Before we get to this week’s grocery deals, I want to ask you a question.
Has the rapidly changing techology changed the way you prepare and cook a meal? It didn’t occur to me that it had until I saw this New York Times article proposing that cookbooks may be obsolete.
The article focuses on new smart phone apps that offer an endless supply of recipes and step-by-step video instructions on how to prepare just about anything. I don’t have these apps (yet) but it got me thinking about the way I cook.
Over the years, I have accumulated dozens of cookbooks that focus on all kinds of recipes — everything from the catch-alls like Betty Crocker to the specific, like Lebanese or Thai cooking. But I rarely look at any of them anymore.
Instead, if what I want to cook is not something I make all the time, I go to the internet to look up recipes. This worries me because it feels like I’m turning my back on all my trusted cookbook friends and instead going to strangers for help.
I’ll have to change my ways. At least until I can afford one of those cool smart phone apps!
Anyway, let’s start saving some money!
In the produce section, Cermak Produce has plum tomatoes and cauliflower both for $.49/lb. Food 4 Less has white onions for $.33/lb. Ultra Foods has California navel oranges for $.40/lb. Pete’s Produce Market has Mexican avocados for $.49/ea. Tony’s Finer Foods, at 8630 S. Harlem Ave., in Bridgeview, has green or red peppers for $.99/lb.
Fresh Pick Market, at 8749 S. Ridgeland Ave., in Oak Lawn, has broccoli crowns for $.69/lb, bananas for $.39/lb, cabbage for $.19./lb, carrots for $.33/lb and iceberg lettuce for $.69/ea.
The Florida citrus crop is in! Tony’s has Florida red grapefruit for $.49/lb; and Fresh Pick has tangerines for $.69/lb.
In the meat department, Pete’s has split chicken breasts in the family pack for $.98/lb; Tony’s has drumsticks for $.69/lb; Ultra has Perdue whole frying chickens for $.68/lb; and both Cermak and Fresh Pick have chicken leg quarters for $.59/lb.
F4L has beef shanks for $1.78/lb; and Tony’s has pork butt roast for $1.69/lb.
In the grocery aisle, Aldi’s has house brand stuffing mix for $.89/box. Both Pete’s and Freshline Foods, at 5355 W. 95th St., in Oak Lawn, have assorted Centrella canned vegetables for only $.44/ea.
In the baking supply aisle, Cermak has 5 lb sacks of all-purpose flour for $1.50 and 2 lb bags of powdered sugar for $2. Pete’s has a 4 lb sack of Domino sugar for $2.49. Ultra has Carnation evaporated milk for $.99/12 oz can. And Tony’s has Red Star yeast 3-packs for $.99.
In the dairy section, Tony’s has Grade A large eggs for $.99/dozen. Aldi’s has house brand cream cheese or Neufchatel for $.89/package. F4L has 1 lb tubs of Kroger sour cream for just $1. And Cermak has Imperial margerine for $.79/lb.
In the frozen foods aisle, Freshline has Green Giant vegetables for $.99/bag.
In the deli, Freshline has Scott Petersen Braunschweiger for $1.99/lb. You know me and liver sausage!
Finally, for this week’s Bargain of the Week, it’s back to F4L, where a 5 lb sack of russet potatoes is only $.78, less than $.15/lb. Mashed potatoes, here we come!
On a sad note, Dominick’s is closing its Oak Lawn store. Although the prices there were always really high, I feel sorry for the nice people who worked there. They always made it an enjoyable place to shop.
If you see an outstanding grocery bargain, please share it in the comments section below. We’re all in this together. See you at the grocery store!
Budget Cooking Blog 
On the subject of cookbooks, I’ve posted about it on my own blog before, and I think they aren’t becoming obsolete at all – the things which end up online, and videos and such are nice for specifics, but nothing beats leafing through a real paper book for inspiration, and going back to basics or checking on a style of a specific writer whom you like. I think there is space for both, the internet and paper books out there.
I’m certainly not going to cease buying the paper books. We already have huge walls of bookshelves between bf and I, and our books are going nowhere! Neither is my love of cooking!
P.S. Doubt grocery bargains in Stockholm would help, but I adore small fruit and veg street stalls – you can find interesting things there, and often not too expensively either! 🙂 Kudos on the post!
I love my cookbooks. I do still use them occasionally and I’m sure I’ll never completely abandon them. The internet is just so easy to use! And I’m dying to try out some of those apps that the NYT article mentioned.
Hope you use sliced onion on your liver sausage.Mmmmmm
Interesting that you consider the recipe source as part of the technology you use to cook.
I haven’t made that association.
My girl and I get our recipes from cookbooks, magazines and the internet. When we find something we like, we copy/cut out/print it and put it in our recipe binder, so we can find it again.
That book is getting more and more full every month. We just had to get a 2nd one recently…
I totally have lots of stained pages in my kitchen and all over the house. I only meant that my behavior has changed: My first impulse is to look online if I decide, for example, to make zucchini bread. I think these apps will change everything, though. When iPads cost less than $100 and everyone has them, like iPhones, cookbooks will become archaic, like newspapers.
I’m happy to have found your blog. It’s interesting to learn of differing food prices in the country. It sounds that prices in your area are lower than where I shop in New Hampshire.
I’m sure it depends where you shop. The big stores around here — Jewels and Dominicks are the local brands but Safeway and Albertson’s are their parent companies — have scandalously high prices. Even their sale prices are ridiculous. There has been a recent increase in smaller chains that tend to be more ethnically focused and are less expensive. Also, the privately owned markets sometimes have great prices.
New Hampshire is lovely, by the way. I passed through the Green Mountain region years ago and still have really fond memories.
I think you should move to my town and do this. Ha ha. Just kidding. But I love these posts. -Beth WA
They are one of my favorite to write, but until I can find a way to promote them locally, I think they are among the least popular. Okay, the blogs about couponing and grocery shoppint tips were the least popular. But I think they have the most potential to really help people struggling to make ends meet.
FYI: I’m considering breaking them off into a separate blog, but I’m afraid I’ll lose what little readership I have for them. Any thoughts?