The Hungarian and I made our weekly trip to Big Lots yesterday. We've noticed a dearth of food items over the past two-three weeks. I asked the manager and he said only that he had been begging the main office in Atlanta to get more food items to him. He didn't know why food items were in short supply. This is the first time in over a year of shopping at this store (central NC) that we've run into this problem. Anyone in other regions have the same experience?

There were still dozens of jars of pasta sauce on the shelves, sardines, some cans of meat and gravy, crackers, cookies, candy, but not much cereal, soup or other good stashable items.

Good buys: London Fog, Misty Harbor and Mulberry Street outerwear, at prices from $30-40--VERY good value for money. The Misty Harbor women's coats in particular are knee-length, heavy, warm, with zip-out lining. Just-My-Size sweats, $5. Lots of socks and underwear.

And my favorite buy: Pour-type water filter thingie and 2 boxes of filters for removing bleach taste from stored water. Will take out some pollution too, but not giardia or crypto. However, for making stored, bleached water more palatable, this is a great system for $2.99 each for the thingie and the filters. Forget the name, might be Pur, but it's a good brand anyway. (Already stashed in a plastic container in the outside shed!)

Oh--there was a HUGE end-cap display of oil lamps and oil. . . (Not so last year.)

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), October 04, 1999

Answers

OG No shortages here. Found a sale place last week called Jack's with brands you never heard of--mostly foreign imports--the food is probably safer, no GM. Anyway, I'm leaving here and going to Florida where I hear there's no shortages yet.

-- Mara Wayne (MaraWayne@aol.com), October 04, 1999.

Big Lots is the only store where I have found Cous Cous pasta.

Also the wooden boxes of gourmet tea for .99 is a bargain. The same brand is $2.00 a box at another discount store. I found canned fruit that is not available in the grocery store like, canned cherry apples, and seedless grapes. I am trying to add as much variety as possible to my food preps and Big Lots has lots of 'exotic' items at a great price.

-- Carol (glear@usa.net), October 04, 1999.

More on COUS COUS.

I started a thread on it on the old forum. Maybe I can find it again.

If you live near a city with an ethnic (especially Middle Eastern) population or a wholesale distribution center, you can get it cheaply in bulk. I bought 50# for about $45 about two months ago. It's a great food because it packs well, and is already partially cooked so it requires very little fuel to cook. Just boil some water, stir it in, wait five minutes and it's ready. Also takes spices well.

-- nothere nothere (notherethere@hotmail.com), October 04, 1999.

Cous cous is one of my favorite starches, not just because of its good taste and texture but because it's so quick and easy, as pointed out above. The whole foods place here makes a chilled cous cous salad, a great way to use up leftovers. I probablyhave at least one recipe somewhere but it doesn't take much imagination to add, say, Italian dressing, raw and or cooked veggies, even raisins, as Middle Easterners would.

The tea--yes, excellent value, and my Sweetie (aka "Twinings Junkie") says the English Breakfast is very good. Those little wooden boxes are neat, too! The tea comes from Ceylon (Sri Lanka) and is imported by a Canadian firm. Big Lots Newbies--snap up all that good tea you can find--BL very often has an item for a week or maybe a month, then you never see it again. (I store it in the original package in a white plastic bucket sealed with duct tape. No need for oxy absorbers. Twinings stored thus a year ago is still good)

-- Old Git (anon@spamproblems.com), October 05, 1999.