In some ways this is old news, but really more the current state of an ongoing story. Today's amusing product in Feinkost Albrecht was single source chocolate. (Madagascar, 65% cocoa, or IIRC Venezuela 55% cocoa). Today's amusing sign in Histon Road Aldi* was one proudly proclaiming that the Specially Selected Beer was down in price from ã1.49 to ã1.19. This would be the beer that I bought a couple of months ago for ã1.25 a bottle. (We all thank big brother for raising the chocolate ration.)(Beer acknowledged on the front to brewed by Batemans, with names very similar to established Batemans brands, which are now for sale nearby in Aldi for ã1.39 a bottle. This is annoying, as some of the brand name beer there was on offer at ã1.25 a bottle last time I went.)
Also this week on supermarket watch^Wramble, we observe to our annoyance that olives are considered to be a luxury rather than a staple**. The only olives I could find in Aldi were in the continental deli range, in small jars, 270g net, 90g drained (!), which I know Tesco describe on their price matching placard in store, hence don't bother beating by much. The annoyance of this is that Tesco used to do various large jars of value olives, which were much better value. Pitted green and Pimento stuffed green dropped off the shelves some time back. Pitted black has gone too, so for tedious record I shall note here that the barcode is 051277 470565, 880g net, 450g drained, before the last empty jar takes the black boxââ¬Â to bottle heaven. Tesco also stopped doing "discounter brand" jars of pickled gherkins, but that doesn't bother me, as Aldi still do, and I stocked up again today. Maybe Tesco still sell all these things in Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary? Perhaps I should pop into Tesco next time I'm passing through Bratislava and find out. And see whether a UK clubcard works there :-).
* which yes, is now bigger and better, with 5 aisles instead of 4. However, that L-shaped building is deceptive - half if it is currently Iceland. Given that Iceland the shop is currently owned by Iceland the country (or as near as dammit, given the state of the bank that bought the shop) I wonder how long the partition will last.
** pizza, of course, remains a human right.
ââ¬Â to be replaced, along with the blue box, by a blue bin later this year. So that, at last, we don't have to partition the recycling in strange ways. Maybe they'll start taking all plastics with ♳ and ♴ symbols, and not just bottles. Hey, even better if they take ♵, ♶, ♷, ♸ and ♹ too.
