Reaquainted love: Grocery shopping

I love grocery shopping.  You are probably thinking "Are you serious?"  It's not the most fun task, I know and there are definitely aspects to it that I hate, but for the most part, I really enjoy it.  I try to go when I know it is going to be quiet and always allow myself about 2 hours, so that I can just wander around and get lost in "What the family needs for the fortnight."  I'm very indecisive by nature and it often takes me up to 5 minutes to decide on "which brand of laundry powder to get", or trying to remember whether or not we needed something (I try and keep a list, but I often forget to put things on it or take it with me!) or whatever other dilemma the amount of choice we have these days presents, but it's great, because I can just wander around and no one cares.  Then I love the thrill of opening all of the cupboards in the house, knowing that I have everything I need to keep the family fed and clean for the coming fortnight

Well, I used to anyway.  The demise started somewhere around the time Franklins closed down and only  got worse as the whole supermarkets owning petrol stations and liquor stores started taking over.  I would get home from doing my shopping, open the cupboards and have hardly anything from the huge amount of money that I'd just forked out.  Used to really piss me off.  And what has really made me unhappy lately is all these "Shelf Prices Reduced".....  not only has it increased the prices of other groceries, but it just rubs in our face how much they have been ripping us off for so long.  (It was the Huggies Nappies that really did it for me.... permanently reduce the RRP by $9/box or something like 21% and charge us what we used to pay for them on what was a good special!!!  Still wondering how they can justify it....  that's right, they're Woolworths & Coles, they don't have too!) So I found myself only doing a big shop when it was absolutely necessary (ie. when all of the cleaning products and toiletries are empty!!) and getting our food and other bits and pieces as we needed it.  This has resulted in us spending a lot more than necessary on our groceries, because there are always little treats and extras that get thrown in each time!!

The thought of doing my groceries at Aldi kind of scared me....  although, I will admit that I had never stepped foot into one until I had had a baby and had heard very good reports about their nappies.  The stores always looked so 'warehousey' (if you know what I mean) and I have my favourite brands of pretty much everything I buy, so all these brands that I'd never heard of where a bit of a turn off. 

While I was in there getting nappies, I would also try out other baby things, like their wipes and nappy sacks, which I found were of a really good quality and I was really impressed by (their nappy sacks are the best I've found, because they come in a packet that has a resealable lid and they are thick bags!!)  I also found that they sold Baby Jelly's and a few other different baby purees and foods, which looked a lot like the Heinz ones I get from Woolies, just with a different name.  Check the label, sure enough, they are made by Heinz....  and they are 25c cheaper than Woolies.  That might not seem like a lot, but when you are buying 14 or 15 of them at a time, the discount adds up. 

So, I decided to do a "full trolley" shop one day and try everything out.  I went in with a "try everything once" attitude and I haven't looked back!  There are a few things that I've found that I won't buy again, and there are other things I've bought that we are yet to try, but for the most part, I am really impressed.

I spend about $200 per fortnight, and pretty much have everything I need.  I still have a list of things that I also need to get from Woolworths or Coles once I'm finished...  some things that Aldi just don't sell, or things I've found that I prefer from WW or Coles etc. but that is only about $40 - $50 worth.  That $200 normally includes all of our meat and most of our fruit and vege too.

We have been really impressed by their fresh stuff.  We haven't faulted any of the meat we've bought yet and they generally have a good selection of different cuts of all the different meats, plus prepacked deli meats, which we've always found to be pretty good.  Their frozen baby peas taste like they have literally just been taken out of their pod's.  All of the general grocery lines are comparable to what I normally get at WW or Coles and things like a bag of chips, are actually 3/4 full of chips and not 2/3's air!!

A lot of things too are comparable in price, but there are a few things that I find are heaps cheaper.  A 500gm block of cheese is something like $3.79, something I would otherwise spend over $5 on.  Free Range Eggs are less than $4, cleaning products are much better priced (I haven't tried a lot of them, but the one's I have tried have been pretty good) etc.

I have found a few things that I won't buy again....  the frozen pizza's weren't great at all!  Mackenna wasn't too fussed on the fruit pieces in jelly (...in her defence, they didn't look so appealing after I'd pulled them out of the packet!) and the baby wipes aren't the easiest to get out of the packets...  just silly little things like that, same as the reaction I have to some of the products I buy from Coles or Woolies.

And shopping at Aldi definitely has it's downfalls....  the checkout operators are always too fast, so normally I'm not finished putting all the groceries on the conveyor belt before they are looking for the trolley and for me to come down and pack it back in.  You've also got to try and think quickly about repacking the trolley...  I always find the bread, eggs and chips on the bottom of the trolley with everything else packed on top of them!!  Everything is pretty tightly packed into the shop too, so it's easy to miss things. 

All these things though, I can definitely live with!!  As crazy as it sounds to some people, it's nice to look forward to doing the groceries again.  

...  And now I've made myself hungry....  might go and check out what we've got to eat (....  it's grocery day tomorrow though, so I think it's going to be slim pickings!!)