What's on sale? I'm back after traveling

I've barely been around for a month and I wasn't shopping intensely before either of my trips. Now my refrigerator is fairly empty and I need to shop.

In Pittsburgh I did get banana peppers for 25¢ each and hatch chiles for $5 for 18 oz, so those are in my refrigerator and I need to use and/or freeze them. I can never find hot banana peppers in NYC.

Bravo White tuna is 3/$4

C-Town Cracker barrel cheese are $2.50 for 8 oz. Often I find deals on Ibotta for $1 back, which makes them $1.50 and quite a good deal. Jif peanut butter is $2.69, which after recent inflation, is a pretty good price. The tuna deal is here too.

Food Bazaar I'm still mad at them, but I will look because I might like to get salmon. In Pittsburgh at Giant Eagle, I got a piece of salmon for $6/lb and I dry cured it. It's $10/lb at Food Bazaar. Coke products are 3/$5 for 2 liter bottles. Can of coconut milk are 4/$5.

Foodtown (fka Brooklyn Harvest Market) London broil is $4/lb. A jar of mayo is $4. Pepsi 2-liters are 3/$5. Kraft shredded cheeses are $2 (and on Ibotta for another $0.50 off). Seltzers are 5/$3 per liter.

Green Corner Four pound boxes of shrimp for $3.50/lb.

Ozzie's Sardines 5/$4.

What is on sale? (Pre-Thanksgiving)

 So many stores to review these days. I specifically need to buy coffee, so I need to look through every circular, so I might as well take notes. I need eggs too. In the past week, I bought 100 pizza rolls and 2 lbs of frozen french fries, so I need to avoid more frozen food.

Ozzie's: coffee? but it says i need a card and i have refused to ever get a card here (even though i got one for BHM immediately). Boneless chicken breasts are $1.79/lb.

Brooklyn Harvest Market: Broccoli is 99c/lb. Both 7-up products and Coke products are 4/$5 for 2 liter bottles, but you have to buy 4 and that's a lot to commit to. A pound of mozzarella or 2 lbs of ricotta for $1.99 and $2.99 respectively. Lasagne (the noodles) is only $1.24. I think I need lasagna. I am Garfield. Hellmann's mayo is $2.99 "with digital coupon" but I don't see it. So I don't trust it. Bacon bits are $1.99, but they were not on the shelf when I looked last week. Vintage seltzer is $0.60/liter. I wonder if that includes tonic water. A box of 15 pizza rolls is on sale for $2. Last week, I got a bag of 50 for $2.50. That circular is so long. And I found the mayo digital coupon.

Food Bazaar: This circular is back up to 6 pages. I don't really want to look because I'm not going to go there this week. I can get Coke for $1. Ricotta is $4 for 2 lbs here. A dozen clams is $4. I never buy them, but maybe it would be nice. Bags of pizza rolls are $5 here. I sure got a good deal last week. Limes are 11/$2. Who can do that kind of math?!

Western Beef: I am unlikely to go here, but I do need eggs and jarred red peppers. They have the coffee I want (Cafe Bustelo 10 oz brick for $2). Too much of their circular is dedicated to meat and their prices for meat aren't that good. Limes are 10/$20 here, which is easier math but more expensive than Food Bazaar. Ricotta is $4. 100 pizza rolls are $10 here.

Bravo: nothing

C-Town: Mayo is $3 with a $25 purchase, but I can't even carry $25 of food. Ricotta is $4 and mozzarella is $3. Cream cheese is $1.50. I may go for that.

Green Corner: Limes are 20/$2 here. I can do that math and it's a good price. Chicken breasts are $1.49/lb here. Ricotta is $4 and mozzarella $3.33.

Key Food: Avocados are still $0.49 and they have been so good every time I get them. So I will get more. Mozzarella is 2 lbs for $3. Wow. Cafe Bustelo is 2/$5 if I don't want to bike all the way to Western Beef. Mayo is $3 here without needing a digital coupon. Buttermilk is $2.

I'm hungry.

Memorial Day sales during coronavirus time

Food Bazaar's ad is back! It's only 4 pages (used to be 6) but it's back. Jumbo shrimp are $9/lb. Hamburger and hot dog buns are $0.79. 4 lbs of frozen hamburgers are $8 and hot dogs are $1. Celery is $1. I haven't been to Food Bazaar since this started, but I'm happy about this.

C-Town has been back for 2-3 weeks, but with only one page of sales. I haven't been there in forever.

Key Food has been publishing its sales and has been good at actually having the things on sale in the store. I'll look at that circular now. Peaches are $1/lb. A peach in May though? (I usually make them into salads, so it would work. It makes use of its firmness and tartness.) Cracker barrel cheese are $2. (I doubt those will actually be on sale.)  Hot dog and hamburger buns are $1.25. Coke products are $4/4. Hellman's mayo is $3.49.

The Sales

Let's see what's on sale this week. Besides the parmesan from my last post. Today's also the day that Trump's tariffs go into effect. I might go stock up on liqueurs before that filters through the supply chain.

Ozzie's: They finally updated their online circular! So I will do them first. Several meats have ok prices: beef liver, london broil, chicken breasts, pork butt. All 3 types of pears are $0.99/lb. (Bosc, anjou, and bartlett. The 3 main types you ever see. I don't know the difference between any.) Green cabbage is 29¢/lb. Wow. Hellman's mayo is $4.50. Yesterday I saw that one of my roommates threw the nearly empty jar of mayo (there was still some left!) in the garbage (didn't even recycle it!) so now I'm on the hunt for more. $4.50 isn't good enough. Parmesan is on sale here too. I don't know if $12.99/lb is more or less than 30% off then 10% off at Whole Foods. I guess I'll go find out.

Food Bazaar: Red peppers are $1/lb. Mussels are $3 for 2 lbs. A 5 lb bag of grapefruit is $4.

Bravo: nothing good

C-Town: Yeast is on sale for $1.50. I have old yeast and tried making focaccia and it didn't rise at all. So maybe I will spend $1.50 so I only have new yeast around. Or maybe I'll try the less old yeast first.

Key Food: This circular isn't online. Maybe the sales are the same as at Ozzie's.

Green Corner: This isn't updated yet.

Western Beef: I looked at this, but there's nothing good.

The sales this week

I really ought to go buy olives and maybe tahini at Parrot Coffee. But this is limited to my local stores. I also bought 2 eggplants and 1 seedless cucumber for $1.50 at King Mart yesterday, and I made baba ghanoush so I should get something to eat that with.

Green Corner: Limes are still a dime. I bought 5 last night. Peaches and jalapeños are both $0.99/lb so maybe I should make peach-o de gallo. I got 2 serrano peppers last night though and made salsa verde. I don't know how many salsas I should have. A bag of yellow onions is $1.25

Ozzie's: Hellman's mayo is $3. A watermelon is $3. The last time I bought one it took too long for me to eat, but I might get another anyway. A dozen large eggs is $0.89. I should make another dozen hard boiled ones. I steam them in a metal colander now.  Oooh extra large eggs are $1. Heavy cream is $1.50. I could make ice box cakes if I find fresh fruit, which shouldn't be hard. Vintage tonic water is $0.60 for a liter bottle. A can of tomato juice is $1.69. I should have brunch. Lots of good stuff at Ozzie's.

C-Town: Salad dressing is $0.79. I need ranch for all my pizza rolls. Cranberry juice is $2.5, but I fell for this a couple weeks ago and they didn't actually have it. Romaine is $0.99/lb. I think that is good, but I don't know how much a head of romaine weighs. If it's 1 lb, that is good.

Bravo: "slicing tomatoes" are $0.99/lb which I would like, but Bravo never has good tomatoes. Sweetened condensed milk is $1.5, so I can finally make kool-aid pie.

Key Food: Iceberg lettuce is $1. They advertise a 12-pack of Miller or Coors after rebate but this store doesn't know how to do rebates. The egg sale from Ozzie's is also here. So is the tonic water. Heinz bbq sauce. I am still looking for vinegar carolina style.

The end of the selling period

I was just at Bravo to buy some heavy cream to make an icebox cake. I don't know why they always have the cheapest heavy cream, but they do. While I was there, employees started going around taking down all the sale tags for the deals that end 8/9. That really stressed me out! Even someone who writes a grocery blog and looked at the circular 10 times this week doesn't have all the deals memorized. I got as little as possible to meet the credit card minimum ($7... another thing that stresses me out) and left.

Besides the heavy cream (1 pint for $2.50), I got Krasdale mayo ($1.99 for 30 oz), frozen corn ($1.25), and Sprite Zero ($1.34).

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.

Memorial Day Grocery Sales

I hope they have good ones. That Key Food beer deal was a scam, because Key Food didn't have rebates. Just a sign about rebates. They eventually put something up for getting a Coors rebate, but nothing else. That deal is back again this week.

I guess I'll start with Key Food. A big bottle of Heinz ketchup (38 oz) is $2.50. Memorial Day is good for condiments. They have Hellman's on sale, but I want Heinz mayo, which is hard to find. I wanted to do a project at school researching why Heinz and Kraft both had mayo brands after their merger, but I had to do it on Starbucks instead. Breakstone cottage cheese is $2.50, which is a good price for that if you only eat that brand. I find that still too expensive, but I know someone who cares. Peaches are $1.47/lb. They probably aren't very good in May, but I also like using peaches in savory applications (i.e. salads with corn) and having sour hard peaches works ok then. Spike's salsa is $1.50/jar, which is good, but then I have to eat tortilla chips.

That's it for Key Food. They like all my pictures on Instagram about food, so maybe I'll ask them why they scam me about beer.

Associated: Peaches are $1.49 here--2 cents more. Various incorrect ketchups are on sale at irrelevant prices. 16 oz of sausage is $2.99, which might be good. These sales were not very good.

Bravo: 38 oz of Heinz ketchup for $2.49. I don't go through ketchup that quickly anymore since my little boy exroommate moved out, but I still might get some. B&G stuff is on sale. It was at Key Food too. I guess it's pickle time. 2 liter Fresca (and other Coca-cola products) are $1.25. Fresca is good. I heard that LBJ liked it too.

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.

Healthy Ham Salad Recipe

My brother posted this on Facebook.

People in New York don't seem to have ham salad. They're missing out. I love it, even the mayo kind. I love mayo though.