and other random things. Sometimes lunch meat. I used to go there all the time with my grandma as a kid, and always got the big packages of name brand candy. And delicious very salty tortilla chip rounds. My friends grandma bought a super delicious cinnamon bread/cake thing there uhhhh so awesome. The place is hit or miss and their aisle of random junk is often hilarious, but I like the place.
I go usually once a month to stock up on chicken breasts and their turkey meatballs and ground turkey. Sometimes they’re good for their boneless pork ribs. My SO loves their mexican cheeses and the black beans are better than the name brand we get from Kroger. The eggs have recently been .49 a dozen and milk is cheaper. I’ve bought butter there. It’s okay, not great but I’d rather have cheap and okay than expensive for everyday cooking.
I remember when my little girl wanted one of those big wheel trikes and they were at least fifty everywhere else but we got a Dora one there for 25 dollars. She grew out of it before it broke so that’s always good.
I paid 3.79 for a gallon of 2% milk at Kroger last weekend. Aldi sells it for 1.99. I rarely drink whole gallons before they go out and they don’t sell half gallons at Aldi so I rarely buy it there. For a while I was on a powdered milk kick and I found they had really good milk cheap.
Basics like sugar, oil, olive oil, baking powder/soda and rice/pasta are great values. Their canned tuna is disgusting. My cat wouldn’t even eat it.
Holidays bring cheap flashy candy for the kids. It’s low quality chocolate but kids don’t notice as long as it’s in a shiny wrapper.
I love Aldi! I don’t buy their lunchmeat unless it’s a name brand but for yogurt, milk, eggs, hamburger, and the occasional corned beef, it can’t be beat.
We don’t have them here, but when I visited my cousin in Ohio, I needed to go to a grocery store and he took me there. I was like “You’re kidding, right?” Depressing place, and I needed a full service supermarket, not a poor man’s Trader Joe’s. I suppose as a suppliment I could find a few items to buy, assuming the deals are as good as some people seem to think, but I would still have to go to a real supermarket for a lot of items, so it is sort of a duplication of effort.
As I am living on poverty-level wages right now saving money is a must. I make up my shopping list every week and hit Aldi’s first*. Everything I can get at Aldi’s I do, then it’s on to the bigger supermarket for what Aldi didn’t have. The big exception seems to be certain condiments, where we just can’t stand the Aldi ones, but those are hardly something I buy every week. Oh, and Cheerios - no other “toasted oat” cereals seem to be the same, so we buy that name brand.
Actually, with the garden this summer I really hit the backyard first, but that costs me time and effort, not money.
I adore Aldi’s. I notice the prices are creeping up a bit, but they are creeping up a lot more at a regular grocery store, too. I love all the basics, laid out, right there - oatmeal, sugar, flour, eggs, bread, milk…their weekly specials are interesting, too - German foods, frozen fish concoctions, Mexican foods I’ve never had…And what other grocery store puts out a Sunday ad featuring the ubiquitous baby-carrots-for-99 cents on one side and on the other advertises a TV, computer things, or lawn furniture? or cheap comfy cotton lounging pj bottoms. I like the packaged cheese and cold cuts, and the hamburger is surprisingly lean and tasty. LOVE Aldi’s.
Finally checked out the new Aldi they build right next to the new Meijer. I can say that they had a fine collection of boxed and canned and otherwise pre-packaged food, but nothing else of any real value. The fresh vegetable selection was abysmal, unless all you ever use are potatoes and tomatoes. It’s not worth my time to go to a second store for $0.25 savings on milk or the two frozen things that weren’t pre-breaded, cooked, or otherwise pre-prepared. Paying $2.00 instead of $2.50 for breaded, skinless, boneless chicken breast is still vastly overpaying versus making one’s own. In short, a totally useless store for anyone with a modicum of basic cooking knowhow.
I’m sorry to hear the vegetables at your Aldi are so limited - at my local Aldi’s they are sometimes superior to the major chain stores. They have carrots, celery, mushrooms, cabbage, two types of lettuce, three kinds of bell peppers, two varieties of hot peppers, broccoli, cauliflower, cucumbers, zucchini, peaches, plums, two varieties of apple, oranges, nectarines, melons (in season - usually cantaloupe and honeydew), bananas, three varieties of potato and two of onions. And yes, they have tomatoes, too. The chain stores do have a broader selection and some exotic varieties, and they have strawberries and such out of season as well as in, but really, at my local Aldi’s you can get a decent selection of basic vegees.
Does anyone know how Aldi’s stacks up against Food4Less (Kroger’s) in some regions? I used to shop Jewel but a Food4Less went up only a few blocks away from home, and the prices won me over, even though the selection isn’t as good as Jewel.
That’s about what ours has, but I need three varieties of onions, about 10 varieties of chilis (I’m not exaggerating), two varieties of tomatoes, about four types of lettuce, about four types of mushrooms – fresh, not canned “pieces”, avocados, prickly pears, prickly pear cactus leaves, purple garlic (not white), fresh cinnamon, fresh cilantro, fresh parsley, fresh mint, fresh ginger, dried sumac (fresh would I’m in Lebanon), laurel/bay, fresh thyme… well, you get the idea. Dumbed-down, McDonald’s style food for people that don’t know how to make anything.
Their Mama Cozzi Garlic Bread Pepperoni Pizzas are killer and inexpensive. Cheap, cheap, cheap whole frozen chickens and cornish game Hens can’t be beat…Great for the George Foreman rotisserie. They have excellent dairy products and some upscale home brand sausages and cold cuts. Tried some of their really delicious and flavorful home brand “Maxwell Street Kielbasas”, and wasn’t disappointed. Made a nice bangers and mash with them and had the leftovers with eggs the next morning, although they are bun size and would probably make a nice dog.
I’m assuming the “10 types of chilies” is related to Mexican cuisine (given your location field) but you certainly CAN make better than “McDonald’s style food” with what I listed and really, I’m getting some food snobbery vibes here. Granted Aldi tends to stock North American/European centric vegetable choices, but that doesn’t automatically mean those of us who eat them “don’t know how to make anything”. What you list may be common in your part of the world, but where I live more than half would be considered exotic specialty items.
And by “mushrooms” I did mean fresh, not “canned” and not “pieces”. Seriously, yours does not have fresh mushrooms?
UK Aldi stores carry a line of utterly fantastic wild mushrooms in really thick goopy oil for very little money - the price varies from 59p to 99p depending on whim as far as I can tell. Christ, you just need to open the jar in the same room as the dish, never mind actually adding them to anything. I can’t imagine how they can make money on it, but nom nom nom. :eek:
To find this variety in Northeast Ohio, you’d have to travel to the highest of high-end markets in our area. They’re about 1/2 hour away from me and *extremely expensive. *
Apparently the ideal usage of the Aldi’s Maxwell Street Kielbasas is to make the famous, Maxwell Street Polish. Which is the Kielbasz on a bun topped with caramelized onions, mustard, and sport peppers. Hafta remember that, if I try them again… really good sausages.
I agree that about the Aldi experience. People are there to get in, get what they need and get out. The parking lot is not an obstacle course of carts and trash. There could be 5 full carts ahead of me and I would never wait as long as I would in a store with 15 aisles of cashiers. I am not dodging people who can’t decide which aisle to go down or who stand there chit chatting in the main thoroughfare blocking everyone.
I love their: Dairy, cereals, frozen meats, frozen veggies, condiments, paper products, pasta, pasta sauces and mexican food items (beans, rice, salsa, etc), bread
Not a huge fan of their: crackers, soups, ice cream, soda
Shocked by: quality of the baby diapers, selection of fine chocolates and coffees, holiday special purchases (you can make excellent gift baskets from there!) and skin care line (Lacura)
Improving: Their produce and fresh meat selections, availability of healthy alternatives like whole wheat pastas, low sugar jam and juices
I think my life is less stressful since I have started shopping there. Less time in the grocery store, less money spent…what’s not to love?!
It reminds me of Trader Joe’s in this way. Some things are good, some things not so good, and always something weird to try if you’re feeling adventurous. And it’s cheaper!
And no one asks you what you’re doing that weekend at the checkout.
I’m a long time regular now. The absence of choice is meaningless to me, I just buy things that I know and use. They are all considerably cheaper than name brands and the quality is the same or similar. So I buy all my cleaning supplies there, everything I use in the bathroom, everything I use in the laundry. Most of the few canned things I eat come from there - little tins of tuna, baked beans, tinned tomatoes for making sauces. I don’t buy much in the way of meat or fruit/vegetables there unless they have something special but looking around my kitchen I have oil, some spices, preserved peaches and the only little bit of pasta that I have.
I have other odds and ends I bought there - my microwave, my electric kettle, my HDTV USB device and a few tools. All bought because they were bargains compared to prices elsewhere.
Surprised to see this thread - didn’t know they had opened stores in USA - although a quick search shows none in Nevada, or anywhere on west coast?
I remember them from Berlin. They had a very limited selection, many of the products were crap, but for the basics (flour, sugar, salt, etc.) it was a great place to go! It was, however, like walking through an East German supermarket - no customer service, no displays, bland and limited selection of foods - again, a great savings with the basics, but most West Berliners I knew only went there to stock up on the basics.
