Baby aspirin, egg whites, organic pasta, takeout, Can Can sale, more

If you take a baby aspirin every day, as I do, you'll be struck by the dramatic price difference at Costco Wholesale in Teterboro between 400 Bayer tablets for $12.49, above, and the 730 Kirkland Signature tablets for $4.49 that I bought last week, below.

Costco's Kirkland Signature Low Dose Aspirin tablets are supplied by LNK International. The Hauppauge, N.Y., company makes solid- and liquid-dose over-the-counter pharmaceutical products for retailers nationwide, according to the January 2017 issue of The Costco Connection magazine.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Although not everyone agrees on the health benefits of taking a baby aspirin every day, Costco Wholesale members are unanimously in favor of how much they save over a national brand.

You get nearly twice as many coated, low-dose aspirin tablets -- and save $8 -- when you buy Costco's Kirkland Signature brand instead of Bayer, a German pharmaceutical giant.

This is another dramatic example of how Costco puts added value in most of the products sold under the house label.

Everything from Kirkland Signature's 81-milligram aspirin tablets to such Kirkland Signature wines as California Cabernet Sauvignon and Malbec from Argentina, both available at the Costco Wholesale in Wayne. 

On a visit to the Wayne Costco in December, I picked up eight bottles of wine, including a non-Kirkland Signature boxed set of four Grands Vins de Bordeaux from France for $29.99 or about $7.50 a bottle.

The one bottle of Bordeaux I tried so far was delicious, but I was disappointed to learn I could have found the same bottles elsewhere for about the same price. 

Kirkland Signature Organic Quinoa, on the other hand, appeared on Costco shelves last year in a larger package and at a lower price than the national brand it replaced.

A hearty breakfast includes an egg-white omelet stuffed with wild Alaskan smoked sockeye salmon and reduced-fat Swiss cheese, served over organic quinoa prepared with organic diced tomatoes and California garlic cloves -- all from Costco. Kirkland Signature Cage-Free Egg Whites are $8.99 for six 16-ounce cartons or about $1.50 each, below.

365 Every Day Value Organic Whole Wheat Shells from Italy dressed in a homemade, heart-healthy ragu of Victoria-brand Vodka Sauce, sardines and anchovies.

At Whole Foods Market, 1-pound boxes or packages of organic whole wheat shells and other shapes are $1.49 each, a better buy than non-organic brands sold in smaller packages. They also can't match the nutty taste of organic whole wheat pasta, which is also available at ShopRite supermarkets and Trader Joe's. Cooking time for the pasta is about 9 minutes, not the 14-15 minutes listed on the package.

I reserved a few ounces of sauce to use for poaching eggs. Victoria is one of the few brands offering a Vodka Sauce free of artery clogging heavy cream. All the ingredients are listed on the front label. I usually add a few ounces of red wine, extra-virgin olive oil, some red-pepper flakes and dried Italian herbs to the pan as the sauce is being heated.

Before adding them to the sauce, I rinse and drain the anchovies to reduce the sodium content of the dish, and mince the sardines (3 cans for 1 pound of pasta) with a fork before they go into the pot. Fattal's at 975-77 Main St. in Paterson sells Al Shark-brand sardines for 99 cents a can.

On Friday afternoon, Jerry's Gourmet & More at 410 S. Dean St. in Englewood ran out of complete restaurant-quality dinners to go, so I picked up two containers of Cheese Lovers' Tortelloni, made with five cheeses, for my wife and son.

As I browsed at Jerry's, I enjoyed several free samples of cheese and bread, including a chewy olive loaf, top.

Can Can Sale at ShopRite

On Thursday, I shopped the first week of the 2017 Can Can Sale at ShopRite in Paramus.

I made a few purchases, including five 12-can packages of Adirondack Seltzer for $10, a savings of $8.95 with a store card, according to my receipt.

The Can Can Sale doesn't offer the wide range of deep discounts it once did, and you can find great buys at ShopRite at other times.

For examples, I picked up several bottles of ShopRite Sparkling Cider from Spain (100% juice) for $1.67 each on Dec. 29.

Golden Pineapples were $1.97 each.

Many food claims don't hold water

Image via Wikipedia
If you want pure juice, don't buy Trop50.

Have you seen the TV ad for Trop50, which Tropicana calls "fabulously refreshing with 50% less sugar and calories"?


How do they do that, I wondered as I watched the ad from the maker of 100% pure orange juice on Monday night.


I found out when I looked at Trop50 labels at the Hackensack ShopRite this morning.


It is only 10% to 43% juice, depending on the variety (not 30% as I wrote earlier ). It is labeled a "fruit-juice beverage" and sweetened by PureVia -- called an all-natural plant extract.


McDonald's beef


Another TV ad from McDonald's seems to suggest the fast-food giant is using naturally raised beef in its hamburgers.


The ad shows a rancher, who says he supplies McDonald's, in a field where cattle are grazing -- what you'd see if the animals are grass fed 

Image via Wikipedia

and free range.


But the ad tells you nothing about whether the cattle are raised on antibiotics and growth hormones, and whether they spend most of their lives eating grain in the confines of a feed lot with hundreds of other animals.


Shrinking boxes


I've been buying mostly 100% whole wheat pasta, but many brands come in a box that is less than a full pound.


ShopRite, Barilla and other brands offer whole wheat or whole grain pasta in boxes that are about 13 to 14 ounces. Dreamfields Pasta boxes also hold less than 16 ounces.


Even on sale, they are not a good buy.


Last week, Jerry's Gourmet in Englewood had 100% whole wheat capellini from Italy in a 16-ounce package for $1.49. Trader Joe's sells a 16-ounce package of organic 100% whole wheat spaghetti for $1.39.


Coupon madness


The ShopRite in Hackensack today refused to honor a Progresso Soup Super Coupon from its sales flier that said "10 for $10.88" unless I bought the full number of cans.


Nowhere on the flier or coupon does it say "Must Buy 10" to get the price of about $1.09 per can compared to the Can Can Sale price of $1.25.


I left a message at Bergen County Weights and Measures in Hackensack.

Do we really need restaurants?

Image via Wikipedia
Parmigiano Reggiano is an aged, part skim-milk cheese from Italy that goes great with crisp apples and other fruit, but try to find it served that way in a restaurant.

Editor's note: Why go out to eat in restaurants when you can dine like a king at home? Today, I also discuss further Can Can Sale adventures at ShopRite.

I had a wonderful Italian dinner on Monday night -- small shrimp and unusually tender squid in a fra diavolo sauce, vegetable frittata, shell pasta with tuna, stuffed mushroom, eggplant caponata and a nice, four-green salad  -- and drank a full-bodied Italian red wine with it.


My wife and mother-in-law ate baked fillet of sole and my son had barbecued chicken wings, all with similar side dishes.


My dessert: crisp apple sections paired with Parmigiano Reggiano cheese. They had ice cream. And we enjoyed all of this in the comfort of our own home.


Why go out?


When I think of our recent restaurant experiences, I wish we could eat like this every night and never leave the house.


That morning, I stopped by Jerry's Gourmet and More in Englewood, and picked up four Meals To Go at a mere $7.99 each -- less than the cost of a restaurant appetizer.


We could have a different meal from Jerry's every night or order takeout delivered to our door from our favorite places.


Then, we wouldn't have to go out and sit in a drafty dining room, as we did recently in settings as diverse as Nanoosh, a casual, organic Middle Eastern restaurant at a mall in Paramus, and Lupa Osteria Romana, a popular Manhattan trattoria where a skimpy meal for three cost more than $100 -- without wine.


Routine gouging


And I wouldn't have to pay $5.50 for a bottle of light beer, $10 to $12 for a glass of wine or $2.95 for a cup of lukewarm coffee.


We long ago started trying to reproduce at home some of our favorite dining-out meals, such as Korean barbecue, which my son refers to as "cook on the table."


For years, we ate what is essentially mystery meat in Korean restaurants before I started buying Nature's Reserve free-range, grass-fed Australian beef at ShopRite, sliced it thin and placed it in a freezer bag with Korean marinade.


Now, we cook this fun Korean meal on a stove-top grill at home and wrap the beef in red-lettuce leaves with spicy bean paste, garlic, rice and kimchi -- just as we did in restaurants.


We don't have to tip or rush because other people are waiting for our table. And a cold beer, which goes great with Korean food, is as close as the refrigerator.


Made to order


I don't know any Italian-American restaurants in North Jersey that serve whole-wheat pasta with a red sauce and sardines, one of our favorite meals at home.


Or would be willing to add a half-pound of fresh spinach to wilt and mix with a pound of pasta with garlic, oil and anchovies.


By eating at home, we can enjoy antibiotic-free poultry and meat, grass-fed lamb and wild-caught salmon -- fresh, frozen or smoked. Our salads are usually made with organic greens. 


For dessert, there are always a few kinds of cheese in the refrigerator to have with fruit and organic black tea.  


At Lupa in Manhattan, the menu tells customers all poultry and meat are from Heritage Foods USA, a network of farms and ranches where animals are raised naturally and not pumped full  of growth hormones to get them to market as fast as possible.


Silent menus


In North Jersey, most restaurant menus are silent on the origin of the poultry, beef and pork served in their dining rooms or the owners cut corners to maximize profits.


Celebrity Chef Bobby Flay's so-called Hamburger Palace in Paramus uses Certified Angus Beef, which is raised conventionally with harmful additives. Flay could buy a more expensive natural line of Certified Angus Beef free of antibiotics or growth hormones, but doesn't.


Restaurant owners seeking maximum profit at the expense of their customers' health are aided by restaurant critics who don't bother to ask about the origin or quality of the food they sample and promote in their reviews.


If reviewers paid for their own meals -- instead of spending their employers' money -- they might pay more attention to the quality of the food they're served and produce critiques that are more consumer-oriented.


When we ate at Lupa, we loved the service. Still, I felt like having wine, but refused to pay $12 for a single glass when I could buy an entire bottle for less.


You can't eat paint


Why go to Sear House, a steakhouse in Closter, where the brothers who own the place claim they spent $5 million to renovate, then served a critic "smelly" tuna sushi and an ordinary, fatty rib-eye for $45? 


Yet, the reviewer still gave the place 3 stars out of a possible 4.


We liked Amici Family Restaurant in Bergenfield until the night we were served a tough, sinewy piece of fish the menu said was red snapper. When we asked, the waitress relayed the chef's insistence it was red snapper.


We won't return.


And if you believe what you read in the newspaper, why go to a restaurant where owners think you're complaining about the food to get a free meal?


Places we love


It would be difficult to kick the restaurant habit altogether, even though we usually eat out only once a week and do takeout on another night. And in retirement, I enjoy meeting friends for breakfast or lunch out.


At Rosa Mexicano, a fine-dining mall restaurant in Hackensack, I had the  wonderful, made-from-scratch fish tacos for lunch on Tuesday and a friend chose the Enchiladas Suizas. The entrees included several side dishes and terrific salsas.


We had to order a la carte, because the fish tacos and his chicken enchiladas weren't included in a $16.50, two-course lunch special. But the two light beers he drank cost $11 and the bill came to $54 and change with tip and tax.


And there are places we've been going to for years we'd have a hard time living without, such as Wondee's and Lotus Cafe in Hackensack, and So Gong Dong in Palisades Park.


Wondee's is a Thai restaurant with terrific prices for whole fish, which you can get steamed and covered with a spicy blend of chili and garlic. (In fact, a whole fish at Wondee's is only a few dollars more than the fish tacos at Rosa Mexicano.) 


Lotus Cafe specializes in big Chinese meals, such as the 11-course Formosa Banquet for Ten at about $31 per person, including tip and tax. And So Gong Dong serves a healthy meal of Korean soft-tofu stew, kimchi and other comfort foods for $10.


All are BYOs, and all are unpretentious, welcoming places where families gather for a good meal at prices that won't break the bank.


I can Can Can


We continue to shop the Can Can Sale at ShopRite with mixed results.


My wife went to the Englewood ShopRite for more Adirondack seltzer and Airwick air freshener, then wiped out any savings with the purchase of Cortizone-10 hydrocortisone cream for $8.27.


I returned the 2-ounce tube for a refund today and managed to find a 1-ounce ShopRite-brand tube of the same anti-itch cream for $2.99, the last one on the shelf. My wife said there weren't any when she shopped.


Today, I also picked up a half-gallon of Smart Balance Fat-Free Lactose-Free Milk with Omega 3 for $1.99 or half-price, compared to $3.39 for the ShopRite brand.


Bottles of VO5 shampoo were 88 cents each, but a can of Progresso soup was $1.25. I bought five of the former, none of the latter.


At last year's Can Can Sale, Progresso soups were $1.19 a can or 10 for $10 with a coupon and store card. 

One street's rich ethnic stew

Image by juancardenes@verizon.net via Flickr

Bergenline Avenue is lined with a rich variety of ethnic restaurants and markets.

I drove to West New York today to drop off photos I took of Belarmino Rico and his sons at La Pola, where I picked up a traditional Cuban Christmas dinner the day before the holiday.

Rico, a native of Spain who describes himself as "King of the Cuban Sandwich," served soup to me and my wife to ward off the day's chill. My wife had chicken soup and I enjoyed caldo Gallego, the Galician white-bean soup made with potato, collard green, chorizo and ham (I ate around the meat).

First, we visited the West New York Post Office on Bergenline Avenue to see a circa 1930s mural showing eight or nine people enjoying a beautiful day from atop the Palisades, with the Empire State Building and the rest of the Manhattan skyline in the distance.

Then, we walked and drove along Bergenline, which has an incredible variety of ethnic restaurants and markets. At a Latino supermarket, we picked up the root vegetable called yuca, which we'll boil and eat with La Pola's garlic sauce, the one that moistens every Cuban sandwich sold there.

In the space of about 15 blocks in West New York and Guttenberg, we saw Peruvian restaurants and a Cuban seafood place, an Italian trattoria, a Japanese restaurant; Las Palmas, another Cuban restaurant with addictive chicharrones or pork rinds; Pollo Campero, a popular fast-food, fried-chicken restaurant that originated in Guatemala; and Jerusalem Bakery.

We're planning a return visit soon to sample the restaurants we haven't tried yet.  

La Pola, 5400 Palisade Ave., West New York; 201-867-6028.
Las Palmas, 6153 Bergenline Ave., West New York; 201-861-1400.
Pollo Campero, 6425 Bergenline Ave., West New York, 201-662-6190.
Jerusalem Bakery, 6901 Bergenline Ave., Guttenberg; 201-868-2253.

Costco v. ShopRite

My wife picked up four 2-pound packages of salted pollack, the fish we have been using instead of pricier cod for her Jamaican breakfast of ackee and salt fish, in which the bland fruit serves as the  perfect foil for a strong, flaky fish and hot peppers.

Costo's price is $6.39 a package, or about $3.20 a pound, compared to $4.99 a pound for salted pollack at ShopRite. Salted cod at ShopRite is $9.99 a pound. 

More Can Can Sale

I continue to shop the 40th anniversary Can Can Sale at ShopRite, but it is losing its allure now that I've stocked up on Adirondack seltzer, Progresso soup, Air Wick air freshener and White Rain shampoo.

Many things I usually buy are not on sale, including canned Alaskan red salmon and imported olive oil, sparking 100% juice and other items from Italy and Spain sold under the ShopRite name.

At the Palisades Park ShopRite on Wednesday, I bought a package of ShopRite lemon-flavored lady fingers from Italy that go great with espresso for $2.99 (six dozen).

Loose garlic was $3.99 a pound and a net bag of garlic from China was $2.99, but weighed only about 6 ounces. I bought elephant garlic for $3.49. Marked 3 ounces, it weighed twice that.


The best buy I found on extra-virgin olive oil was a three-liter tin from Greece for $15.99 (Kalamata brand). 

Three-culture breakfast

I've been trying to eat filling breakfasts since I cut down drastically on bread, which I once enjoyed three or four times a day.

On Tuesday, I plated leftover ackee and salt fish, stewed tofu in red pepper sauce from H Mart, and homemade fava-bean salad and warmed them in the microwave. Then, I fried an organic brown egg in extra-virgin olive oil, sunny side up, and slid it on top of that trio. It was  just wonderful -- even without bread.

When shopping competing sales, don't forget to take a calculator

Poland Spring Water on sale at ShopRite in October 2015.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Just when I thought ShopRite's 40th anniversary sale ended on Saturday, a newspaper flier heralded a second week of bargains -- through Jan. 22. But I also discovered that some of the items offered during the Can Can Sale aren't good buys at all.

We stopped buying bottled water more than a year ago and started using reusable bottles for home-filtered water.

But we decided three 24-packs of Poland Spring water at the ShopRite in Englewood for the Can Can price of $10 was a good deal (my wife likes to keep bottles of water in her car trunk).

When she came home, I used a calculator to figure out each 16.9-ounce bottle cost us nearly 14 cents -- far more than the same bottle at Costco, where we shop every week.

On the same trip, my wife bought three,18-ounce plastic bottles of White Rain shampoo for 59 cents each, reduced from 99 cents.

One-stop shopping

At one store Friday morning, I picked up two polo shirts ($12.99 each), a mixed bouquet of flowers to welcome my wife home from a trip ($14.99) and lots of terrific food at great prices: 

Dungeness crab, Black Tiger prawns, canned anchovies, organic spring mix, herbicide-free tomatoes, organic spinach and Tropicana orange juice. 

Will Costco Wholesale in Hackensack ever become the only store I have to visit?

A good week for food shopping

Image via Wikipedia

I substituted fresh spinach for romaine lettuce when I made Cesar's salad pasta.

Any week I visit Costco in Hackensack is a good one for food shopping, but today I'm referring to the 40th anniversary Can Can Sale at ShopRite.

The supermarket chain's fliers have been previewing the sale, which starts Wednesday (Jan. 5). It looks like a number of items will be sold for 40 cents. I don't know whether canned Alaskan red salmon will be part of the sale.

The wild-caught red salmon, with some skin and bones, once went on sale for $2.99 a can, compared to the regular price of $4.99. However, for more than a year now, it rarely goes below $5 a can, and it's usually priced at $5.49 (Bumble Bee).

From seaweed to salmon

At Costco today, I picked up a box of roasted and seasoned seaweed from South Korea -- another item the warehouse store is offering in a direct appeal to its Korean-American customers. Twenty-seven packages cost $10.49, or 38 cents a package.

Along with items that appeal to Korean and other Asian customers, Costco has beefed up its kosher food line in the past year. 
 

I also picked up cans of Genova-brand light yellow fin tuna in olive oil ($6.95 for four 7-ounce cans); canned pink salmon ($10.85 for six 6-ounce cans), farmed U-15 prawns ($9.99 a pound) and Kirkland-brand frozen sockeye salmon fillets from Alaska ($27.89 for three pounds).

The price of Earthbound Farm organic spring mix rose to $4.79 a pound, but two pounds of  herbicide-free Campari tomatoes eased a bit to $5.59. Nine large mangoes from Ecuador were $8.49.

Salad-like pasta

On one of those morning TV cooking segments, I saw a cook from a restaurant in Manhattan make a pasta dish from the ingredients for Caesar's salad -- including romaine lettuce. (The salad was invented in Tijuana, Mexico.)

You'll need:

• Fresh, sliced garlic to taste
• Romaine lettuce or fresh spinach
• Extra-virgin olive oil
• Can of anchovies, with or without capers
• Chicken broth
• Red-pepper flakes 
• Grated cheese 
• Any kind of pasta

Directions:

Sautee the sliced garlic and anchovies, with its oil, mashing the fish with a wooden spoon. When the garlic is fragrant, add chicken broth and bring to a boil. Reduce the mixture. Use about a cup of broth for a half-pound of pasta, two cups for a pound.

Wash romaine or fresh spinach well, and chop roughly. Cook pasta until al dente (I used thick spaghetti, but you can use penne or another type). 

Add cooked pasta to sauce, coating it well, then lots of grated cheese, then romaine or spinach, then turn off the heat to combine. 

Add more cheese before serving. The anchovies and garlic give the sauce a robust flavor, without being at all fishy.

The recipe doesn't use egg yolk, another ingredient in Caesar's salad, but I can see frying an egg sunny side up and serving it on top of the pasta.