How to Shop

I had a friend who once told me that she never learned how to shop. What she meant was she didn't know how to "bargain shop". She said she went to one grocery store and just bought what they had. This was kind of amazing to me. It never occurred to me that people didn't watch the sales and shop accordingly.
I was quite pleased when I moved here to find that there were 4 large grocery stores in town to choose from (we only have 3 now) and they are all no more than a mile from each other. It didn't take long to establish  'what to buy where'. This has changed some over the years but I still know what is mostly on sale now at each of the stores.
One of the stores is my favorite for meat. It always has a good selection and if you get there early enough...but not too early, you can go through the marked down meat and get some good deals. The other store has all the buy 1 get 1 free sales and it also has the fuel perks. The last store is Wal-mart, it is where I get most of my boxed and canned stuff because it is always cheaper there.
What also amazed me about my friend was that she didn't buy the marked down stuff saying she didn't know what was still "good".  You have eaten food all your life and you don't know what is good? Smell it! Touch it! Look it over good! If it looks good and smells good it probably is good as far as meat and fresh vegetables go. If it is in a can, it is likely still good anyway.
Also think about what you can use it for. If it is a really good deal but you don't usually buy it, think of what you could use it for. For instance, this week one store had these small rolls of turkey marked down.

This part of a roll was only $2.11.  It was too good of a deal to pass up so I had to think of what to use it for. I felt I could slice it and use it for sandwich meat or I could dice it in cubes and put it in a casserole or quiche. I bought 4 of them. I sliced one today.

Sorry about the phone picture but this package is only a third of what I sliced up. We will have plenty of sandwich meat for a while and meat for several dinner meals...and they were $2.11 each! (Yes, I will post when I make other meals from it).
I always buy extra of a good deal. Last year at Christmas the turkeys were so cheap that I couldn't resist and bought four of them. Two of them are still in the freezer and will be used this year at Christmas and Thanksgiving. It is one less thing during the holidays that I will have to worry about this year.
Also keep in mind that the larger grocery stores aren't the only place to shop. I go to the next town over every week for violin lessons and I often stop in their little Family Dollar Store because they have the treats my dogs like in there at a really good price and since the store is right there on my way it doesn't cost me any extra gas.

Of course, your garden is the best place to shop. These are probably the last of the peppers picked from my pots the other day.

I don't use hot peppers very much (unless I have a lot of them to make hot pepper relish with) but I will cut them up and freeze them so that I can use a little of them here or there.

Anyway, happy shopping and keep looking for those bargains!