 on your list has been eliminated. All the remodeled stores thus far now have a cut-thru in the middle of the long aisle.

[SilleeMee]

I spend $50 a month just on yogurt alone! ...and it's just me here, well I do share some with my dog but still.

There are no Aldi's stores here.

[novamc1]

I absolutely hated Aldi the first time I went there.

Then I started learning from others about some unusually inexpensive pantry  staples and other things.

Now I go about once a week, along with visits to several other groceries very close to it if I need more things that I can't or don't want to get from Aldi. 

All the stores are extremely close to my gym, so shopping around here is wonderfully convenient and plentiful.

Today at Aldi, I bought some marinated mozzarella balls, my husband's big container of Vanilla Bean ice cream (only $1.95 but  at least $2.50 when it's on sale elsewhere), a steam-ready  package of frozen asparagus spears (excellent, always and mostly are better than fresh), and a 16-oz. bag of frozen peas. for 85 cents.

Organic offerings seem to be increasing at Aldi.  I passed on the frozen organic peas and got the "regular ones".

Also rely on Aldi for good prices on lettuce,  carrots, celery, baby gold potatoes, mini-tomatoes, and cabbage....plus grapes sometimes.  Produce is always fresh there.   Eggs are usually under $1.00 a dozen and sometimes as low as 88 cents.

Don't like all their canned goods, but the refried beans, jars of queso sauce, cans of sliced mushrooms are cheaper than dirt, seems to me, and are excellent.

In all today, my 8 items totaled $17.99.  They included a $2.99 package of brioche rolls, a jar of garlic-stuffed green olives for $2.89 and the marinated mozzarella for $3.29

Aldi has no choice but to get better and better, now that its German-owned rival, Lidl, is opening stores everywhere.

The two Aldi's near me are already surrounded by Fresh Market, Sprouts, Trader Joe's (which owns Aldi), Walmart, Whole Foods, Costco,  and an incredible number of Kroger and Publix grocery stores.

What I want and probably will never see here in Georgia is a Wegman's......seems everyone loves Wegman's.  I notice that in many of the kitchen shows and  cooking demonstrations on QVC, Wegman-branded canned goods can be seen in the presentations.

[SahmIam]

@novamc1 You're not missing much by not having a Wegmans. I have all the stores you mentioned plus a Wegmans within a few miles. When it opened, it was THE place to be. I never bothered due to the traffic. It's been 3 years and traffic is now dwindled down to almost nothing. Wegmans is closing in my area due to lack of business.

I did go there; once. The pre-made foods took over the store. The costs were high. No wonder it's closing. People may have money where I live but you don't have and keep  money by being stupid with it.

[novamc1]

@SahmIam 

I used to live just outside Wash DC.......we were going to get a Wegman's near the malls at Tysons, but we moved before it could be built.  Never wanted to make the trip out to Fairfax or Loudoun County where a few Wegman's could be found.

Interesting that the stores are closing, due to dwindling business and high overhead.

Maybe it's getting harder  to compete with the likes of Costco and other warehouse-type operations, or stores with the buying power of Walmart  or even Target, which enables them to offer lower prices on many things.

The closest you can come here to a pleasant, varied place to grocery shop would be Publix stores.  Excellent quality bakery, deli, meat and seafood departments.  

[viva923]

it is possible I guess to feed 7 for 250 a month.

We have an Aldi's. they mainly sell their own brands. Most of their brands I can't eat for one reason or another.

I wasn't that impressed with Aldi's.

We also have a Lidl's right across the street.

I find Lidl's a better quality store. both are run by same parent company. one is more top notch than the other.

We purchase all our meats at Lidl's.

[Sooner]

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@SilleeMee wrote:

I spend $50 a month just on yogurt alone! ...and it's just me here, well I do share some with my dog but still.

There are no Aldi's stores here.

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@SilleeMee Have you ever made your own?  I have a cheap Dash yogurt maker that works great and I also make it in my 6 qt Instant Pot.  I use either the little 4 oz. mason jars or a quart jar or both!  I can do 2 quarts at once that way.

I guess it is a lot cheaper--but I KNOW it is better!  You can make it as tart as you like.  

[Sooner]

Out of all the stores mentioned here, the one I probably like least is Sprouts.   It's a mess and they have very little organic product, and it's not at great prices or very fresh.

They have a weird mix of items and things that I would never buy, brands I don't know, and some very common staples (can't think of them now) that you just can't find there. 

For me it has very little I'm buying. I'll add ours is always packed with cars when I go by and I know a lot of people that go there.