Where do you shop for food?

[bongo]

I get 3 brands of veggie burgers at Costco now. Plus they have bulk organic brown rice, pinto beans, organic vegetables. We get our maple syrup, coffee, organic frozen blueberries, organic eggs, salsa, etc. there.

[bkjonesborough]

I get most of my perishable food at Greenlife Grocery, and I Fancy Food for spices and sauces.

[415_s2k]

Safeway, Trader Joe's, Whole Foods, Albertson's, Lucky's. I'm a bargain shopper, I tend to go where stuff's on sale.

There's a Grocery Outlet over by my best friend's in Oakland, across the bay; they sell a lot of discontinued, overstock, etc. items... I've made some interesting finds there. They always have a whole ton of spinach and feta piroshki, some interesting thin crust pizzas, and usually some good microbrews and/or rare imported beers that people passed up on elsewhere.

I usually get my produce at local Chinese/Vietnamese grocers, because it costs 1/10th what it does at a major store, and it's usually bigger, healthier, and more fresh!

[asubram3]

Kroger for regular grocery items and vegetables

[TKramar]

Once Publix moved to the same side of the street as Wal-Mart, I started going to Publix more often.

I have also been known to shop at Family Dollar for some items. They had potato chips for 50 cents a bag (5 oz. size)--but it had to be the sour cream and onion variety. BBQ were still a buck. Snack cakes run a $1.00 there--but a lot more anywhere else.

[kelsie]

Sam's Club for bulk paper products. The Fresh Market (equal to WF) for Organic and Free Range meats, & poultry, Organic veggies. Now that the season is upon us, we have our own vegetable garden & I show the local Farm Markets & fish right off the boat down on our Crystal Coast.

[Green Irish Eyes]

With summer comes the local farmers' market -- great for produce! I've also learned that a couple local farms have CSA programs in place! We're too late for this year, but hope to participate next year .....

[katzenfreund]

Dark, we tried the CSA route and think it is great, just not for a 2 person household in our case, unless you have a big freezer (which we don't). I found I had so much food go to waste, because there was just too much, especially greens. So better for me to go to Farmers Market. But I would recommend it to larger families or those that can get small amounts. We bought a half share and it was still waaaaay too much food...lots of it ended up in our compost pile

[KathyH360]

Where ever you shop, these are the items to buy organic as they are covered with fungacides and pesticides:

Peaches, nectarines, apples, bell peppers, celery, strawberries, cherries, spinach, lettuce, imported grapes, pears and potatoes.

Other items you can purchase at your local store or even better at a farmer's market.

Look carefully at ingredients. Don't get any item with HVP (Hydrogolyzed Vegetable Protein). Look at salt content.

You can buy organic beans at Fred Meyers/Frys on sale for the same price as regular beans. Look for the sales.

Look into square foot gardening. You can grow some things very easily like salad fixins and then pick them and eat them!

[TKramar]

Publix, now that they've moved to MY side of the street and I don't have to cross the main road.