Grocery shopping can be quick and easy or it can take forever and be very frustrating. Making wise decisions when grocery shopping will save you time, money and aggravation. Here are a few tips and tricks that will help you get the job done fast, and efficiently.
Introduce yourself to people that work in the store, especially if you go there often. Make sure to meet the Produce, Meat, and Seafood Managers if you can, and be very friendly. They’ll tell you all you need to know, and help you with any problem you might have.
If you can’t find what you are looking for and if they don’t have it anywhere else, you can ask the Food or Seafood manager to order it for you. They would also like to know at least 48 hours in advance!
If you are looking for cuts of meat that the local markets don’t have, you might need to be friends with your local butcher. If you call them ahead of time and let them know what you want, in most cases they will have it waiting for to pickup.
The quality of your fish and seafood in the dishes you cook is very important. If you don’t like how something looks, don’t buy it. Only cook with the highest quality ingredients, it will give you a much better final product. Only choose ripe vegetables and fruits, and fresh meat and seafood.
Find a great place that is local to you, and do the majority of your shopping there. This way you can get to know where everything is, you get to know the people, and it gets easier over time. Shopping in a new place every time can make this process more difficult.
Investing in canvas bags that the store sells is a great way to save on the volume of plastic and paper bags you will use shopping for your ingredients.
Storing dry ingredients in a pantry or dry storage can help you save tons of time. Keeping the pantry stocked means that you might already have the majority of the ingredients for your new recipe you want to try. It makes the grocery shopping list much shorter.
Buy your meat and seafood last, so it’s not sitting in your cart for the rest of the time you are shopping for other things. This ensures that you have the freshest, highest quality product to cook with.
Planning ahead of time is always a great idea but when it comes to a grocery shopping list, it definitely makes the process a lot easier.
Make sure if you are buying for days ahead that you plan out everything and figure out all of the ingredients you will need as this makes for fewer last minute grocery shopping trips.
