Thursday, August 19, 2010

Steak sales and store comparisons


Hello folks,

Today I visited Via Foods, a grocery store located on 5th St. and Spring Avenue in Panama City. It's about a block west of East Avenue. One of this week's specials at Via Foods is whole New York strip steak for $2.38 lb. That's got to be the deal of the week!

If you were to cut a 13 pound whole strip side (pictured below) into 8 ounce steaks, you'd have 26 steaks for about $31, or $1.19 per steak. Wal-mart's strip steaks, already cut, are $8.48 lb. The equivalent amount of steak bought at Wal-mart would cost $112.95 this week, so Via Foods would save you $81.25.


This week, Via's ground beef is $1.79 lb.; Wal-mart's 5 lb. tube of ground beef is $10.98, or $2.20 lb., and Winn Dixie's ground beef is $1.99 lb.

Via has thick ribeyes, $3.99 lb. (pictured below). The ribeyes at Wal-mart are $7.98 lb. Winn Dixie's ribeye steaks are $9.99 lb. (pictured below).



Wal-mart will "comp" prices on most stores--match prices on comparable items. If broccoli is on sale at Winn Dixie for .88 lb. (which it is), you can buy it from Wal-mart for .88 lb., even though Wal-mart's price today was $1.79 lb. I tried to buy the broccoli at Winn Dixie on Transmitter but it was awful; each head was unusable--brown, slimy, and gross (picture below). I bought it at Wal-mart for Winn Dixie's sale price.


Lynn Haven Wal-mart's manager told me that they'll match Grocery Outlet's prices, without adding the ten percent at the end that Grocery Outlet does. You may have to prove the price, though. Wal-mart won't match buy-one-get-one-frees, which is precisely why area grocery stores began offering bogofs when Wal-mart came to town and started selling food.

I like to use roma tomatoes (aka plum tomatoes) for roasting and making into tomato soup. They are on sale at Via for .99 cents a lb. At Winn Dixie, they are $1.79. My recipe follows.


Tomato Soup


3 lbs. roma tomatoes
6 tablespoons olive oil, approximately
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar, optional
kosher salt, few pinches
cracked black pepper, few grinds
a chopped yellow onion
pinch red pepper flakes
couple cloves smashed garlic
vegetable or chicken stock, or water, 3 to 4 cups
fresh basil,  several leaves (optional)
splash of cream (optional)


Heat oven to 450 degrees. Line a cookie sheet with foil. Cut tomatoes in half lengthwise and place in large bowl. Toss with a couple of tablespoons of olive oil, balsamic vinegar (if using) and some salt and pepper. Mix them thoroughly to coat and pour onto cookie sheet, roast until brown in spots and well-cooked, about half an hour or more, depending on the size of your tomatoes. 


Meanwhile, heat a little olive oil in a pot and sauté the onion until nearly tender; add the crushed garlic in the last few minutes, stirring occasionally (don't brown the garlic). Throw in the pepper flakes for a minute, too. 


When tomatoes are ready, add them to the pot along with the stock (or water) and basil. Use an immersion blender (or carefully spoon and pour into a standing blender) and blend until smooth. Taste for seasoning. Heat up the soup to a high simmer, take off heat and stir in cream (optional). Enjoy!


I like to add a swirl of cream to each bowl for decoration. Great served with panini sandwiches or grilled cheeses of all kinds. 


Roasted tomatoes are great to put on pizza or in grilled sandwiches, too. 

Bye for now and thanks for reading! 

2 comments:

  1. Hey Nise,
    Really great blog tonight. I so need to go to that store...I feel like a steak very soon. The pictures, wow I was laughing for awhile then I thought how interesting..
    Frankie said your blog is over the top...that's nice, huh...Ok, thanks for the great advice..does this come out on Wednesday, or blogging happens everyday???

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  2. Hey love your blog. What a great thing this is for everyone, even you.

    ReplyDelete