Wowie Zowie! Take a look at all that free food! As you would imagine, summer is one of the best times of year to score free produce because there is such an abundance of food flowing into grocery stores.
Before I could take my final picture, The Girl Who Thinks She’s a Bird snagged 2 avocados and whipped up a batch of guacamole and had herself a little fiesta!
Fresh strawberries? Have you been to the stores lately? Deals on berries are everywhere!
Fresh corn? Heck ya, I’ll take it. The way I see it, I’d rather be able to take all this corn and turn it into side dishes like corn and black bean salad, roasted corn with bacon {yum!} or summer corn with zucchini and onions than see it go throw in the dumpster to rot.
This Earthbound Farm organic salad was thrown out because the expiration date stamped on the front. According the the package, it was one day past it’s prime. Remember when food never even came with an expiration date? Am I getting old? Geez.
Here is a picture of all the food we kept {the rest was either composted or given to our flock of pet chickens}. Does this food still look edible to you? Would you have thrown it away? Or would you have bought this right off the shelf and fed your family with it?
Mavis wants to know!
Would you like to see what else we have brought home over the past year?
Head on over HERE to read all the past stories and to see all the pictures.
If you have just stumbled upon this series and are wondering how I got all this food for free, you’ll want to read this story first.
Nicole in Portland says
So, you just find the produce manager and ask what they do with the produce that’s about to expire? How many places did you have to ask before they said yes?
Mavis Butterfield says
This post has how I did it.
Shirley says
I have learned so much from you, Mavis. Thank you!
Carol says
Thank you, Mavis, for the Roasted Corn and Bacon recipe. I’m going to try this today. 🙂
All of your free veggies look wonderful to me this time around. The only thing about the organic salad is be sure to really look at the lettuce leaves. They tend to turn bad fairly fast (personal experience…yuck), but you should see that as you wash them off. I learned the hard way to stay wholly present while washing greens.
Have a great day!
Faith says
Our local Kroger has started bundling produce that is close to its prime and selling it for $0.39, $0.59, or $0.99! Our locally owned, hometown grocery store does this as well. This week I got 3lbs of mandarin oranges, 4 nectarines, 8 plums, 1lb black grapes, and 2lb red grapes all for less than $2! Other than one bad grape, there was nothing wrong with any of it! I never pay full price for red or yellow bell peppers anymore, because I can get them 3/$0.39! Normally, they would be $1.69 each! None of the stores in our area (northern Alabama) give away their produce, so I will take the reduced prices any day!
Shirley says
We have one (to my knowledge) QFC here, which is Kroger, that bundles (what I call their ugly fruit & vegies) and sells then for the same price you mentioned, Faith. I always go there first and that’s what I buy.
Lisa says
I am jealous of all those strawberries you received! Since school let out, we haven’t been getting our reclaimed produce as often because we have to go get it at 6am. The produce guy only works until 10am and there are others who come to get the reclaimed produce too, so if we don’t get up early there is nothing when we get there. After seeing your haul, I’m definitely making my husband get up early tomorrow! 🙂
Mavis Butterfield says
Ha!
Stephanie @ The Simplebees says
We’ve asked and asked and asked! LOL No dice.
Instead we go to the grocery salvage and pick through what they have. There is still plenty of life left in their fruits and veggies. I got bell peppers for .33 each, peaches for .88/lb, etc.
The best deal I ever got there was a few days ago. I picked up FLATS of strawberries (12 cartons!) for $1.50!
sharon says
What is the grocery salvage?
annie says
Not sure about grocery salvage but out Bi-Lo store has a produce salvage and it is a shopping cart with the kind of produce Mavis brings home for free except thay charge for it .lol I have gotten some good deals from there but it burns me that I have to pay for it 🙁
Lissa says
It’s been very hit or miss here. So dependent on the day and time of day. Last week got 2 small heads of romaine, a huge head of cauliflower, 1lb strawberries, 1lb blueberries, 1.5lbs Rainier cherries, and some celery ribs. Today got ~1/2 head of butter lettuce, 2 radishes, a bunch kale, and 9 bananas. I love it!