ShopRite, H Mart supermarkets ask customers to jump through hoops

At ShopRite's Can Can Sale, 8-ounce cans of Glade Spray are 99 cents each, compared to 19-ounce cans of Lysol Disinfectant Spray for $3.99, below.

The Can Can Sale price for Lysol matches the $15.99 Costco Wholesale charges for a 4-pack, but this week Costco is offering an instant coupon of $4, lowering the price to $11.99.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

ShopRite has a great deal on 15.5-ounce cans of organic beans for 77 cents each, but you'll have to buy 10 to get that low price.

The organic beans, which are made with water and a little sea salt, normally are $1 each. 

Welcome to ShopRite's Can Can Sale, which I shopped at the Paramus store on Wednesday, picking up Organic Black, Pinto, Kidney, Garbanzo and Cannellini Beans.

For a one-dish meal, I add organic beans, organic diced tomatoes, and water or chicken broth to organic brown rice or organic quinoa, and prepare them in an electric cooker.

Progresso Soups are $1.08 in 18.5-ounce cans, a discount of 97 cents, but you can't lower the price by buying 10 cans.

At the Can Can Sale, Adirondack Seltzer is a better buy by the ounce in liter bottles, above, than in cans, below, but you'll need a calculator to figure that out.

Botticelli Pasta Sauces from Italy in 24-ounce jars are half-price at the Paramus ShopRite ($1.99), including a meatless Bolognese Sauce, left. The vodka sauce is one of the few without heavy cream.

I prepared a pound of Luigi Vitelli-brand Organic Whole Wheat Fusilli ($1.25 at ShopRite) in the Vegan Friendly Bolognese Sauce, which substitutes soy for meat. Next time, I'll add a little red wine while heating up the sauce and use a half-pound of pasta.

A addictive Korean seaweed roll known as kimbap was $6.79 at H Mart in Englewood, where the price of such prepared side dishes and snacks has risen dramatically in the past year.

H Mart rebates are not cash

The Korean supermarket chain known as H Mart offers customers a Smart Savings Card similar to ShopRite's Price Plus Club Card.

To qualify for sales and specials at both stores, customers must use their loyalty cards.

But, unlike the ShopRite card, the Smart Savings Card also is a rebate card, entitling the customers to 1% back on their purchases.

There's a big hoop to jump through, however.

You don't get the rebate until you spend $1,000, and when you receive the $10 certificate, you have to use all of it to buy more food at H Mart.

On Saturday, at the Fort Lee H Mart, I picked up two $10 rebate certificates, then purchased fresh whole whiting ($4.99 a pound), and a head of red leaf lettuce ($1.29) for a total of $18.26.

When I gave the cashier the two $10 certificates, she informed me she couldn't give me change. 

I had to use one $10 certificate and a credit card for the $8.26 balance.

At the Englewood H Mart on Tuesday, I bought fresh Chinese Broccoli and Chinese Eggplant, both on sale; and a Seaweed Roll for a total of $9.94, and paid with the second $10 certificate.

Again, the cashier said she couldn't give me the change. I ate the 6 cents difference.

I added a little sea salt and brushed Chinese Eggplant slices with sesame oil as they grilled on the stove top until the flesh turned creamy.

I washed and seasoned, then cooked Chinese Broccoli in chicken broth and sake in a covered pot. I brought the liquid to a boil first, then cooked the broccoli for less than 5 minutes, softening the thick stems.

H Mart eggplant and broccoli over organic quinoa prepared with organic diced tomatoes, whole garlic cloves and olive oil in an electric rice cooker. The organic quinoa, diced tomatoes and California garlic were from Costco Wholesale.

Details

The Paramus ShopRite is at 224 Route 4 east, but also is accessible from Spring Valley Avenue.

The Fort Lee H Mart is in the Linwood Plaza shopping center on Fletcher Avenue, and the Englewood H Mart is at 25 Lafayette Ave.

Other H Marts are in Little Ferry and Ridgefield. All of the Korean markets have counters offering fresh fish and other seafood at low prices. 

H Mart coupons prove to be no big deal

Image via Wikipedia

Beef, pork and chicken look good, but how were they raised?

I've been getting H Mart coupons in the mail for months now, but don't think I've saved a great deal of money at the Korean supermarket chain.


I signed up for an H Mart "Smart Savings Card" in February, which gives customers a $10 gift certificate on every $1,000 spent -- a rebate of 1%. I'm still not there yet.


I drove to the H Mart in Englewood today to return black plums that were spoiled, got a $1.37 store credit and then took out my coupon book. 


Flipping through it, I couldn't find anything I needed. There were coupons for Korean radish, green squash, red peppers, Korean grapes and red delicious apples, as well as small appliances.


The discount on red seedless grapes was 10% with a coupon. The red delicious apples were $1.49 a pound, and the coupon would give me 15% off. 


Three coupons for meat were of no use to me, and $1 off on Chilean sea bass exploits an endangered species that is high in mercury. Sea urchin roe or uni is $5.99 with a coupon.


Some coupons are good through Oct. 14, others until Oct. 30. You might be able to get a coupon book in the store. The regular price of discounted items isn't given.


Two things I wanted today were fish sauce and California-grown rice, which I have been buying at H Mart in 20-pound bags. I couldn't find the fish sauce, and no rice was on sale.


The four H Marts in Bergen County seem to run sales at different times, and discounts vary at stores in Ridgefield, Fort Lee, Little Ferry and Englewood.


I did buy a prepared seaweed-and-rice roll, called kimbap, and pan-friend crab pancakes or pajun for dinner ($4.99 each); yellow nectarines, 79 cents a pound; white peaches, $1.79 a pound; and empress plums, $1.49 a pound.


On my last visit to the Englewood store, I replaced the Korean-made, 12-inch, three-tiered, stainless-steel steamer that I had returned for credit after it rusted. The steamer was on sale for $22.99 (regularly $29.99), and no coupon was needed.


Today, the renovated store's new food court was closed. In September, I saw two women having lunch there, but a cashier said it hadn't been inspected by the city.


Before H Mart, I stopped nearby at Gaboh Inc., 191 W. Englewood Ave., Englewood, to pick up a 64-ounce jar of Arirang-brand cabbage or mahk kimchi ($9.99). This kimchi is made by hand and contains no MSG or preservatives (201-503-1314).


After H Mart, I picked up two large dinners with escoveitch of whiting, rice and peas, and cabbage ($10 each) from Ashanti International, a reliable source of  Jamaican takeout at 227 W. Englewood Ave., Englewood (201-227-0061).


Web site: H Mart


Costco membership


The annual fee for shopping at Costco Wholesale is going up 10% on Nov. 1 -- to $55 or $110 a year. 


Regular customers get the membership fee and more back in cash rebates when they use a credit card from Costco and American Express. 


The rebate checks must be used at Costco, but you don't have to spend the full amount there. You get the difference back in cash.


And you get low prices year-round, such as two dozen Eggland's Best large white eggs (vegetarian feed) for $3.99; three half-gallons of Kirkland Signature organic, low-fat milk for $9.49; and three pounds of bananas for $1.39.


There are hundred of items in sizes suitable for couples or small families, contrary to the impression of recent media reports that you have to buy large quantities to take advantage of Costco's low prices.


High-quality meat


Long after I stopped eating meat, I continue to receive catalogs from Brooklyn-based Heritage Foods USA.


The company was founded 10 years ago "as a response to the dwindling options in the marketplace for high-quality, humanely raised meat products grown by small and medium-sized independent farmers."


There are too many kinds of poultry and meat cuts to mention here, but everything is raised without antibiotics, hormones and animal by-products. In many cases, the animals spend a lot of time outdoors.


Piedmontese beef is described as "one of the tenderest beef varieties ever bred by man -- great marbling [fat]."


Four 14-ounce ribeye steaks are $75, four 18-ounce ribeyes are $93. Piedmontese briskets are 5 pounds for $60 and 10 pounds for $110.


This is a great catalog if you live far from the butcher counter of a Whole Foods Market, such as the one in Paramus.


Here's the Web site: Heritage Foods USA



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Related articles

• Diner's Journal Blog: Heritage Meat Comes to the Essex Street Market, With Brooklyn Taco (dinersjournal.blogs.nytimes.com)

Korean supermarket issues rebate card

Image by wallyg via Flickr

The Super H Mart in Ridgefield is the largest Korean supermarket in Bergen County.

H Mart, the Korean supermarket company with four stores in Bergen County, is now issuing a Smart Savings Card that rewards customers with a $10 gift certificate for every $1,000 spent -- effectively a rebate of 1%.

The card also entitles holders to discounts on four items every week. This week's items are SPAM, olive oil, red-pepper powder and pickled radish.

I was at the Little Ferry store on Tuesday and heard a store announcement for the very first time, alerting shoppers to a sale on Organic Valley milk for $2.99 per half-gallon, compared to $3.99 or more elsewhere, but the lactose-free variety wasn't available.

The Smart Savings Card is presented at checkout and shoppers accumulate one point for every dollar spent.

I rely on H Mart for fresh seafood, greens and other produce, California-grown rice and prepared Korean food, including stewed tofu and Alaska pollock, both prepared in a spicy red-pepper sauce.

Lyndhurst-based Hanahreum Group operates supermarkets in 10 states. Other New Jersey stores are in Fort Lee, Ridgefield, Englewood, Edison and Cherry Hill.

American Express Costco card

I received a $322 rebate check from American Express for purchases I made in 2010, including 3% back at restaurants and on gasoline purchases, 1% back for Costco purchases; 2% back for travel purchases and 1% everywhere else.

As an executive member, I will receive another 2% rebate on Costco purchases with the card, which is called the Costco True Earnings Card. The warehouse store only accepts American Express cards.

Second look at fish sticks

We tried The Ultimate Fish Stick from Costco for dinner again last night, and found they are "crunchy," as advertised on the package.

I preheated the oven to 475 degrees, not the 400 degrees I used last time when I misread the package directions, and turned them half-way through the 11 to 13 minutes cooking time. I cooked them a little longer.

The finger-long fish sticks are made by Trident Seafoods from fillets of wild-caught Alaska pollock, a cod-like fish. 

I still think "ultimate" is going overboard, but these are delicious fish sticks.