Disguising Price Increases(No Politics Please)

[Sue_CT]

Wow, Tormato, I don't see prices like that anywhere around here! Where are you finding those deals?

[GoDawgs]

In the immediate area (15 mile radius) there are 3 IGA's, one Ingles and a Walmart. Ingles has rather higher prices on everything so I only get stuff there when it's on sale. Their produce often sucks.

The IGA's have good meat sales but don't stock deep enough so one needs to get there the first day of the sale to make sure you get what you want before they run out. There have been a few times when a meat sale item never even arrived at the store. The meat manager said their portion was diverted to another store.

Our Walmart has the best daily prices of the three groceries on things other than meat which is not only higher in price at WalMart but also seems to come in prepackaged. The other stores cut their own so that's where I buy it. Their produce is also the most fresh but their availability has been spotty here and there lately.

[worth1]

My whole chicken was 6.5 pounds.
It's in the oven at 300F with a probe set in the breast at 150F.
The lower the cooking temperature the more even the cook.
Its simple physics.
The spatchcock thing is for real but not today.
The bird takes up the whole oven.
I also put up 12 leg thigh quarters in the freezer.
The price was higher than usual but not as high as it is if everything is separated.

[Sue_CT]

I always go for the largest bird I can find because I feel like I am getting more meat and less bone percentage wise. I would rather pay for meat. That sounds like a nice meaty bird.

[Danny]

Well, we tend to use all the bird pretty much. The skin gets eaten, the meat gets used in various ways and the bones make stock and then get crushed and deeply buried or burnt. If burnt down, added to the garden as part of the ashes. The turkey gets pretty well used up through the many means, so it is a good buy for us.

[zeuspaul]

I heard on NBC reporting today on what they called "skimpflation". This was about changing ingredients on well known products to cheaper ingredients. On the outside the products looked identical. On close inspection ingredients changed. Different oils were used or protein content would change from 50 grams to 32 grams but the overall weight of the product remained unchanged.

[Tormahto]

Wow, Tormato, I don't see prices like that anywhere around here! Where are you finding those deals?

That chicken at .34/lb at WalMart is the lowest I've seen in many, many years. One other store in the area had about the same price, but you had to buy a frozen 40 pound box. They raised the price last year, and this year they didn't stock any. I've just been extremely lucky. When there is a space in the freezer, there is a one day clearance sale at the local WalMart. When there's no space, there's no sale. Sometimes I know when there will be a possible sale, by monitoring the expiration dates on the packages. All of my freezers are full and it's almost turkey time, so I won't be buying any meat other than turkey for some time. Maybe a ham for New Years.

I think that I mentioned it before, that my eyes are accustomed to scanning for the yellow clearance stickers at WalMart. They are slightly bigger than the regular stickers, and there are no white areas on them. When I have the time, and I'm only there to pick up a couple of specific things, I cruise the aisles not even looking at the products, just the stickers. When I see the clearance sticker, then I look at the product to see if I'd ever use it. Some of the clearance items are things like Indian or Asian sauces, which I am not familiar with at all. I picked up some Boom Boom shrimp sauce marked down about 80%. If I like it, I'l write down the ingredients and attempt to make my own. Those jarred sauces can cost more than the rest of the food in a recipe.

I really lucked out the day after Halloween, half-priced candy day. I get to the candy aisle, and there's a woman at the other end of the aisle, walking towards me, carrying about a dozen small bags of Snickers bars stacked up to under her chin. On my end of the aisle are the last two LARGE bags of Snickers bars in the store, which I had picked up. She looked at me a bit sadly, because I think she knew the large bags are much more of a bargain than the small ones. At least I know that I am not alone in this world, that there are other people who specifically go to WalMart on half-priced candy day, just for Snickers bars. I also saw some chili roasted shelled pistachios, marked down from $3.28 to 25 cents. I only bought one bag because the ingredients included vinegar, which didn't sound appealing. When I tried them, I couldn't taste any vinegar, just the pistachios hot pepper, and garlic.

[worth1]

Stopped at the store yesterday can't find anything took forever to locate stuff.
This is due to rearranging the store.
Some isles looked like a 3rd world country with nothing to buy.
Totally empty.
Stopped by to look at the frozen duck and still couldn't convince myself to pay almost 30 dollars for a 6 pound duck.
Looked at turkeys and slithered on by.
Decided on a pork butt bone in.
Best bang for the buck.
Got another whole chicken too.
It really put me off wondering around seeing stuff I like for twice the price.
Finally remembered to get Fava beans but no way on earth am I going to pay almost 4 dollars for a pound of beans.
So I passed on that idea as well.
Instead I picked up 4 pounds of navy beans.
Got more frozen corn and frozen okra.
Some sweet potatoes too for whatever reason.

Late Friday evening is the worst time of the week to go grocery shopping.
Especially after driving almost 100 miles from work during a cold front coming in.
I was cold wet ticked off and tired from driving in a downpour from College Station.

[Sue_CT]

Got up early and got to Aldi's shortly after they opened. I was there yesterday looking for Ciabata rolls, and they were sold out. He said he put out all they had just two hours before I got there. Still no Ciabata rolls this morning. I did pick up a 20lb turkey for 1.07/lb though.

[worth1]

Got up early and got to Aldi's shortly after they opened. I was there yesterday looking for Ciabata rolls, and they were sold out. He said he put out all they had just two hours before I got there. Still no Ciabata rolls this morning. I did pick up a 20lb turkey for 1.07/lb though.

If you would have made the sponge the day before to make the rolls today you wouldn't have to depend on the store.
This comment is intended only in jest.
But thet really are easy to make.

[Sue_CT]

I have had ciabata rolls from a number of different places, none as good as Aldi's, and I don't know why. I wonder if they use some type of fermented or sour dough to make them. I used to make my own hamburger rolls using the King Arthur recipe and they were good. I will have to try their website for a ciabata recipe. Nothing to loose from trying it. I can always make another trip to Aldi's if they are not as good. Good suggeston, Worth.

[Sue_CT]

Just looked, none of their recipes look like what I want. Don't understand the breads caked with dry flour on top. Does not look appetizing to me at all. Their rolls are crunchy crust. The Aldi rolls are soft crust. They do have a sour dough recipe, and I bet that is what Aldi uses. But thier recipe doesn't have the holes ciabatta is supposed to have and are "flat" rolls, that mostly crust with a finer crumb.

[brownrexx]

I have seen a lot of empty spaces on shelves lately too. I also saw a quart of Hellman's mayo for $9. Luckily, I did not need mayo.

[worth1]

The sourness comes from letting the very wet sponge sit out overnight.
I picked it up from some Italian bakery chef on YouTube quite some time ago.

[Tormahto]

The local Stop & Shop again (about 20 years running) has frozen turkeys at .49/lb when purchasing an additional $25 worth of product. I'll get one today, and who knows after that.

Shelves, aisles, any open floor space, is overflowing at my local WalMart. Frozen potato products, maybe being half-filled, are the only items with a lot of shelf space that has gaps. Fresh potatoes have an extra 3 pallets, down from 4.

On a nice side-note, I saw what appeared to be a recently relocated Ukrainian family. The little girl didn't seem to be suffering from any trauma. She was wide-eyed in the cookie aisle. A bit of blocking that aisle didn't bother me in the least.

[Sue_CT]

I paid 1.07/lb for a Butterball at Aldi's, no additional purchase required though.

[bower]

I finally made the trip to the 'other' supermarket looking for flour, and scored a 5 lb bag of organic spelt flour for $15 and one of rye for $12. Speerville mill in Nova Scotia, I love their products and what a difference in price. The last spelt I bought was Anita's - they're all the way out in BC so really no surprise it was $23 for 2 kilos even before the crazyflation. that's an awful price even last year... I was expecting to pay a lot more this time, so I was really stoked to see the Speerville products!

@Sue_CT if you want a soft crust, just brush your bread with milk when you take it out of the oven. Should work with any bread recipe, afaik...

[pepperhead212]

I went to Aldi's when they opened this morning, at 9 am, and there were a lot of people there already, I guess because it was raining all day yesterday! The main thing I wanted was some more of those 85¢ avocados, plus some cilantro, but they had already set the celery price at 95¢ - the only thing on next week's ad that interested me. Usually they don't do that. I noticed some things were still way overpriced, like eggs and some dairy, but some dairy was down! Fortunately, I didn't need any of it.

The ads for all the stores had nothing good for next week. They used to have good sales for TG, but now I guess they figure people will be buying the food no matter what the prices, so why have sales?

I found it amusing that you could get a free turkey from one store...if you purchased $400 worth of junk after 10-14 (I think that was it). I wouldn't even do that since that date last year! I realize most are buying for more than one person, and many don't shop around - just one place. That's still a lot for just over a month.

[Sue_CT]

Actually, my neice does spend that much and gets those turkeys. She has a family of 4 and spends at least 150.00 a week I think she said, and that was a few years ago. Crazy.

[Danny]

Butter was on sale at our local Aldi's and even further marked down in our store. Limit six, and another lady traded out buying six more for PIC for her buying the same amount of baby food for the lady. So, 12 pounds of butter in the freezer. We use a lot of butter here so getting it at a good price was extra nice. May have PIC pick up another 6 or 12 pounds.

Off the hook for Thanksgiving cooking this year, but have sent all the main ingredients for the menudo over to Family already. Left over menudo will be canned. May also be canning turkey broth after the feast, hate to waste a good carcass.