Vivo O Sonho

I love Grocery Outlet. First and foremost because it reminds me of my Nana. The only thing she loved more than a bargain was her grandchildren. We didn’t shop there often as she lived in Alameda and the nearest stores were in San Leandro and Oakland. Leaving the island and traveling above 25 mph gave her anxiety; instead we opted for the various dollar stores around town so she could get her discount fix.

Grocery Outlet opened in Alameda a few months ago on Buena Vista at Lincoln (the site of the old Liquor Barn for you old timers, and more recently West Marine) and I made a trip to check out the deals. I take after my Nana in loving a bargain only slightly less than my own Grands and enjoy creating delicious and eye-pleasing meals so I challenged myself to come up with a week’s worth of dinners using only their  products. The menus consisted of roasted game hens over root veggies (pictured at the top of the page), seared ahi tuna and arugula salad, a low-cal and low-carb lasagna (recipe next week), barbecued chicken and grilled asparagus, and steaks and artichokes.

This week we’re having tortellini with chicken meatballs and veggies in an Alfredo sauce (pictured above), orange peel chicken stir-fry over cauliflower rice, barbecued tri tip with coleslaw, and roasted butterflied leg of lamb over spinach with crispy polenta cakes. Each meal costs between $9 – $15 total for hubby and I, with leftovers for lunches.

I post many of my recipes on this blog and thought that it would be fun to post my bargain meals from Grocery Outlet. Then I took it a step farther and got up the confidence to meet the store owner, Elie Zgheib, also an Alamedan, and pitched my idea. He loved it and offered to feature the link to my blog on their Facebook sponsored post which has a huge reach. Win-win … we’ll promote each other! I’m pretty excited about this partnership and fun challenge.

Beginning next Tuesday I’ll be posting “GO To Tuesday” weekly recipes for meals made from Alameda Grocery Outlet products in my tiny kitchen. I don’t consider myself a gourmet chef in any way, shape or form, but I enjoy feeding my family and friends with simple but tasty and cost-effective meals. I hope you’ll check out your local Grocery Outlet and give my recipes a try!