Talk to me about grocery shopping

It always costs at least $45 for some reason. there is a checker named Bob who I am convinced is a habitual masterbater.

We go to Trader Joe's AND Albertson's (combined!). We go to the Berkeley Bowl when we are feeling flush. Andronico's is lovely (they have cigars!) but obscenely expensive.

I need to get groceries delivered.

We shop at Pathmark, and when you enter the store, you're in the middle of the store. I insist we walk all the way left and begin at aisle one, and go up and down every single aisle in order. We don't have a baby, yet I insist we go down the baby aisle - what if there's some new kind of cool-ass bendystraws, or some delicious new Pedia fruit punch drink on sale? - and so on.

It really is an event for me, I really love it. I worked overnight in a supermarket once, and despite the horrible time I had there, it did nothing to blemish my love of grocery shopping. I quit that job Half Baked-style, too, if you know what I mean. Felt mighty good. Mighty good.

I like King Kullen too. Loved A&P till it closed down. NEVER Waldbaums. NEVER.

xpost yeah C-Town sucks bad but there are good options for you not far away in Greenpoint.

andronico's isn't really all that much more expensive than other places for normal things (except that other markets have more sales or trap you with that stupid "use your discount card" shit). The produce and the lack of irritating insane people make up for it; the last time I went to Safeway I almost got in a fight. the previous time I went there, the fucking self-closing door slammed shut on me. There are always only two checkers there and 700 people there and shit all over the floor. Fuck that!

There is a small produce market on Shattuck in berkeley next to the Cheeese board that is cheap though and has produce that is as good as andronico's. unfortunately they aren't open at 11 PM when I go shopping.

http://www.levillage.com/StoreFront.bok

Somewhere on there you can subscribe and they tell you when their warehouse sale is.

now that my diet consists almost exclusively of cereal and peanut butter sandwiches it doesn't matter much how good the produce is anywhere, I admit.

We go to a handful of different stores depending when we decide to go, which one's having a sale, etc. The coolest one is probably the Metropolitan Market in West Seattle, though it's also the most expensive in the bunch. Good produce there...

I don't particularly like going grocery shopping, and I don't really think Jen does either, but we both like having a fridge full of food, so it's a constant struggle.

All I really need to do after that I pick up fresh produce and that's the Smith Farms stand, Farm Boy, or the Seal Beach farmer's market.

I forgot about Pike Place Market in Seattle. That's kinda fun as a little shopping adventure, especially if you want to pick up something tasty like crab legs or other seafood.

xpost yeah, kyle, Costco has a memebership fee. I think it's $45/year for the regular membership, and there's some other "Executive" membership nonsense that gives you like 1% cashback on purchases and is only useful if you spend an assload there.

On the other hand, Jen and I spend an assload there, so we probably should have gotten the "Executive" membership.

We load up on some stuff now that we have a bigass basement in which to store it.

Oh yeah, the bakery is kickass. Only problem is you gotta buy a fucken pallet of danishes, and there's almost no way to eat them all before some get stale unless you're feeding a small party or unless you want some serious gastrointestinal distress.

My favorite thing about Costco is that cartons of smokes are a lot cheaper there.

(x-post)
I get all my granola specs-wearing Phish loving hos at Berkeley Bowl!

no I cannot confirm. I haven't shopped there since they relocated.

Not only that, it's pretty much impossible if you eat any vegetables or drink anything like milk. I mean when a food item has a shelf-life of a week or two...

tut tut.

I love being able to shop on a daily basis. It's immensely liberating.

Me either, I'm not good at planning ahead with that sort of thing.

Gallons of milk are now something like $4 in NYC. Don't know exact figures because I never drink milk.

AND YES I THINK THE REPUBLICANS ARE BEHIND IT!

Yup. Long Beach precisely

You see, we go once ever 7-9 days. It always costs aroubd $160. What are we doing wrong?

nothing! that is cheap.

you have a car, drive it and keep the economy going! carrying groceries home is about as fun as lugging laundry across town by hand.

Autant que cela m'est permis de l'être.

First of all, I can always use the excercise. Second, if winded, I can stop for a pint on the way home. Tertio, if you're only buying some fresh vegetables or whatnot for dinner, it's really not that taxing. Of course I'm talking about walking 5 or six blocks at most.

When I lived in Hells Kitchen I had my little cart for groceries and had laundry in the building. When I lived in Carroll Gardens my apartment was over a grocery store, and I had my tiny handtruck to take my hamper to the laundromat across the street.

Ah, so many memories.

I wish I didn't care so much!

I like Shop-Rite. C-Town is so nasty.

-- gygax!

xpost: that statement is still true!

I don't know why I am suddenly on a white wine thing, I def. prefer red.

here's the new trader joes flyer... there may be some good recommendations in there:
http://www.traderjoes.com/fearless/NC.pdf

@d@ml, you met the former imports manager for Kermit-Lynch when we were all briefly sitting together upstairs at the Edinburgh Castle.

Dude with the glasses that was talking about Etta James?

Where did you get the TJ's flyer?

now i just go for diet dr pepper, beer, water and vegetables for my iguana. i was going to go tonight b/c i need to start eating yogurt again but it's raining.

when i shopped i would go to albertsons b/c whole foods is too expensive. now i usually go to fiesta because it's two blocks away and i never get more than 3 or 4 things away. i miss HEB in central texas.

close, his girlfriend.

green beans, greens, sweet potatoes, chayote squash.. stuff like that.

Is school out?

I live across the street from a cheap-stuff chain called Save-a-Lot, aka Eric Rudolph's Favorite Store (he was captured behind one), so from 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. we have a big-ass pantry and fridge available and don't have to stock up on staples. We can let ourselves run out of stuff like bread and milk completely before going out for more. This time of year there are produce stands popping up everywhere you look, so the fresh veggies are covered. For TP and laundry detergent etc, there's Sam's Club every three weeks or so. (Sam's is shit compared to Costco, which I went to back in CA and miss a lot. I'm tempted to renew my Costco membership just for the 2-3 times a year it would be convenient for me to shop at the Memphis locations.)

I miss California produce. I haven't had a decent artichoke or been to a decent farmer's market in 3 years. But I can't complain about the tomatoes here.

yes. i have two months to decide if i'm returning. so far my iguana chingy has offered no advice. i'm thinking of downgrading him to iceburg lettuce.

Well, it's June and I haven't had any decent heirlooms yet.

Iguana chingy?

i'm sure clarkeb would agree.
-- gygax! (gygax0...), June 8th, 2004.

Oh, it's good drinking *anytime* of the year -- why wait for summer for something so otherworldly delicious? A caveat: Alsatian Gewurztraminers can be big and blowsy, coming on a bit too luscious and rich for their own good. These wines need dagger-like acidity to balance their richness, which Trimbach's always seem to have in spades, but some do not. I'm a Riesling freak admittedly, but Alsatian Riesling can be an eye-opening experience. These are some of the only white wines that can age and age and age. It's really neat, too, to see how Alsatian whites evolve -- like most white wines, they start life fairly pale in color, but after four or five years in bottle, top Alsatian rieslings turn a deep, evocative gold, and reveal layers and layers of amazing flavor.

OK hasn't anyone addressed this? Cat litter ie JUNK FOOD? Where is Dan?

Anyway I hate the grocery store near me, kind of. Manhattan grocery stores are the sketchiest shit going half the time. They don't stock the same things on a regular basis and the produce is half bad half the time. I actually really liked Fairway when I lived by Lincoln Center but that seems quite far now...though I keep getting tempted to go.

I do like grocery shopping, but not in Manhattan so much. I kind of wish freshdirect.com would hurry up and deliver to my neighborhood already.

I go to Key Foods on Grand to pick up stuff on the way and I also hit all the discount cheeses, crackers, coffee at E. Village Cheese shop to set me up for the week.

For instance I get a real kick out of bargain hunting in the discount stores (such as Poundstretcher, or more recently the even better 99p Store!!) for household items such as cleaning products/saran wrap/dustbin bags etc. I don't see the point of spending a fortune on things like that.

At the other end of the scale, I like to buy organically-reared meat from the Farmer's Markets - the quality is far superior to anything you could buy in a supermarket - but it's correspondingly more expensive. I'll sometimes buy vegetables from the Farmer's Markets too, or from the local Pick-Your-Own Farm, but I grow a lot of veg in my own garden so most seasonal stuff is taken care of at home. Likewise I have a few chickens running around in the back garden so I hardly ever have to buy eggs, and I bake my own bread (in a breadmaking machine - it's so easy!) so don't often need to buy any.

There's an excellent cheese shop in the covered market in Oxford, and I'll go there every few weeks and stock up. Wine is usually bought in bulk a few times a year on a booze-cruise to Calais. I also have my favourite Chinese supermarket and an Indian grocery store - excellent for buying interesting spices etc very cheaply.

I'm not stuck in an office all day at work because my job takes me out and about a lot, so I get the chance to nip into all sorts of different shops all over the county fairly regularly. I couldn't imagine doing a one-off monthly shop in one supermarket - how dull would that be?

I don't really miss grocery shopping in any of the places I lived in NYC at all. Especially not being beholden to the Food Emporium on 42nd & 10th as the only nearby supermarket. That place sucked a fat one.

dude! brighton beach! astoria! chinatown! you've gotta hit the ethnic neighborhoods for the good produce.

in brooklyn heights there's garden of eden, where the produce always looks gorgeous and is displayed proudly in bins outside the store. expensive, though.

rasheed otm re the key food across from southpaw.

Chorus

That is what I have to say about Grocery Shopping!

i bought cat litter, coffee, kleenex, zuchinni, toffee bits, ibuprofin, and odwalla breakfast bars. $40!

Maybe we'll go tonight. We got some burritos from Cancun and watched The Sopranos.

these were your two high-dollar items, I'd bet.

xpost

these were your two high-dollar items, I'd bet.

no! odwalla bars were a dollar each. The cat litter is $11 (we have to get the silicone crystal stuff) and the coffee is $12 (Peet's). I spend more money on stuff for my cats to shit on than I do on breakfast.

That thing at Columbia is even considered any type of market? It's about 5 stands, most of which just sell breads. And the one on Columbus/77th is actually an antique fair with 5 or 6 produce stands mixed in. Neither of these have ever struck me as particularly impressive and often by midday the produce doesn't look so hot, thanks to being outdoors in the humidity for hours and hours I would assume. Just a word of warning, I suppose.

I live in an ethnic neighborhood but the produce here is a bit sketchy off and on, I'm assuming due to the fact that the bodega owners don't really give much of a shit since most of their business actually seems to be people buying beer.

Fairway honestly never seemed that bad for produce but I don't fancy the idea of going down there in this weather and then carrying back 4 or 5 bags, esp. since the 1/9 is the closest line to there and I fucking hate the 1/9, cos my subway stop utilizes the dreaded ELEVATOR ONLY approach to the 1/9 ie 400 people in one elevator=crushed bags. If I had a car or for some reason the city moves the A/C over 5 blocks or so, I'd be so set though.

xpost this is why living in the outer boroughs is better sometimes, I just hate toting back that many bags over the subway.

I wish I lived near a greenmarket, but then again I never cook. I buy all of my $6 tomatoes here.

I go to the store every day now because it is one block away. This is very inefficient.

Wal-Mart Supercenter has a decent selection of food items and one can conceivably get almost everything one wants there, but part of my attraction to that chain is that their canned vegetables are simply the best canned vegetables around. I am *so* spoiled by the store brand canned corn and green beans, that I can't have anything else. Their canned corn tastes remarkably like the corn kernels that come off a lightly grilled and crunchy ear of corn, and if one just adds a dash of salt and a little freshly cracked black pepper to the green beans, they are the next best thing to fresh.

I love that I can get "exotic" things at Super Target. Like, I've spotted Edamame in the produce section and, in the refrigerated section, pesto sauce and grated parmesan cheese. Aside from that... well, one could find pretty much the same things at the Wal-Mart Supercenter at lower prices. (And I've also found Edamame, pesto sauce, and grated parmesan at H-E-B, so....)

Sam's Club is great for when I want to get meat. Lots and lots and lots of meat. Tons of ground beef for about $11, lots of pork chops, tons of poultry, etc. Although one could conceivably go mad when it comes to the regular groceries -- one time, we picked up a container of mayonnaise and it lasted us about five months. Never again. We still have six cans of chili we got about a month ago, too. But -- oh! They do have really neat things in the frozen foods aisles, and the avocados they sell are delicious. And their baked goods are always tempting, and I've never gone wrong with one of their bundt cakes, and it's actually the place where I got my computer (for a steal!), so it's good.

We always go to the groceries about once a week, making sure never to run out of anything. Okay, so we'll run out of sodas, sometimes run out of bread and eggs, sometimes be down to the last box of rice, and sometimes have an inexplicable need for ice cream or a certain type of cereal, but pretty much everything else will be available to us at any time.

I like going to Farm Boy and Trader Joe's because I get to drive over a bridge and pass a marina to do so, and drive along Ocean Ave on the way home--it is rather scenic.

I really do split up my shopping like this, because quality of ingredients is important to me. Like Dee, when much meat is needed, I go to CostCo, (Sam's competition) and love their giant salmons that make me think of sexy Canadian citizenship.

The Safeway here does home delivery. As a person with no car, I am in love! I can drink all the fucking milk I want now.

Veggies/fruits/nuts = farmer's market
Proteins = i piggyback on to my bro's restaurant orders every 2-3 weeks (salmon, fluke, ribeye, pork shoulder or loin, veal sausages, whole chickens, usually)
Spices, seasonings, grains, starches, bulk = local co-op

I hit Costco for flats of Nutella 2x a year

I miss Costco -- Sam's is a poor substitute.

People who can get groceries delivered: what's the delivery surcharge, if any? What do you tip?

The delivery was $13 if I wanted to request a two-hour window for delivery, or $7 for a four-hour window. The email announced that "our friendly drivers accept no tips!"

In Boise, it was $5 for delivery from Albertson's, but that was in 2005 & the price may have risen since then.

having your groceries delivered sounds glamorous!

there is a "super fresh" store near me that underwent a makeover a year ago i suspect in part to compete with the nearby whole foods. anyhow, the place is awesome, pleasant low-key lighting, great deals, nice employees, attractive shoppers, etc

i usually buy all my vegetables, tofu in chinatown or at vietnamese market

once in a while i will visit trader joe's and pick up tempeh, olive oil...

occasional forays to indian grocer for spices or frozen treats

going grocery shopping is one of the greatest pleasures in my life. not exactly sure why

I think grocery shopping is very exciting, but also soothing! I love it too. I just hate carrying home milk, cans, dog food, other heavy stuff, with my bare arms. I think this delivery guy might have my dream job, actually, just grocery shopping & driving all day.

People who can get groceries delivered: what's the delivery surcharge, if any? What do you tip?

i don't get groceries delivered very often, but vons will deliver within a 4-hour window for about $10 (i think for a minimum purchase of $50).

i just got back from a trip to the supermarket actually... tonight i'm making breaded eggplant with mushroom sauce and ricotta.

I think this delivery guy might have my dream job, actually, just grocery shopping & driving all day.

i used to think that being the staffer who holds the queue starts here sign/s at trader joes would be a dream job: in a grocery store; pointing people in the right direction; insulated from a lot of other supermarket hassle; customer smalltalk. then i realised that you'd be stuck perpetually experiencing the feeling of being at the end of a queue, without even that pleasing queuer's schadenfraude of having a bunch of people behind you who'd wait longer.

grocery shopping is a pleasure though. i get option paralysis but like being in such a high-density environment.

A Sprouts Farmers Market is opening in town and their flyer promises "Better produce than Trader Joe's, better prices than Whole Foods." I see they're Arizona based and spread over the Southwest. Anyone have any experience with their quality?

weren't they wild oats?

*googles*

ok maybe not

there's a Sprouts a couple blocks from my house. i would agree about the prices, but not about the produce

I think this delivery guy might have my dream job, actually, just grocery shopping & driving all day.

ha, yeah, you might be onto something there!

going grocery shopping is one of the greatest pleasures in my life. not exactly sure why

― dell (del), Wednesday, July 28, 2010 8:05 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark

OTM, grocery shopping is my favorite thing in the world

grocery shopping is a pleasure though. i get option paralysis but like being in such a high-density environment.

yeah, maybe you've put your finger there on what i find so pleasurable about it.

but i get o.p. in a terrible way, too. i am the most boring shopper ever. rice, pasta, beans. maybe cheese? the occasions on which i buy something "fun" or unexpected like snack foods or ice cream or some processed junk seem far and few between. i appreciated shopping w/my exgf b/c she was the complete opposite and would parade through the aisles like a drunken sailor in a brothel or a sugared-up 10-year old. in that sense we were a good pairing

OTM, grocery shopping is my favorite thing in the world

dude, i go shopping like almost every night. it's not even funny.

haha I'm pretty sure I'm going to end up like one of those old people who spend all day clipping coupons and has an encyclopedia of grocery store prices in their heads

yeah, i have memorized prices to a degree that i never would have imagined, and sometimes i quote deals to ppl and begin to feel like i'm their grandma or something

Haha, yes! All the best conversations I have with my mom are about grocery prices, either bitching how the price of an item has increased, or sharing sweet deals. "Mom, I just got three pomegranates for $1!" "I raised you right, honey." It's nice to have someone to share this with because I do think about it an awful lot, too. Like, I get excited when the circulars come in the mail.

we are waking early tomorrow to go buy lobster tails from pathmark because they're on sale (eithe 399 or 499 per lb, or per tail - I forget!)

I was angry earlier today because aldi raised the prices on their bag of avocados from 2.29 to 2.99!!

thursday is always in my mind b/c it is the last day to take advantage of the week's sales! oh and friday is when the new sales start!

kinda wish i lived closer to an aldi

I have discovered Grocery Outlet and it's kinda cool

A few months back I got a box of 6 luna bars for $4 ... Mr Veg eats canned soup and I can get those for $1.50 compared to $3+ at the supermarket...and Kashi frozen entrees for like $2

the wines are apparently p good too, though we have like 4 unopened bottles rn so it'll be a while before I investigate those

also I kind of love grocery shopping in general -- but only if it's a once weekly expedition with a list. I hate having to go multiple times during the week

i love it in general, but in the i-try-to-go-everyday way. i probably don't have my shit together enough to work things out with a list & move crazy quantities of things back to my place anyway, but it being a fifteen minute window in my day is nice. calculating routes home in conjunction with your mental map of where sells what.

ha ha i was just thinking yesterday of starting a grocery routine thread but then was like "nah too boring"

also I kind of love grocery shopping in general -- but only if it's a once weekly expedition with a list. I hate having to go multiple times during the week

― set the controls for the heart of the sun (VegemiteGrrl), Monday, October 8, 2012 5:02 PM (17 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this is like exactly how i feel.

my favorite thing to do in any new place I visit, or maybe just anywhere I am, is to go to a supermarket and wander the aisles

ugh, get in, get the stuff on yr list, get out

markets are a different deal tho

and cheese shops and bakeries, etc, you know

I still do the thing my Mum used to do, which is write yr list based on where everything is in the store.

And new grocery stores are my favorite thing.

The only thing I hate is that I have 2 main stores I do most of my groceries at - a Safewy, and a co-op for bulk grains etc...but if I want somethingk like coconut milk then only Savemart on the other side of town has the brand I like! jerks

My family used to do the main shopping every other week, and my dad coming home with the groceries was a big event (cookie supply replenished, yeah! sweet cereals, yeah!) I recently remembered that we bought 12 half-gallon cartons of milk on the trips (they came in 6-pack cardboard boxes), and it was the top shelf of the fridge was almost all milk. Mind boggling compared to the amount I buy now (that was 5 kids, though).

I'm a Trader Joe's 2-3 times a week guy now, and there's one on the way home so it's very convenient.

does anyone else get a weird sense of comfort when walking in a grocery store that if some kind of catastrophic/apocalyptic event happens you're in about the best place to be, maybe even better than some bunker underneath the whitehouse?

I live in a suburb with many middle class and professional residents, so naturally the grocery stores around here have good fresh produce and frequent price-cutting inducements to lure these well-off shoppers in the door. Poor people should be so lucky. Which is kind of crazy, but that is how it works irl.

I do my damnedest to make rational use of these resources, by making a menu once a week that takes note of what is cheap and on sale, by shopping from a list, and by stocking up our pantry when prices are especially good. I have a vehicle, so I can travel a circuit of three different stores in about 5.5 miles, targeting each one for the best deals and best food.

We eat very well for about $500/mo. A lot of fresh organic produce. Whole grains, legumes. Bakery bread. Usually not factory-farmed meat, although we do eat some. Wine, though it is extremely ordinary stuff, most nights. I could bring that bill down much closer to $400/mo, if my wife didn't have some strong food preferences that increase our total costs.

I am kind of proud of my above-average prowess. (preens self)

that all sounds preenable. i am very "strong food preferences" about a lot of stuff, but for the most part it's things i feel totally okay about not economising on; like if you buy tea or bread or basically anything that comes in multiple-units, you're spending money on stuff that you're going to appreciate or resent the quality of on like ten or fifty different occasions, so it's worth springin for. a bunch of stuff i eat - beans, say, or grains - is so cheap when you add up how much it costs per serving that it's okay to get the nice option.

my favorite thing to do in any new place I visit, or maybe just anywhere I am, is to go to a supermarket and wander the aisles

― barthes simpson, Monday, 8 October 2012 18:23 (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

for real. it's the area with the highest-intensity of small differences.

i have the luxury of having no kids to feed and no major monthly expenses (except rent and health insurance; i don't own a house and don't have a car), so i like being a little spendy with grocery shopping. i'm a food person; i believe you can/should eat like a mensch even if you don't have a lot of money.

yeah mr veg got into into organic (aside from his weird obsession with canned soup for lunch) ...so now the routine is - farmers market in the morning, then to safeway for basics like kleenex and meat, then to the co-op for bulk grains and hippy shit and other organic whatever.

I'm trying to cut back our grocery bill, and the farmer's market has saved us about 50% compared to what the co-op was charging for most of their produce. no matter how much I would *like* to buy organic meat, meat's expensive enough as it is, so we only do organic for special occasions.

but we're spending $100-$150 a week. we don't eat out at all, we make our own lunches, make our own coffee, the whole nine. So I feel okay spending a little more here and there. I would like to spend less but I'm not stressing about that right now..and I know in the back of my mind that if I had to really slash at the bill, I could. But I still get kind of a buzz from bargains so that's where my Grocery Outlet adventures come in

my favorite thing to do in any new place I visit, or maybe just anywhere I am, is to go to a supermarket and wander the aisles
for real. it's the area with the highest-intensity of small differences.

my people

I can't believe someone app-economied No Frills

https://brandless.com/

ha! that's ridiculous.

so generic

I love grocery shopping, hate pretty much every other type of shopping

i live a block away from a 24hr supermarket and sometimes just go there at odd hours to browse for interesting stuff if I'm bored

i enjoy grocery shopping when it's not too crowded
and when they're not playing bad music

I drive from Mississippi to Atlanta for groceries a couple of times a year. Buford Highway Farmers Market and Dekalb Farmers Market always, H-Mart in Duluth and Patel Brothers usually, Trader Joe's, Patak's Meats in Austell and Total Wines in Kennesaw (or Green's on Ponce) occasionally. Next week is my next trip.

I love grocery shopping, hate pretty much every other type of shopping

^^this.

i don't understand when people are at grocery store listening to headphones, and not earbuds but huge noise-reduction headphones.

mostly because it looks silly.