cost-u-less

Oh Gag me. I bought some i think. In fact i had just got huge jar of Pea. Butter. I ett the holeeeeeee thing. lol

Steak you can probably tell but hamburger you can not. It used to be a common practice at places like Food Lion in the U.S. as I recall to re-grind the hamburger meat after it turned brown which made it look red and fresh for a couple more days.

The main thing at Food Center is the cryovac packaged meat. The dairy stuff is easy to check but I KNOW they slap new price/date tags on that stuff that is sealed in those packages like ham & corned beef. I have bought regular steak & hamburger there because I can look at it & tell if it's OK or not.

G2G.....Food Lion would also take just enough fresh burger to cover up the rank grey decay & repackage............you'd bust open a pack of ground up chuck!

Trade: I never even LOOK at the Food Center meat section. But they place the price sticker right over the "Buy By" date on the packaged salads. I complained to the produce guy once and he argued that "those dates don't mean anything." He stopped doing it for a few days, but he is back to it again. Yesterday (4/28), there were salads with a 4/18 "buy by" date. I pull the darn sticker off.:P

I have never had any problems with Cost-U-Less here on St Thomas. Great strawberries for $3.99 vs $8 at Marina Market. San Francisco Bay coffee-yum. :@)

I think CUL is a godsend, they have some great prices on things that other stores gouge you on. I've gotten burnt once or twice with moldy items so you do have to watch it, but that has happened to me on the mainland too.

I have mixed feeligns about the grocery stores here on STX. On a good day they are ok but there are bad days where everything seems to be out of date, rotten, dirty etc. that is just unacceptable. Plaza is of course the best option and if you catch them on the day they put out new stock you can have a decent shopping experience. But I was just in the states and it is shocking how we are being gouged down here for groceries. Hell I ate out at a nice sports pub in DC (Green Turtle) for $40 which included appetizer, soup/salad course, entree with sides and 2 Guinesses a piece. I couldn't even buy the ingredients to make that stuff for $40 in St. Croix. Sorry, venting 🙂

Sean

The hamburger I've bought at Food Center has been fine because I can tell in a hurry once I get it home plus I always use it on the same day. I'm not out that way all that often but when I do go by there I usually stop to see if I can find stuff I haven't been able to find elsewhere & trust me, if they sold me rotten meat I'd be running it right back there. I still won't buy the cryovac sealed meat though, under any circumstances. They have a really good frozen food section. Never any problems with that.

You ever notice how "flat" the cornish hens are? I figure that means they thawed somewhere along the way, the weight on top flattened them, and then they re-froze. I've been in the back room of most of the grocery stores on STT. Scary! Surprisingly, the cleanest and best smelling is Pueblo LongBay (It's been a few years.). I literally gagged in some!

Plaza extra had Tostinos pepperoni & everything pizzas on sale just after they were recalled around 9 months ago or so(the pepperoni was recalled due to fecal coliform bacteria).

Regarding Food Center & Cost-U-less & expired dates:
i`ve said this before...

Go to Cost-U-less, the meat section, make a right as you approach the display case(where the refrigerated Rotisserie Chicken is, next to the shrimp to the left).
You`ll see the steaks,then the hamburger, continue on to the next case, this is where you will see the crayovac, marinated pork & beef @ eye level.
Turn it over, in the food handing instructions, you will see an expiration date in the lower right hand side, it won`t be expired.

Now, go to Food center, go to the opposite side of the store of the entrance(go to the back of the store, then hang a left, when you get to the dented cans, make a left to the meat display case, Look at eye level, check the same exact brand of marinated pork & beef.
Now, Turn it over, in the food handing instructions, you will see an expiration date in the lower right hand side...IS MISSING!!!!
It`s been scrapped off!
On the rare occasion they do have some within the expiration date, low & behold, the date will remain!
The fillet Mignon 5 feet to the left & lower, around knee height of this is one of my favorites, you`ll clearly see the paper & glue from the labels pulled off, with new store made labels, the last date I saw was July 09, the original labels were dated October of last year!
Those labels are long gone!

At least Pueblo marks their near expiration date stuff down, these Food Center Ba$tards leave the full, worse of the island price on!
I will say, they only seem to do this with their meats, the other items they put a "Special Today" sticker on the item, where it is only twice as much as it ought to be instead of 4X.
On rare occasions, they actually mark it down to a reasonable level.

EWWWW! i'm so disgusted by this ripped off expiration date business. has anyone thought to call the Department of Health? We're not 2nd class citizens, that's just gross! They come through the restaurants to bust people without healthcards, they might want to do a check of the stores that THEY'RE buying from too.