Hey everyone, still around, just really not active. I think twitter killed giving me things to blog about I swear. Anyways though not a whole lot has been going on except a lot of misfortune job and financially in my family, so I'm not really gonna blog about that. We did however do some spring cleaning a couple weeks ago and I'm getting rid of a lot of stuff. Srsly just giving it away. I've got like a whole box of gashapon (mostly bleach) that can just find a new home. So yah if there are any bleachers still out there that happen to read this, drop me a line, I know I've got hundreds of dollars worth of stuff but it's not worth my time attempting to sell it so you can have it.
Anyways though the thing I was going to blog about because I wanted to document it somewhere. Around here in DFW Aldi grocery stores are going in EVERYWHERE! We've officially had one open up here in Garland and we took a trip last weekend and fully intend for it to be the first stop from now on on our grocery days.
For those that don't know, Aldi is originally a chain from Germany and seems like where they are going in they're taking America by storm. Everything's a little different. They have super low prices, mainly just their own brands of food and merchandise, some things limited supply. Now usually one thinks "yuck off brand", I myself am always for trying something just to see how bad it is and if for the lower price I could get used to it. Over the last couple of years me and L have tried our way through several of the Target off brand foods and found some of it you can only buy in their brand, and some of it is better than name brands of that same product. Aldi is already turning out that way for us...
So for those that have heard of Aldi 2 of the main "weird" things are that you pay a quarter for a shopping cart and you have to bring your own bags.
Well the shopping carts are set up kidna neat. On the handle is a small device where you put your quarter. Once you put it in it unlucks the cart from the one in it's connected to by a little chain and thing that are connected to the device. Now if you know better (which our friend we went with did), make sure you take your cart back to the cart area after taking stuff to your car, or take your stuff out in it, put it back and then carry stuff to your car cause you will get your quarter back when you reconnect it to the other carts.
The bag, deal, really they're just trying to encourage using reusable bags and that sort of thing, but they also offer paper, plastic and reusable bags for purchase. This idea also allows them to keep their prices lower because the cost of bags are not configured into your items you are buying like at other grocery and retail stores.
So we stuck our quarter in the cart and went on in. The place really has a lot for being as small as it is. There was anything you could want seriously. Overall prices were really good and pretty low except for the chicken was about normal price it is everywhere bacon and lunch meat were kinda on teh highside, and while a lot of their produce looked great, they did not have good looking broccoli (it was all prepacked and stuff and not completely fresh. These were the only complaints we had really, but we found a lot of good stuff for good prices and a lot of stuff I've never found anywhere else.
Now to the breakdown. I'm gonna give you my receipt list and then below I'm gonna go into detail about a lot of the products we purchased
ALDI Large Eco Bag $1.99
Chocokookie Cereal $1.89
Take 'N Bake Bread $1.69
Stufd Shls/Mctti $2.29
Shredded Co-Jack $2.29
Variety/Choc Donut $1.59
Breaded Fish Strip $2.99
Battered Fish Tend $2.99
Bacon Wrp Bf Filet x2 $1.79 ea
Center Pork Chops $4.58
Chicken Entree $3.99
Toasted Ravioli $2.69
BBQ Potato Chips $1.29
Omega-3 Fish Oil $3.99
Onion Minced $1.09
Multi Vitamins $3.99
Chz/Meat Tortellin $2.49
Unsalted Butter $1.69
Fruit & Grain Bars $1.59
Pnt Btr Wafers $0.99
Yogurt Raisins $1.49
Choc Sdwch Cookies $1.49
Bananas $1.26
8" Flour Tortillas $1.39
Chocolate Milk $1.77
Ham & Turkey Tub $2.69
Cinnamon Rolls $1.49
Buttermilk Biscuit $0.38
Potato Skins $2.49
Mama Cozzi Pizza $0.99
Crescent Rolls $1.49
total after taxes - $67.53 and then i had a $5 off cupon for $25 or more purchase so I spent $62.53
Okay now for some breakdowns:
- ALDI Large Eco Bag - Basically their large reusable bags. I went in only intending to pick up a few things and brought one of my measley reusable bags from B&N with me and ended up using it AND needing their bag. This bag is nice, comes with a plastic bottom insert and carries the equivilant of about 2 super stuffed paper bags. I could barely lift it, L totally had to.
- ChocoKookie Cereal - Equivilant to Reeses Puffs - Same flavor as Reeses Puffs, just not as strong. $1.89 for a 13oz box - good buy!
- Take 'N Bake Bread - 2 medium size frenh breads, you just pop em in the oven... it was SUPER YUMMY!
- variety/ choc donuts - chocolate covered donuts! twice the size of the little gem sized ones you get from hostess and mrs bairds and super more delicious. lol they even sparkle (oh noes not twilight donuts!). I've been eating them for breakfast and I can never look at those little ones the same way again.. usually a bag of those costs $3+ this was a plasic pack of 16 donuts for only $1.59 - cheaper than walmarts nasty tasting immitation and better than the name brands
- bacon wrap bf filet - basically little bacon wrapped beef filets... most stores charge around $2ea+ so finding them for under $2 was a super yay and they were decent pieces of meat
- toasted ravioli - eating some right now! OMG these are super good! melt in your mouth gooey cheese filled yummy... never seen anyting like this before and they made a really good side, will buy more again
- bbq potato chips - on par with lays for flavor and a less greasy chip
- omega-3 fish oil & multi vitamins - we couldn't beat $3.99 each to get back on our vitamin kick..these are 120 & 130 tablet bottles... so bout medium size bottles which run you $6+ for most brands at other stores.
- minced onion - just adding something we ran out of to the spice rack.. they are good
- unsalted butter - we use it and price was good for it too
- pnt btr wafers - equivilant to little debbie nutty bars - i can't contest to this, but L says they are BETTER in flavor and wafer than the little debbie and he will not go back, and at $2 less, yes we will buy more of these
- choc sdwch cookies - equivilant to oreo cookies - once again an L assesment. He thinks they are the best off brand to oreo he's ever tasted and while they aren't quite oreo, he'll take them over oreo for the price differance (oreo being roughly double the price)
- bananas - bananas are bananas, they were good and ripe and $0.32/lb
- flour tortillas - they were mission brand and i think the price was just a little lower than most places
- chocolate milk - OMG!!! My usual choice of chocolate milk is like borden dutch chocolate and this is right on par without being a dutch chocolate milk. i have never had such yummy non brand ready made chocolate milk! I've been drinking more than normal it's so good... i just wish they made it in a gallon, but $1.77 sure beats $2+ everywhere else
- ham & turkey tub - lunch meat - it was really good, but over priced for how little you get
Things we haven't tried yet:
- shredded co -jack - shredded cheese
- stufd shls/mnctti - Frozen Manicotti! I have NEVER found this anywhere. I absolutely love manicotti and now finally I can make it at home for less than the sorry excuse Michalina's calls a manicotti microwave dinner. 6 manicotti rolls, standard meal is 2, so 3 meals worth for less than $1 ea
- breaded fish strip - frozen fish
- battered fish tend - frozen fish... we're gonna see which we like better
- center pork chops - frozen porkchops, it's a pack of 6 CENTER CUT pork chops... they look very yummy and for the price and cut they felt like a steal
- chicken entree - not one of their norm items but an entree meal for about 2 of sesame chicken... it looked good so we thought we'd give it a try
- chz/meat tortellin - cheese tortellini - cheaper than i buy the target brand which is my current fave so looking forward to how they compare
- fruit and grain bars - strawberry flavor cereal bars. my fave now are target brand that cost almost twice these so we'll see how they compare soon.
- yogurt raisins - they looked good, they are strawberry yogurt covered raisins and it's hard to beat $1.49 for a snack food especially when the bag being 8oz
- cinnamon rolls, buttermilk biscuits, crescent rolls - the price was just too good to pass up. frige tubes of them as they're all things we just like to keep on hand for breakfast munchies
- potato skins - haven't tried em yet but they are same brand as my fried ravioli so I'm looking forward to them
- mama cozzi pizza - aldi eqiuvilant to totinos pizzas - we'll see soon how they compare
I know on this bill if i'd bought stuff anywhere else my total easily would have been over $100. After the trip here the only other trips we made were to Walmart for Sunchips, Little Debbie Fudge Rounds, and our usual lunch meat as we realized after getting home how little was really in the package we bought at Aldi, then we went to Target for fruit gummies because still to date it is the ONLY place I can buy strawberry only packs of fruit gummy snacks.
So I definitly recommend if there is an Aldi going in close by to you to give them a try! Don't be afraid of brands you've never heard of, so far we haven't hit a bad one yet, but we'll make sure to let you know if we do.