I need to go buy groceries after being away for a week

 I don't even know what might be on sale because I haven't looked at circulars for 2 weeks (the week before the trip I needed to eat all my inventory). I am very hungry right now, so I hope I find things. Also my trip made me fat, so I hope I find healthy things.

Bravo: Frozen vegetables are 3/$4 for 14 oz bags. Those are good for fried rice. Big cans of tomato paste are 3/$7 but I'm not made out of math to divide things by 7. Seems more expensive than when they used to be 3/$6 though, so I'm not buying that out of spite. Frozen spinach is $1.5 for 14 oz.

Brooklyn Harvest Market: A 12 pack of Sixpoint Hard Seltzer is only $10. I wish they sold the cucumber ones separately because those are great and the rest are ehhh. A pound of hummus is $4, which seems like a good price, but I will just make my own. That's a good idea. Cabot Greek yogurt is $5 for 2 lbs. I haven't bought greek yogurt in a while and I can't remember if I like that brand. Bac'n bits are $2.5, which I could use for the 4th of July.

C-Town: Romaine is $1.49/lb. This is mostly a repeat of Bravo.

Food Bazaar: Limes are 9/$2. Corn tortillas are $1.5. Mussels are finally on sale! 

Scallions are 5 bunches/$2 and I should get some because mine all died when I was away. So did almost all my other food in my window boxes.

Ozzie's: Heinz BBQ sauce is $2 but nowhere ever has Carolina which is the best one. A whole cauliflower is $2.5.

Green Corner: nothing

Western Beef: nothing

I guess I should go to Mr. Piña, which doesn't have a circular that I know of.

Labor Day Deals

I assume there are some! Let's look together.

Key Food: Nine page circular. That's a good sign. I bet they have a beer rebate scam that no one can use. Cantaloupe is $1.5 (I still have a honeydew to use... but I could get another one for $2.5). Corn is $0.29 per ear, which is way less than a pirate would pay. So many cereals are on sale, for school starting I guess. I don't dabble in cereals. Hot dog buns are $1.25 so maybe I should make banh mi hot dogs again. Big Heinz ketchups are 2/$5 (must buy 2) but I might do that anyway. After the rebate (that no one can use) an 18 pack of Bud Light would be $9. Oh well. Pierogies are $2.5 for a box. Cool Whip is only $1! Time to make Koolaid Pie again!  Well, Cool Whip will last a long time, so when I find pie crusts on sale is when it is time to make Koolaid Pie. Romaine is on sale for $1 or you can get 3 for $4. Smh. "Super select" cucumbers are 3 for $2. I don't know what makes them super select but they look long. Maybe the flipped the pic with the seedless ones. Tonic water is $0.60 for a liter. A 12 pack of hard seltzer is $8 after the rebate you can't use. :-(  A pie crust is $2.49 but I am not willing to pay that.

Bravo: Plums are $0.99/lb. Mozzarella is $3 for a pound and ricotta for 2 lbs. Sweetended condensed milk is $1.69 here (it was $2.50 at Key Food). That's another important ingredient in Koolaid Pie. Pizza rolls are $2 for 40. They seem to have a bunch of the sales that C-Town had last week.

C-Town: Wishbone salad dressing is $0.79. I can use that with my pizza rolls (if I buy them). Pepsi products are 4/$5, which is what the circular said last week but it was Coke products in real life. Plums are $2.99/lb here. What a big difference. "Prune plums" are only $1.99. I looked that up yesterday because that phrase didn't make sense. It's an Italian variety.

Green Corner: Nothing much.

Ozzie's: Didn't update their website yet again.

Associated on Flatbush Avenue in Prospect Lefferts Gardens: I am going to be in this neighborhood so I will look. I got so many good deals last week. Heinz Ketchup is $2/5 but I do not have to buy 2. Coconut milk is $0.69. Cracker barrel cheese is $2. Grapefruits are $0.80 which I think is a good price.

The Weekly Sales

I didn't buy much last week, so I better find some stuff if I'm going to eat.

Green Corner: They didn't update their circular all last week. I went anyway but only got 2 cucumbers. But they already updated this week so I'm happier. Cabbage is $0.59/lb and radishes are $0.99/bunch which isn't good enough to make me go there.

C-Town: 3 liters of Colavita pure olive oil is $16. I think I have about 2.75 liters remaining in my last can though. Other people should buy that. Radishes are also here. And romaine, chicory, and escarole are all $0.99/lb. And zucchini.

Ozzie's: Cantaloupe is $1.50. I still have one I haven't cut when I bought it 2+ weeks ago. I should not get sucked in again.   Wait, this ad isn't updated. What a scam. How did they get worse than Green Corner?

Key Food: Things that are $0.99/lb: romaine, plum tomatoes, broccoli crowns, yellow peaches and nectarines, red and black plums, and bartlett pears. I'm going to buy some of those things. Corn is 3 ears for $1, and maybe I'll get that too. Tuna is $0.89/can and I realized last night I need that. Cabbage is $0.59/lb here so I definitely don't need to go to Green Corner.

Bravo: Cantaloupe is $1.50, so what I said early about Ozzie's, but timely this time. 38 oz of Heinz ketchup is $3. Maybe I will buy that because my apartment is almost out and my roommates might bring disgrace upon this apartment by buying some weird brand. Then people will come over and say "Why don't you buy Heinz?" and I am put in the awkward position of either throwing my roommates under the bus or pretending I invited that ketchup in. Or maybe they'll buy Heinz. They use it a lot more than I ever do.

Food Bazaar: I don't remember. I looked yesterday and nothing was as good as the week before and I was sad I didn't go there then.

I bought Heinz BBQ Sauce and it wasn't on sale

I was walking around after riding a bike a little bit and ended up cutting through the Food Bazaar parking lot. I wondered if they had the Heinz Carolina vinegar style bbq sauce, which is my favorite and the hardest to find. I went in, and they had it but it was $2.89 because it wasn't on sale. I bought it anyway. I also bought a Heinz yellow mustard for $2.50. I want brown but I can't find that either. Maybe it's at Western Beef.

Then I went to Kings Mart and got 2 big eggplants and 1 seedless cucumber for $1.50. The guy behind me got a pack of gum for $1 so I got the better deal.

My groceries just pile up because I don't have anyone to cook for.

What a trip to Gala Foods!

The music was so good. The first song I tried to Shazam didn't work, but I got this one. Imagine me wandering around the store listening to this.

I got many deals. I got chicken quarters for $0.49/lb, tomatillos for $0.99/lb, ice cream for $3, diet pepsi and ginger ale for $1 for 2 liters, Heinz mayo for $3, and Polly-O mozzarella for $3. I just learned that Polly-O is owned by Kraft Heinz. Here's my receipt an a picture of everything I got.

New Heinz Barbecue Sauces

I was in Western Beef yesterday (which I don't like anymore because it's not cheap anymore) and I saw Heinz BBQ sauces. Those are new. Heinz used to (still does?) make Jack Daniels sauce. Heinz merged with Kraft, which has cheap sauces. This article explains how they'll be different. (In short, Heinz ones are fancier.) I don't eat a lot of barbecue sauce and I have too many condiments in my refrigerator already, but I'd like to try the vinegary Carolina style one.

Yellow Mustard

Heinz tried reintroducing yellow mustard and getting people to pair it with their more famous ketchup. I got a bottle at Associated when it came out. Today I was browsing the mustards there in anticipation for the 4th of July and I noticed it was gone. It's been replaced by 2 or 3 new flavors of French's yellow mustard, like a chipotle one and a brown sugar one.

Cheating on C-Town

I cheated on C-Town today. With a different C-Town. My main C-Town, the one I mean when I write C-Town, is about 4 blocks from my house. It's not very big. It's produce is increasing--a while ago, it had none, then it got some cabbages, tomatoes, peppers, and lettuce on a stand in a space in the back, and now it has a real section. But the prices are gentrifying faster than I am. I still go. I like all my stores. But I find myself buying less.

Usually when I shop elsewhere, it's at Key Food, Associated, Western Beef, Food Bazaar, or Bravo. In that order of frequency or money (but not geography, because Bravo is the closest of all. It used to be called Cat Pee). With so many stores, I don't go to extra C-Towns.

But there were two forces that led me to another one this week. One is that Chase Freedom gives 5% back on groceries from April through June. June is almost over. So I should buy pasta and sardines and whatever won't go bad now. C-Town's circular said Ronzoni was $1, but when I went in twice, that wasn't true. Second, C-Town's circular said they had Heinz mayonnaise (new). I went twice, and didn't see it. If any of my other stores had had pasta this week for $1 or less, I would have just bought it there. I checked them all. None did. So I went to the other Williamsburg C-Town.

Now, I've been there many times. I used to be good friends with someone who lived near there and shopped there frequently. And since I'm an avid shopper and he was an adept cook, I accompanied him often. I didn't think much of it then. Today was different. Today I liked it because it respected the weekly circular. But it also had the best price on tomatillos I've seen ($1.49 instead of $1.69) and the best price on jalapeno peppers ($1.29 instead of $1.49). I didn't buy those things, but I liked it. It carried braunschweiger. It didn't carry Iron City. It doesn't tweet to me or have tumblr. But it's a nice store.

I bought 6 boxes of pasta (they were out of spaghetti, so I got thin spaghetti, which is worse. And I don't eat as much pasta these days). I got strawberries ($2.50), leaf lettuce ($1.59?), Heinz mayo (on sale for $2.99), Fresca ($1.67... eh), chamomile tea ($3.99? $2.99? I don't know the correct price for that, but needed it for the Gin test kitchen), and maybe something else. I don't recall. I spent $20, which is a big trip for me.

I wouldn't have bought so much, but Agnes said she'd come over for the Gin Test Kitchen and I needed to make her dinner. I had just eaten so I wasn't clever with ideas. I went for the strawberry/fennel salad I invented on Sunday. It has a bitter green  (ideally, but I used leaf lettuce today), strawberries, fennel, and red wine vinaigrette. I put some balsamic in it today too cause I had too much oil and didn't want to use the rest of the red wine vinegar. It's pretty good. Agnes agreed that it's pretty good. I forgot to serve it with pecorino romano. I bet it would be good with some croutons too. This is a salad I want to build upon and create variations of. It's the best salad I've invented since apple coleslaw.