Narratives below photos as usual...
Strawberry prices ebb and flow according to the proverbial laws of supply and demand. California produces about 80% of the strawberries consumed in America. Believe it or now, a mere 36,000 acres can produce an eye-popping yield of nearly 200-million flats. So far, California production in 2017 is hovering near the record levels of 2012 and earlier years. Data suggests Americans eat about 8 pounds of strawberries each year. That sounds excessively high to us but it's a good personal goal. Actually, "Eat More Strawberries" has ALWAYS been a personal goal!
Fry's has some mighty fine California strawberries on sale this week. Anything under a buck a bound is basically free and indicates there's a temporary oversupply in a rather fixed-demand market. Another factor in the low strawberry prices this year may be the dark clouds forming over the US-China relationship. China was poised to become a major factor in increased strawberry consumption this year following 11 years of negotiations with the USDA.
While some grocery chains like to bamboozle your berries, Fry's is always pretty responsive to the price elasticity inherent in the delicate dance of supply and demand for strawberries. If Fry's geets a good price from the growers' co-op, Fry's passes it along. Sad to say Safeway rarely passes on such savings. While Fry's is charging 87 cents a pound this week, Safeway is picking your pocket for $.50 a pound. That's a 287% higher price than Fry's!
We bought two pounds of these berries in Globe last week. They are high quality berries and we highly recommend them. Heck, buy and eat 8 pounds and you will have made your annual goal for a typical American's strawberry consumption!
Fry's routinely features a decent price on small boneless half loins. The ones for sale until midnight Tuesday run in the four-5 pound range and make two nice, small crock pot roasts. These little half lions also cut nicely into chops of your choice of thickness. This is a very good deal and a fine freezer filler.
Note to marketing: Don't put a picture of white onions on white newsprint. It just won't work. Showcase your fine white onions by placing them on a dark background. OK? Got that? Why is it that all white onions all seem to be created in equal symmetrical size? I've never seen a truly small white onion. Nor have I seen a giant white onion either. They all look almost precisely the same size and weight. Anyway, Fry's whites this week are roughly a half pound each and make a fine onion to add to a recipe. We like the whites over the yellows because of the milder flavor. Whites aren't sweet, per se, but they have a distinctive flavor that we enjoy.
Believe it or not, the asparagus you see this time of year is coming up out of Northern Sonora, Mexico, from an agricultural area between Caborca and Rocky Point. Back in the 90's we spent a lot of time in that neck of the desert and it was always a real hoot to drive through the seemingly endless miles of asparagus. When we camped on the beach in Rocky Point, a Mexican vendor would come through camp with a wheel barrow overflowing with asparagus selling big bunches for a buck each. This year you don't have to go to Rocky Point to get fine Mexican asparagus for a buck a bunch. Just wheel your barrow over to Fry's and fill 'er up!
The past few years have seen store jump on the "Buy XYZ and Get ABC $$ Off". Right now Fry's is on the Buy Five Get Five gig and that's a pretty good gig. Yuban is our "GOTO" coffee and $5 is about as low as it goes. Once in awhile, we see it for $4 but those times are rare. When we see Yuban for $5, we stock up.
My wife, Susun absolutely LOVES Goldfish. Man, how she loves those things. So, when I can get Goldfish for a buck a bag, I stock up and save real money. When goldfish aren't on sale they sure are pricey little buggers.
Although this isn't the best price on cheese this week, it's still pretty danged good. It's a good time to buy the specialty shredded cheese such as Italian, Mexican, etc. It's also a great time to larder up some pepper jack for sinfully rich cheesy snacks.
The Buy 5 Get $5 is just about the only time we buy mayo. Kraft makes a fabulous olive oil mayo that's quite expensive when it's not on sale.
This is as low as you will ever see V-8 and Ocean Spray beverages. It's been a really long time since I've seen either of them below the buck eighty price point. I badly wanted to buy some spicey V-* yesterday at the Camp Verde Basha's but the price was $3.79 and, of course, I knew it was $2 bucks cheaper over in Cottonwood. Heck no, I ain't paying an extra $2 just because I had a hankerin' for V-8 juice yesterday. A guy can wait awhile save $2 an item. And since I will be buying five of them, that's a $10 savings over what the same items would cost in Camp Verde.
Dawn isn't a food item for most folks we know. But we go through a lot of Dawn Ultra and, once again, it doesn't get much cheaper than this. Lowest we've ever seen it was $1.79 but what's twenty cent among Friends?
We only buy green beans when they are a buck a pound. And they better be danged good looking beans, too. We don't have time here today to talk about how to tell a good green bean from a bad green bean but it's an interesting topic and someday we will make time to tell that story. Suffice to say, we can merely glance at green beans and know if they are worth buying...or not. We plan on checking out these beans Tuesday before they go off sale at midnight.
Kale is a Big Winner here at the Parsons Household. We both love kale. There's a huge long, weird story about why organic kale is selling so cheap at a buck a bunch for organic. Heck, it would take me maybe 30 minutes to write that story and I don't have time today. Kale has been a buck a bunch at Fry's now for well over a year. Some weeks, you get great big bunches and some weeks it looks like they put Spawn of Scrooge in charge of taping the bunches together. If you have trouble fitting the bunch in a produce bag, that's a good-si bunch. If the bunch fits into the bag easily, Scrooge & Sons are smiling somewhere.
Bear in mind organic kale at Safeway is a better deal this week. See our Safeway writeup.
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