Cheapest Supermarkets

Nigel · Post by **Nigel** » Sun 02 Mar 2014 09:35

I had always thought that Auchan at Perpignan was the cheapest supermarket within easy reaching distance for us...according to this site it is not ...but Lecerlc at Le Boulou seems to be

http://www.quechoisir.org/app/drive/carte/

just put in your post code and how far you are prepared to travel to check the place place for you

russell · Post by **russell** » Sun 02 Mar 2014 10:22

Interesting site, but can you edit it to remove the "w" at the beginning of the URL?

Rgds
Russell.

Nigel · Post by **Nigel** » Sun 02 Mar 2014 10:28

Thanks Russell ...have done

Geoman · Post by **Geoman** » Sun 02 Mar 2014 17:52

Lecleric at le bolou has the cheapest fuel in the area,as far as I have seen.

Santiago · Post by **Santiago** » Tue 04 Mar 2014 23:52

Auchan cheapest? You must be joking.

If you really want to economise on weekly spending here you should buy basics like milk and loo-roll, tinned veg and chicken from Lidl (plus other interesting things they have from time to time). You should buy fresh fruit and vegetables from markets or grocers and farm-shops in season. You can buy cheap meat from various supermarkets but I have found that certain butchers, notably Maison Paré, have weekly deals that undercut the supermarkets and offer far better quality.

Owens88 · Post by **Owens88** » Wed 05 Mar 2014 00:34

Finish the list Santiago - Fish?

Robert Ferrieux · Post by **Robert Ferrieux** » Wed 05 Mar 2014 01:26

Chicken from Lidl ?? You must be joking! Unless of course, you're satisfied eating rubber chickens that have been "living" in cages all their miserable lives. Pay a little more, eat a little less, savour the flavour and ease your conscience.
Plus: if you're prepared to spend all day going from one supermarket to the next, wasting petrol, to save 2 euros on your weekly shop, go to Lidl & Leader Price for flour, sugar, loo-paper & bleach, the local baker for bread, Auchan for meat (very good) Port Vendre for fresh fish (EXCELLENT)n Dia for vegetables & the local growers for fruit.
Time is money.

Helen

blackduff · Post by **blackduff** » Wed 05 Mar 2014 05:32

Time is money.

Helen

Now that's really funny. WE spend hours trying to get our TVs English programs, so we can waste this "Time is Money" for naught.

Personally, I use Aldi for drinks, loo paper, cat litter, some cheeses, frozen gambas (they're the best tasting, compared to the other supermarkets), dish washing soap, and the various "specials" each week. I meet friends at 08:00 at McDo and visit next door to Aldi.

I do buy at Auchan but it's way too far for daily shopping. BUT, if you need some good Italian tomatoes, they sell Ciro tinned tomatoes. Often Italian tomatoes are on sale there. The annual Chinese New Years sale has 20 kg sacks of rice (best quality available) for 27€. The same product was 47€ at the Asia Center.

Sales for chicken in Auchan tends to sell the "Michelin" brand. Intermarche Hyper in Argeles sells a lower brand of rubber chicken too. Simply name seems to mean simply bad food-funny that it's part of Auchan.

Weekly I will visit the fruit/veggie shop in Mas Guerido - Provence Halles. You can get some fresh products and for me, I can buy botts of basil, coriander, and a few other herbs, etc.. I needed some mint and I bought the small package at the Intermarche. It had a small flap to remove only leaves, thereby keeping the other leaves fresh. This package of mint at Intermarche and it was fresh looking but no smell of mint in this package. Price was 1.65€ but a great bott of mint at the Prov. Halles was really smelling good for 1€.

I guess we all have our needs and wants so we spend enough to get decent food in the PO. I will buy across the border too. I'm not looking for cheap in Spain though. There's lots of products across the border.

My rant is almost finished but Leclerc needs some treating too. I bought some chicken wings at their store near to the hospital. They were cheap and very, very tasty. So, I passed the Leclerc in Le Boulou later and bought some more chicken wings but they were Michelin products instead.
The wings were only for making Asia recipe ~ wings cooked in CocaCola. Giggle for the recipes of this treat. Yet, you don't want Michelin wings for this meal.

Sorry, I started to post at 05:00 am today.

Blackduff

Santiago · Post by **Santiago** » Wed 05 Mar 2014 13:45

I'm not sure how you shop Helen but we tend to buy groceries about 3 times a week. I couldn't possibly store a weeks worth of food for my family - and I already have 2 fridges.

Maybe we're lucky where we live. We have Lidl, Champion, a very good greengrocer and a great butcher all along the same road. I have 2 weekly markets that I can go to. I don't go from one to the next all at the same time. I go to one or two at a time, usually when I'm doing something else like banking, delivering wine, taking the kids to an activity, etc.

But then again I've never been a big lover of the single weekly shop at one store.

This time-is-money thing is a funny argument to use. Food shopping shouldn't be a chore that you try to not waste time on. It becomes a chore when it is soulless. Going to a local market here is a pleasure (OK, not in the Tramontane). When I lived in London, both my partner and I had high-pressure jobs which, including commute, left little time for food shopping. I can understand how a UK family with both parents working full-time, living in a town with only supermarkets, would concentrate that down to a 1-hour dash.

Here, especially within the Anglophone community, I don't think there are many people who can claim not to have time to do anything more than a 1-hour supermarket sweep once a week. Not many of us have 40 hour a week jobs that prevent us getting to the shops. In my experience, people have more flexible schedules.

It's more about whether you enjoy food shopping or not. Personally, driving to Auchan is guaranteed to take 1.5 hours of my day and not in a pleasant way. It's huge, crowded, the queues are slow, parking is a nightmare and a lot of the food is overly expensive, especially meat. Oh, and their wine selection is pretty crap as well.

blackduff · Post by **blackduff** » Wed 05 Mar 2014 14:41

A few years back, my brother-in-law lived in a small village near St. Germain en Laye. He worked in Paris and took the train each day. I would drive him to the train station and the same for coming home.

The first thing I found the few weeks that I lived there, was the rushing of the people. How many people have you seen here in the PO running. Not many, I think. But, around the St. Germain en Laye, many people are running to the train station daily.

Returning from Paris, we would visit a small market to get the evening food. My brother-in-law is a fast shopper but personally I like to check the food and see what it looks in Paris. Yet, my brother-in-law was a slouch with shopping those nights at the store. People going home hit the store and they're in and out in minutes. Geeez, they believe the expression about "Time is money".

Now I love the time to touch and roll the food before I buy. I only places that allows me to choose the foods I buy. If I get home and something is "bad", it's my fault. So, Time means money can also mean that if I don't spend the time to check the foods, it costs me money. When I need a bell pepper and the market wraps plastic around three colour peppers, I don't buy this food. It seems I'm a grouchy old guy when I shop.

Blackduff

Geoman · Post by **Geoman** » Wed 05 Mar 2014 17:07

When we come out we go to Figures in the first couple of days & get enough to last us a few weeks at half the price we would pay in France. There is a butcher down behind the Dali museum that is very very cheap & quality is excellent.

Santiago · Post by **Santiago** » Wed 05 Mar 2014 20:55

Yes, if you are going to Spain, it is definitely worth doing a shop there. We use Mercadona quite a lot.

Merisin · Post by **Merisin** » Thu 06 Mar 2014 08:51

Santiago wrote:
It's more about whether you enjoy food shopping or not. Personally, driving to Auchan is guaranteed to take 1.5 hours of my day and not in a pleasant way. It's huge, crowded, the queues are slow, parking is a nightmare and a lot of the food is overly expensive, especially meat. Oh, and their wine selection is pretty crap as well.

We buy our preferred crap wine there - and enjoy every drop of it!!!!!!!

Mary

Robert Ferrieux · Post by **Robert Ferrieux** » Thu 06 Mar 2014 11:10

[quote="Santiago"]

This time-is-money thing is a funny argument to use. Food shopping shouldn't be a chore that you try to not waste time on. It becomes a chore when it is soulless. have more flexible schedules.
It's more about whether you enjoy food shopping or not.
From Helen

I see your point, St.James, but I really do hate shopping of any sort (yes, even shopping for clothes, which I hate even more). Robert loves shopping - he'll come home with items of which we already have half a dozen, read faisselle instead of vaisselle on my list or misread Jaffa and Javel. The real reason he loves shopping is that he likes to chat up the girls at the check-out....not for him the automatic check-out.

FORUM