Good and Bad Buys at Lidl and Aldi stores (***Please don't expire***)

dealyboy

... green fingers 

Rosa_Damascena

@maman - you are clever.

I have had 3 basil plants from Aldi this year, received half-dead in TGTG boxes that I have managed to revive. I re-potted them but it never occurred to me to take cuttings and propagate. Its a bit late for that now, but I'll give it a go next year.

Brie

maman said:

I use dried basil for some recipes but fresh works far better for others. 

I have a basil plant (plants) still going strong from a YS pot I got from Sainsburys in May. I split the original plant because they're too crowded in the original pot and have since taken several cuttings and rooted in water before planting in new pots. So I have the original plant and new ones too IYSWIM. 🤔

Cuttings and original 

Well you and @dealyboy are doing very well!!! 

I like the fresh basil leaves in all sorts of things adding them to pizza and pasta of course but also using them in salads and sandwiches too.  Adds a nice spark to things.  All the dried stuff is to hand as well but fresh is so much better.

dealyboy

What is it about basil and tomatoes? ... Ahem! ... both of which can be found at Lidl and Aldi ... phew!

maman

Thanks for the kind words about my horticultural skills. 🤣

It's not too late to take cuttings if you want to grow some basil over the winter indoors.

I plan to use some of mine to make pasta sauce tomorrow with passata from Aldi. 😁

DigForVictory

OT both water rooting Basil cuttings & assembling a Forsythe pot (nest terracotta in plastic) then crooning to the cuttings are relatively easy - it’s moving the delicate roots into soil that tends to trigger the fatal impatience & or neglect. Absolutely worth trying if you’ve a bright draught proof windowsill! (It’s a cheap hobby, I can give it up any time I like, has to be less expensive than therapy…)

Clowance

Tried growing purple basil from seed but it seems to have got stuck at the seedling stage (weird 2 starter leaves). However had great success rooting basil in glass water until plenty of roots showing, then moved to soggy soil which gradually dries out to normally moist. 

wild666

maman said:

I'm glad it's not only me that talks back to the self service checkouts @Pollycat. 🤣I'm always telling them to be patient when it nags me to scan another item or pay PDQ!

I've explained to so many staff in banks and supermarkets that I try to choose a human to save their jobs @Brie but they just trot out the script they've, no doubt, been given. ☹️ We all know that the changes are to preserve the profit margins and think we're stupid enough to believe it's what customers want.

I'm thinking of Sainsburys  where the same staff (sometimes just one person) are trying to sell fags and lottery tickets, do customer service all at once. In my local Asda, they do click and collect on George purchases as well.

I do compliment good service too. A super young man put my large 25% off wine shop in Asda through for me at the self checkouts. He was able to scan a single bottle and key in the multiple so that I didn’t have to take them all out of the trolley. What a star! 👍

Each self service checkout is saving the store £10.42 per hour, in the case of my local Lidl which has 4 manned checkouts, it used to be 6, and 10 self service checkouts it's £41.68 per hour on the manned checkouts and times that by the opening time 08:00 to 22:00 that's £41.68 * 14 that's £583.52 per day multiply that by 6 that's £3,501.12 per 6 days then add the Sunday's 6 hours of £250.08 making a weekly total of £3,751.20 if everyone went through the self service checkouts, over a year that a saving of  £195,062.10 per store. 
On a Sunday, my chosen day to shop they open two manned checkout at 10:00 and people start queuing from 09:45 for the manned checkouts, when they first opened them you couldn't use the Lidl app on them so hardly anyone used them, now they are a bit more popular but there are still queues for the manned checkouts.
If there was mass use of the self service checkouts then they would be saving  £1,458.80 per hour  in wages or £9002.58 per week, £468,149.76 per year per store in wages as all the checkout operators would be self stockers and be required to be only on the till for brief periods throughout a day.

Brie

Cien cocoa butter moisturiser.  The big body lotion one.  (in case there is more than one)

Good?  Bad??

I'll confess I had a freebie on my app for a Cien product and picked this intending to drop it at the food bank.  And then wondered how different it might be to the Vaseline Intensive Care lotion I've used for the last couple of years.  I'm on the verge of running out of expensive gift lotion so thought this might do until birthday/Christmas.....

All of which having written it down makes me feel horrid - is it good enough for me and, if not, I'll donate it!   Bad Brie!!!  Or should I just ask if it's worth using at all - for anyone. 

Is there a really great Cien product to pick as this seems to be a monthly option for me!!!

Rosa_Damascena

Brie said:

Cien cocoa butter moisturiser.  The big body lotion one.  (in case there is more than one)

Good?  Bad??

I'll confess I had a freebie on my app for a Cien product and picked this intending to drop it at the food bank.  And then wondered how different it might be to the Vaseline Intensive Care lotion I've used for the last couple of years.  I'm on the verge of running out of expensive gift lotion so thought this might do until birthday/Christmas.....

All of which having written it down makes me feel horrid - is it good enough for me and, if not, I'll donate it!   Bad Brie!!!  Or should I just ask if it's worth using at all - for anyone. 

Is there a really great Cien product to pick as this seems to be a monthly option for me!!!

Moisturisers tend to be a matter of personal taste. I'd go ahead and try it - unlikely to smell unpleasant! - and if its not for you stick it on Olio, someone will have it.