My plan for dinner tonight was to make Chicken Cordon Blue, this time with ham (rather than prosciutto), as it's significantly cheaper. Alas, Mike had forgotten to get the ham at the supermarket, so I decided to get some at Grocery Outlet. It was a mistake.

There were only two packages of ham available, and I got this Plumroase brown sugar ham rather than the other one as it actually had brown sugar instead of high fructose corn syrup. Still, this one had artificial maple flavor, so it's not as it was a much healthier alternative. But the real problem with this ham is that it has very little flavor. There is some saltiness to it, and some fake sweetness and even fake smokiness, but no ham flavor at all. It doesn't taste "bad" just not very hammy.

At about $3 a pound, though, it's quite cheap. But it has added water, so who knows how much actual ham you are getting.

I just came back from Grocery Outlet very excited at what I thought was a /great/ bargain. A twin pack of 26oz jars of Smuckers Natural Creamy Peanut Butter
for $4. This stuff is just peanuts and salt, so the price was really unbelievable. Too good to be true, indeed.

And it was. The plastic wrap around the twin jars blocked the expiration date, which, as I discovered when I got home, is only 3 days from today. Three whole days to consume over 3lbs of peanut butter. I don't think I could even if I tried :-)

So I returned it, which is not /too/ big a deal as Grocery Outlet is just across the street from me - but it could be a bigger hassle for other people. As I've said before, I love Grocery Outlet and the people who run it, and I do realize that they play the expiration-date game, but really, they shouldn't sell things unless 1) the expiration dates are clearly shown outside the packages and 2) these expiration dates are more than a couple of days away.

Once again, I found myself wondering what I was going to make for dinner tonight and decided to see what quick and cheap things I could find at Grocery Outlet. Dinner ended up being an assortment of things rather than one in particular, but it worked out pretty well.

I started with Middle East Baking Co. Pita Bread ($1.40 for 6 pitas, 12 oz) and Sabra Classic Hummus ($3 for 10 oz container). The hummus tasted exactly as what it proclaims itself to be - "classic hummus" and I enjoyed it very much. It doesn't list any worrisome ingredients (e.g. no trans-fats). The pita bread was just pita.

Mika and I had hot dogs (I got their no-brand hot dog buns, '$1.80 for 16!) and Camila an Evergood Chicken Apple Sausage ($4 for 4, not really a bargain). I like these sausages because they are not as sweet as others. - they also don't seem to have any worrisome ingredients.

I also served the kids peas - a 4lb bag of a no-name brand was $3.30.

Finally, I gave in to temptation and got a bag of frozen pre-cooked onion rings. They came in a transparent plastic bag with a badly attached label and no expiration date I could find. The 3lb bag was $5. I baked them according to instructions and was quite disappointed. The onion rings were limp and chewy, not in the least crispy, and yet quite greasy. They also didn't have much in the way of flavor. Heed my advise and avoid them.

I also bought a large package of Président Mini Brie cheese. It's not my favorite brie by far, but at $3 for a 16 oz package, I can't really complain.

I didn't have anything to make for dinner, so when I chanced upon frozen/refrigerated boxes of Belafino Take and Bake Pepperoni Pizza at Grocery Outlet, I thought I'd give it a try. Probably I won't do it again.

The 2lb, 16" pizzas seemed good enough in the box. They are made with 100% real mozzarella cheese, and at $3 each they looked like a good bargain. They seemed to have a fair amount of cheese and pepperoni - though once I took them out of the box, the pepperoni seemed rather scant. Still, what ultimately matters is the flavor, and these pizzas taste only of sauce. There was no cheese flavor /at all/, and while the mild pepperoni was nice in itself, it couldn't stand up to the sauce. I found the sauce to have an unhappy combination of a predominant too-sweet taste, with hints of annoying bitterness. I just didn't like it.

The crust was OK, though it had a slight refrigerator taste that I didn't really appreciate, still it was masked by the sauce.

All of this said, the kids *loved* it. I can't imagine why, but kids are funny.

I did a bit of googling about this pizza and it seems it's a relatively recent brand from Schwan, the makers of Freschetta, Red Baron and Tony's frozen pizzas. Belafino is supposed to be a "gourmet" offering, one to be sold on the deli section of the supermarket - giving the impression that it's fresh (though the box does note that it's been previously frozen). Supermarkets are supposed to defrost them, put a "sell by" date of 10 days after the pizza was defrosted, and place it in the deli. I find that kind of scary, because nothing on the box says when the pizza was made (it has a 6-month freezer life). It also seems sort of deceptive.

In any case, the pizza doesn't taste good and that's what really counts.

As everyone who reads my blog knows, I'm a big fan of Grocery Outlet. For one, it's just across the street from my house - which makes it very convenient to grab those items we are out of or have just forgotten. It's also a good place to get cheap treats and I enjoy seeing what's new on each trip. You have to be careful, though, they are not always good about keeping expired products off the shelves - so you do need to check expiration dates carefully. Also, their prices are not always the best - sometimes you can get better deals at the supermarket. But in general they are cheaper to much cheaper than regular stores.

What I really like about the San Leandro Grocery Outlet, however, is how dedicated the manager is to make the store pleasant and family friendly. They moved here to San Leandro from Seattle, and it's really clear that it's their baby. The store is always clean, there are always people around to help and the lines are MUCH shorter than at the supermarket. They strive to never have more than 3 people in line, and today I saw the manager open a new line when the others started getting over that. There is also always a dedicated person to bag your groceries, so you can get out of there quickly.

I also like that they seem to make a concerned effort to hiring people with disabilities and minorities. My only concern is that they are not unionized, but I don't anything about their labor practices. I'll ask the manager at some point.

--

So I finally asked the manager about their labor practices. Workers are started at $8.50 an hour (50cents over minimum wage in California) and they are not provided with any kind of benefits. The manager say they can't afford it. GO managers have a base pay of $90K a year, which is not bad - but the manager at San Leandro's GO works there 6 days a week most of the day, so clearly they work hard for what they make.

The question for me are just how high the profits are for the owners - GO is a privately held company so I wasn't able to find out how well they do. Are wages so low because they have a small margin on their products, or because the owners are reeking in the profits? I'd like to know.

I'm a moderate tea drinker and mostly a fan of Twinings English Breakfast Tea, which I buy at the supermarket when it's on sale or at Santos Spice Products, where a 50-tea bag box is only $5 or so. But it's not always possible to get it at either place, so when I found myself with no tea last week, I decided to give the Barrington Tea I found at Grocery Outlet a try. At about $1.50 for a 20-tea bag box, I figured I wasn't gambling much. And to my surprise, I ended up liking this tea quite a bit.

I usually like plain black tea mixes - like English breakfast, though I'll have the occasional cup of Earl Grey. I drink my tea with milk and sugar.

Only "Pure Ceylon Black Tea" is listed as an ingredient on the Barrigton English Breakfast tea box, but I could swear the tea has some sort of flavoring in it. I can taste hints of mint and something else which makes the tea taste particularly sweet. It's not as robust as the Twinings, but it stands well to milk and sugar, a bag is strong enough for two mugs and it doesn't seem to over-brew very fast (I don't usually remove the tea bag while I'm drinking the tea). In all, I'm quite happy with this tea and I'll probably go and, given the price, I'll probably go and pick up a few more boxes of it to keep in case Grocery Outlet stops carrying it. The tea expiration date is 11/12, so it should be good for quite a while.

A final thing that I like about this tea is that the bags come in plain paper covers. Twinings' come in sealed waxed/metallic paper bags, which I don't think I can recycle/compost.

Finally, I haven't found much about the Barrington Tea company online - which makes me assume it's quite new. According to its website, their corporate offices are in Palo Alto. The tea comes from Sri Lanka.

--
Update

I just got a box of their Ceylon tea and I've enjoyed it very much as well. It's a robust black tea, with some hint of flavoring but not as strongly as in the English Breakfast. It's very nice with milk & sugar. I'd buy it again, though now I'm curious about trying the Trader Joe's tea, which is even cheaper.

I've also tried the Earl Gray tea and this one has disappointed me. It's very weak and it doesn't really have a different spicing than the other teas - it's just weaker. I won't be buying it again.

I got a bottle of Villa MIlena Extra Virgin Olive Oil (I don't remember how much I pay, I'd guess about $7-8 for a 1 lt bottle) at Grocery Outlet a couple of weeks ago because I had ran out of it and I didn't have time to go to Trader Joe's, where I usually buy my EVOO (I get the Greek Kalamata one in the large bottle, it's quite good and cheap). I wasn't expecting much, but I still managed to be disappointed. The oil is a green-yellow color and has a fruity beginning, no middle whatsoever and a *very* bitter finish. Indeed, it leaves a bitter taste in your mouth when you are done.

I've used it for sauteing/pan frying and it's fine for that, but definitely not for salads or with bread.

Today I saw Vienetta Triple Chocolate dessert at the San Leandro Grocery Outlet for $1.50 or $2. I didn't taste it, so I don't know how good it is, but I know that Vienetta has a lot of fans and it's hard to find, so I figured I'd post about it here.

Grocery Outlet (at least the one in San Leandro) has Walkers Shortbread Box Festive Shapes cookies, in a 6.2 oz box, for $2. They are over $6 at Amazon, though just $2.50 at Safeway (so it's not /that/ good a deal). Still, it's not a /bad/ deal.

I got a package of Hibachi House Sesame Chicken at Grocery Outlet as a quick lunch. It wasn't cheap, $4 or $5 if I well recall - and while the box says it has 4.5 portions, nobody but a supermodel would be satisfied with one cup of rice and chicken for lunch. And it's mostly rice, I was surprised at how little chicken it came with. I felt ripped off. On the plus side, the sauce was quite good both with the chicken and the rice.

All that said, I wouldn't buy it again.

Got the Organic Classics Macaroni & Meat Sauce at Grocery Outlet a couple of days ago. I think it was a dollar or two for 10 oz - definitely cheap. Alas, it was quite unsatisfying. The meat sauce didn't seem to have much in the way of meat, and it just wasn't very tasty. The macaroni were just macaroni. It would have been better if I had some Parmesan cheese, but in any case I wouldn't buy it again.

Yesterday I picked up a Bourbon chicken frozen entree at Grocery Outlet. I don't recall the brand now (and I already threw away the box), so I'll have to edit that detail in after I go to GO again. In any case, it was actually quite good. The chicken was tender and the sauce flavorful. The only minus is that the amount of chicken provided is somewhat skimpy for two people, but you can extend it by serving the chicken over rice (there is enough sauce for that). In all, I liked it and I'll probably buy it again - my only hesitation is that the $5 price is a bit stiff for the amount of food. Still, it's cheaper than going out to eat.

Also, right now Grocery Outlet has Ben & Jerry's NY Super Fudge Chunk ice cream for $1.50.

I need to learn to look carefully at the "cooking" instructions of frozen food items I buy. This is not the first time I buy something only to find out that it can't be easily microwaved for serving. For me the whole point of buying frozen food is to be able to quickly heat it up - if I have to thaw it first, or oven-bake it or deep fry it, I might as well take the extra step and prepare the food myself.

Fortunately, most of the frozen taquitos out there just require that you microwave them for a minute or two. Unfortunately, El Monterey taquitos (and gorditas), which I got today at Grocery Outlet, demand that they be thawed before cooking. I can see, perhaps, thawing the whole box if you are going to be serving them at a party - but that doesn't work if all you want is to fix a couple of taquitos as a snack here and there.

The box offers no instruction on how to cook the taquitos/gorditas from its frozen state. I decided to microwave two taquitos and two gorditas on high for 1 1/2 minutes. The result were taquitos that were very cold in places and boiling hot in others. Still, they were quite food for being frozen processed food - nicer than the taquitos I usually get at the supermarket or Costco. Still, the improved flavor does not make up for the inconvenience of having to thaw them first.

What I'd say is buy them if you want to serve them for a party, but skip them otherwise.

I've been eying the Buzz Strong's Real Coffee Cookies at Grocery Outlet for a couple of weeks now, curious about the possibility of ingesting some extra caffeine in the form of a cookie. I finally got a package and the cookies were fine, but they weren't tasty enough to be worth the calories.

The smallish cookies taste like your standard packaged chocolate chip cookie, with a hint of metallic preservative taste masked by coffee flavor. They go well with coffee and each one has the equivalent caffeine of 1/4 cup of coffee. I was pretty buzzed after eating four cookies and drinking two cups of coffee, so I think they do the job they promise.

In all, I think these cookies are fine for people who like coffee and packaged cookies, but that's not really me.

This week I found Ben & Jerry’s Goodbye Yellow Brickle Road ice cream at Grocery Outlet. This "limited edition" ice cream once again reminds us of the fact that without Ben and Jerry, Ben & Jerry's ice cream is completely lost. Indeed, how long has it been since they've come up with any ice cream flavors that have been successful? By now, all they seem to do is either randomly assemble flavors or play it safe and boringly. This ice cream, as most of its predecessors, is a complete failure. It mostly tastes of mediocre chocolate ice cream, sometimes of caramel, and never of anything special. No wonder it ended up at GO, for $1.50 a pint.

I haven't had Sarah Lee Frozen Cheesecake (original or New York) for years, but if you've been craving some, GO has the little ones on sale for $2. Seems like a pretty good deal.

Of greater interest to those of us planning holiday dinners and parties, GO is selling Pepperidge Farm Frozen Puff Pastry Sheets for $2 a package! These usually sell for about $6 a package. Expiration is 12/23/09 - but I'm sure they'll be fine for Xmas dinner.

Finally, GO has Cantare Mini Baked Brie en Croute on the refrigerated cabinets, by the diary products. A package of 12 brie/cranberry pastries is $2 and one of 12 brie/cranberry and 12 brie/jalapeno is $4. They expire in 1/10. The kids and I liked the cranberry kind quite a bit - they cook in 6 minutes, so they're a great choice for your holiday parties.

I've never been a big fan of Scharffen Berger because I'm not a fan of dark chocolate. Give me milk any time. Well, apparently Scharffen Berger has, unbeknown to me, been making milk chocolate for a while. Today I found their 3oz bars at Grocery Outlet here in San Leandro. The bars are $2 - they sell for $5 at Scharffen Berger's website. Of course, these bars are close to expiration (January 2010), they were made at the Berkeley factory
which closed in January 2009.

Well, my verdict is that Scharffen Berger milk chocolate is (or was) by far the best milk chocolate I've ever tasted. The chocolate taste is very intense, it has layers of complexity and it's just delicious. I imagine that Scharffen Berger will not/has not been able to keep its standards at the new factory - so I'll probably hurry and buy a bunch of these bars at Grocery Outlet.

One of my favorite products at Grocery Outlet is Smithfield cream cheese bars (8 oz for $1.30). Not only are they cheap (which significantly lowers the cost of baking a cheesecake), but the cream cheese has a nice, solid/stringy consistency that is wonderful for New York (and other) cheesecakes, and a vibrant, fresh flavor. I have gotten nothing but compliments for the NY cheesecake that I've been making with this cheese.

One thing to keep in mind, some of the cheese packages may be marked with the "Spanish" date notation (day-month-year). The ones currently on sale expire on "02-12-09", which means on December 2nd, 2009.

And for those of you planning to make cheesecakes today, Grocery Outlet also has honey maid graham crackers ($2), sugar ($2.50, I think) and jumbo eggs ($1.50 a dozen). If you do use my recipe, note that it's for large eggs, so reduce by one if using the jumbo size.

This week we discovered Crunchies at Grocery Outlet. Crunchies are basically dehydrated fruit, but very airy and light. They are made by removing the water from the fruit in a refrigerated vacuum (at least, according to the box). The results are very flavorful, extremely light, crunchy foams of fruit. They supposedly keep their nutrients, but you can eat a full fruit in 2 bites.

Each box of Crunchies comes with 9 packages, 3 of each kind. One contains strawberries, another a mixture of mangoes, strawberries, apples, raspberries, blueberries and peaches, and the final one mangoes, bananas, strawberries, pineapple and oranges. Each package of dried fruit is equivalent to one serving of fruit (which, btw, is either 1 piece of fruit or 1/2 cup of fruit, depending on the fruit in question). Of course, one package of crunchies is unlikely to make even a small dent in your hunger, but it's a very easy, very healthy snack. And quite perfect for when you are craving something sweet.

I'll check later how much the Crunchies were at Grocery Outlet (I can't find the receipt), they have a msp of $9!!!

A few days ago I bought a two-pack of Kraft Grated Parmesan cheese. Each jar is 16 oz, and I was getting 2 for $7, so I thought it was a very good deal. Wronnnng! It wasn't until I'd open a jar that I realized the cheese expired Oct. 6th. Now, I realize that Grocery Outlet sells items that are close to expiration date, but 2 weeks? For a packaged cheese product? Who in the world can possibly consume 2 pounds of grated cheese in 2 weeks?

Yes, my bad - in the future I'll check expiration dates very carefully. But also Grocery Outlet's bad for selling such products.

*Update* My blog entries are automatically forwarded to my twitter account, and one of my followers there is Grocery Outlet. Well, they looked into this matter and they are sending me a couple of coupons for the cheese. They will also make sure that, in the future, they will split up containers and lower the price on items, as they get closer to the sell-by date. This makes a lot of sense, I'd have bought one can for $3, but not two for $8 so close to the sell-by date.

Anyway, I'm impressed at how Grocery Outlet dealt with this issue.

Grocery Outlet is selling a branded tin that includes a 20-teabag package of Twinings tea (Lady Gray or English Breakfast) for $3. This is actually /not/ a good deal - as you can often get said package for $2.50 on sale at the supermarket - but I ran out of tea so I bought it. I think I can use the tin for crafts (or to hold craft supplies), so it may be worth those extra 50 cents I paid for it. But I'm not at all surprised that that particular item didn't sell well at regular stores.

I also got Kellogs Cocoa-peanut butter puffs for $1 for a box, Haagen Dazs Hawaiian Lehua Honey & Sweet cream ice cream and Zambeedo Creme de chocolat ice cream. Both are $1.50, I think. I actually liked the sweet cream ice cream quite a bit. It has an amazingly creamy texture, and a nice, light flavor. There isn't much honey to speak of, but when you get some mixed in with your ice cream, it's quite nice. I'd buy it again. The same cannot be said about the Zambeedo ice cream, which leaves *much* to be desired. First of all, it was melted and re-frozen (a not unusual problem with frozen products at Grocery Outlet), and second, it had a very, very light flavor, not at all chocolaty. Again, it's no wonder this product ended up here.

Finally, I got a 2-oz bottle of McCormick Pure Vanilla Extract for $3 (it sells for $11.50 at Safeway). Alas, once I got home I realized that it contains corn syrup (?!!), so I won't be buying it again. Maybe that's why it's not selling well at the regular stores?

And that's about it for now.

Grocery Outlet is selling a 1qt carton of Land o lakes heavy whipped cream for $1.50. Safeway usually sells their 1 qt carton of Lucerne regular whipping cream for about $4.50 - 5.50, so this is quite a bargain. HOWEVER, the expiration date on the cream is 9/22 - which means that it's only good for the next 10 days or so. But if you want it for something right away, it's a good deal. As for myself, I'm making strawberry ice cream now, and I'll figure out what else this weekend.

I love Grocery Outlet, you never know what you'll find there. Today I found, of all things, Tortuga Caribbean Rum Cakes. I had never heard of it until a few weeks ago when I started researching my upcoming Cayman menu. Apparently, these cakes are a very famous Cayman product, known throughout the Caribbean. I was planning on making a rum cake myself (from this recipe), but I'm thrilled at finding the real thing. And at Grocery Outlet, no less!

Of course, the price is also unbeatable - $1.50 for the 4oz cake. Not cheap in the abstract, but Amazon sells the 16-Ounce cake for over $13, twice the per-ounce price. The cake gets great reviews at Amazon and other places. I'm not sure if I'll save it for when I serve my Cayman menu or whether I should just eat it and buy more if I like it.

Today and until it runs out, they have Ben & Jerry's chubby hubby (one of my favorites), strawberry cheesecake and ginger snap ice cream for $1.50 for the regular-size package.

I bought this wine at Grocery Outlet a few weeks back, mostly because it was Argentinian. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's not a big enough reason to try a wine, but I'd been wanting to give Grocery Outlet wines a chance for a while. Baaaaad Idea. I've drank a lot of bad wine in my life, but this one seemed to be spoiled. It tasted sour and well, spoiled. I don't know if Grocery Outlet will take it back (I'll check next time I go), but I will take this as a warning against buying wines at Grocery Outlet.

While looking for a picture of Royale Center Cut Naturally Smoked Bacon, or at least a link to the manufacturer's website, I came across bacon tasting from the SF Chronicle in which Royale Bacon came at the bottom. The bottom bottom, getting only 24 out of 100 points. The winner, Tyson (really, Tyson), got 80 points.

I have to say that I don't agree with the tasters. Royale may not have the best bacon, but I actually think it's pretty good. It has a slightly sweet flavor that I like. Is it the best bacon I've ever had? Probably not, but it's great in my spaghetti carbonara.

I bought it at Grocery Outlet, which carries several Tyson products, so I will look for the Tyson bacon and give it a try.

Grocery Outlet had these cookies for sale last week in a variety of flavors. Some of the no-name products have actually turned out to be quite good, so I decided to give the chocolate walnut cookies a try. Well, they were so bad that my 7-year old daughter, not the pickiest of gourmands, stated that these "must be the worst cookies ever". Mike also commented as to how bad they are.

Alas, I have to agree, they have no chocolate flavor whatsoever and nothing that could be identified as a walnut. They just suck. Perhaps other flavors are better, but I wouldn't hold my breath.

Hollywood Peanut Oil, 24-Ounce at $2! It's usually $5-6 at the supermarket. I probably should stock up.

Now that I have Grocery Outlet so close, I figured I'd start making a list of what I /can/ and /cannot/ find there - for my reference as well as yours. As more items come to sight and mind, I'll add them to this post.

Not Available

Whipping cream
Fresh herbs
Spaghetti
Fresh bread
Sugar
Meat I'd want to eat
Fish sticks
Any soft toilet paper
Name brand cleaners
Natural peanut butter

Available

Grapes
Avocados ($1.50!!!!)
Melons
Off-brand bacon that was actually good
Tyson chicken (which I don't want to eat)
Stouffer meat lasagna party size for $10
Frozen bagels stuffed with cream cheese (it could be worse)
$3 bottles of wine
Martinelli's sparkling apple cider
Sliced bread
Analgesics
Nescafe/Tasters' Choice Instant Coffee
Lemons (I think 25c each)
Jiffy peanut butter

Today was the (unofficial) opening of the new Grocery Outlet "supermarket", located a stone throw away from my house. I was a little dubious at first about what the store would do for the neighborhood (and clearly, this is not a posh neighborhood by any stretch of the imagination), but once I looked at it from the point of view of how this would ease my grocery shopping, I welcomed it with open arms. Indeed, I think I may have been responsible for suggesting this location. I remember distinctively talking to the manager-to-be of Grocery Outlet a couple of years ago, when they wanted to place it in the old-Albertsons building downtown (which we fought), and suggesting that the lot by my house would be a better location.

Of course, being that it opened today, we had to check it out today - and we were pretty impressed. Bear in mind that the store is brand-new (well, the building itself was vacated by the Salvation Army, but it's been cleaned and painted so that it's now unrecognizable), so you would expect it to look nice - and it did, the aisles were wide, the light, functional, and the colors, soothing. It wasn't as faux-quaint as Trader Joe's, but not as austere as your regular supermarket either. Everything was nice and neat (again, as you would expect), I can only hope it stays like that.

Now, for what matters, what does Grocery Outlet carry? Well, clearly they are attempting to be like a real supermarket and they carry a little bit of everything, specially vis a vis packaged stuff. Most of their products seem to be overstock - things that didn't sell that well at other markets. I think that will mean that what's available will change frequently. Today, for example, they had Haagen Daz sticky toffee pudding ice cream - a flavor introduced in 2006, that seems to no longer be on the market (at least it's not listed in their website). No choice, but it was just $1.50 - about half the supermarket on-sale price. They also had off-brand stuff, but much less than what they use to sell when I frequented the Berkeley location. I'm not sure if that's a good or bad thing, some of that off-brand stuff (I remember the frozen baked Alaskas) was pretty good. As you can expect there are lots of canned stuff.

Prices are generally low, but not everything is a bargain. Haas avocados were $1.50 - three times as much as what Smart & Final and Mi Tierra supermarket has them for this week. Suave shampoo was $1.50, about the same price as the Safeway's. But Nestcafe coffee was about $3 less than it's at Safeway.

They had a surprisingly large wine selection - mostly of cheap wines, of course. I'm thrilled, as this will mean that when I need wine for a dish and don't have any 2-buck-chuck at home, I can just go across the street and get something.

In all, I don't anticipate doing my shopping per se at Grocery Outlet, but rather use it as a place where to either get specific things that I know they have them for less - or to go and get something I realize at the last minute I'm out of (darn! I didn't check if they had flour).

I will, however, write from time to time about special bargains that they have, or interesting items. This time I bought a slice of cheese that I plan to serve blind to my guests on Saturday. Let's see if anyone can identify it :-)

Next Day. I went to Grocery Outlet to see if I could get something for dinner. The answer is, unfortunately, no. They have Tyson chicken, but I think that was the company investigated for disgusting chicken practices. They had a few different cuts of pork and very little beef. But I feel uneasy about the quality and origin of the meat they sell. I did notice that they do have a small produce section, I didn't study it, though.

One thing they don't have are enough carts or any baskets - making buying just a few things a hassle.

As for dinner, I decided to make spaghetti carbonara and thought I had everything I needed at home. Of course, once I got here I realized I didn't have enough bacon :-(

Finally, Grocery Outlet is having its Ribbon Cutting on Thursday, May 7th at 5:30 PM. They'll have sandwiches or something like that. The Grand Opening is on Saturday, May 9th, starting with Coffee and Treats at 8 AM. They'll have raffles, samples, etc. - kind of like the BBQ they had a couple of years ago, when they wanted to get public support for converting the downtown Albertson's building into a Grocery Outlet.

As Mike (my husband) reports in San Leandro Bytes, his blog about all the goings on in San Leandro, Grocery Outlet, a discounter of mostly canned/boxed food, is coming to San Leandro. The store, which is almost finished, is located on East 14th, near Estabrook Street - a stone throw away from my house. It occupies the lot previously occupied by the Salvation Army. An affordable housing unit for seniors is being built next door.

It's been quite a while since I've been to a Grocery Outlet - but I'm hoping this one will be cleaner and neater than others of its kind. I'm also hoping it will not add a lot to the traffic on Estabrook St. - which is already congested at rush time.

That said, I'm happy that we'll have a grocery store so close to our house. Though we don't buy much in the way of packaged food, it'll be useful for emergencies.

In other news, the Starbucks downtown, near Safeway, is going out of business. Starbucks is shutting many of its stores, so it's not a huge surprise. The Starbucks which is /at/ Safeway seems to be safe for now.