As I shared in this post, the first step toward living a simple life is not purging your closets or getting chickens or even starting a garden, but to start in the kitchen. Read the other posts in this series here.
In my search for balancing frugality with healthy, whole, organic foods, I’ve come to love shopping at ALDI. (I know some of you live in areas that don’t have this store nearby, and I’m sorry. What other healthy options might be available to you?)
Before our move almost two years ago, our closest ALDI store was about 40 minutes away. I still tried to make that trip every month or two, and it quickly became my favorite grocery store. We now live 15-20 minutes away, and I stop by about every other week.
One of my favorite things about the store (and my husband’s #1 reason for shopping here) is actually the lack of choices. I can easily spend 2 hours at Meijer, walking the long aisles and thinking about the differences between multiple brands for something as simple as pasta or cereal. What’s on sale? What’s healthiest? What does my family like?
Decision fatigue is real.
At ALDI, we don’t really have to think when we walk in. There are usually only one or two brands of everything (organic and regular). The everyday prices are all cheap enough that I don’t have to compare cost-per-ounce every time. I can be in and out in a half hour, AND spend much less money than I would at Meijer even with their coupons and sales.
Here is a quick rundown of some of our family’s favorite things to buy at ALDI.
Snacks
- Meat sticks and summer sausage
- Peanut butter pretzels
- Graham crackers
- Veggie straws
- Fruit snacks
- Nuts
Baking supplies
I’m getting more and more dry goods from Azure Standard, but if I run low in between our monthly drops I’ll pick something up at ALDI.
- Cane sugar
- Brown sugar
- The one baking supply I never get at ALDI is flour — currently their only option is bleached all-purpose (which surprises me…).
Dairy
- Milk
- Heavy cream and half & half
- Shredded cheese
- Blocks of cheese
- Cheese sticks
- I also bought yogurt from ALDI before I started making it myself (blog post coming soon!)
Produce can be hit or miss, depending on your location and the day of the week. Thankfully my store has decent produce most of the time, though they do sometimes run out of things I happen to be looking for (bell peppers, grapes, berries). I also like their packaged salad kits.
Meat
- When we run out of something from our 1/2 pig or 1/4 beef, I’ve found the quality of ALDI’s fresh meat to be pretty decent. This might also vary from store to store.
- Bags of frozen chicken breast
Miscellaneous
- Bagels — my kids LOVE ALDI’s Maple French Toast bagels. They’re more expensive than the other flavors, but since I’m saving in other areas I feel okay splurging on these.
- Pasta
- Soft tortillas
And who can turn down the sections of ALDI Finds and seasonal items?? I don’t mind doing a little bit of impulse shopping when there aren’t rows and rows of it available like at other larger stores.
Do you have an ALDI store nearby? What are your favorite things to buy? What are some fun seasonal things you’ve found?
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