5 Reasons to Visit Giant (aka Stop and Shop) this Week, 05/22-05/28

Sweet hickory smoke, there are some great stock-up prices on barbeque and picnic eats at Giant this week. Even better: a lot of the stuff can be frozen or stay fresh for a long time in the fridge, so as a Klingon might say: "Ah, the thrill of the hunt! This evening we eat well!" Egads, did I just expose my Trekkie streak? I think I did.

*Ahem* On to the best deals! We may post more in time, but for now, here are the ones that caught our eyes:

5 Reasons for the Carnivores - CLICK HERE TO OUR POST WITH A $3/$15 meat purchase coupon:

1. $4.99/lb. (half price) Porterhouse or T-Bone Steaks.
   
2. $1.99/lb. (at least half price) Fresh Pork Spareribs or Italian Dinner Links. I'm thinking of trying out this highly-rated slow cooker (crock-pot) BBQ ribs recipe.
   
3. $0.99/lb. (45% off) Chicken drumsticks or thighs. This looks like an easy marinade to try.
   
4. $4.99/lb. (37.5% off) Snow Crab Clusters. I admit - I'm reluctant to try new recipes on more expensive seafoods. Anybody have a killer/easy recipe for crab legs?
   
5. Ball Park Franks are BOGO - and if you use the 05/17 RP $1/2 insert coupon OR the $1/1 angus franks peelies that reader Trisha emailed us about (thanks, Trisha!) - you can probably do pretty well. Anybody know if that $2.50/3 Shopper's Food Warehouse ad manufacturer coupon has already expired? If not, you could get $2.50 off the price of 2 to get 4...

5 Fiberlicious Reasons

1. Sweet white corn, 12 for $1.99, ~$0.17 each. This well-rated recipe for grilled corn requires only butter, salt, and pepper in addition to your corn. I know I sure have an overflow of Catalina-generating triple couponed butter from my Shopper's escapades.
   
2. $3.99 each. Whole Seedless Watermelon, 13-16 lb. weight (these normally go for around $6.99 at my Giant). The last time that Giant did a whole watermelon sale, I tried weighing a couple - going for "big" looking ones, and the highest I got weight-wise was around 9.5 lbs. Weird. Anywhoo, I mention this only in case you are looking for a specific weight watermelon for a recipe - weigh your melons in advance and don't rely on the ad's listed weight.
   
3. Franceso Rinaldi Pasta Sauce is 4/$5 ($1.25 each). It normally goes for $2/jar, so this is a significant discount, even without any active insert coupons.
   
4. Planters Mixed Nuts are BOGO, and Coupons.com currently has a $1/1 printable available (limit 2 per Windows run computer), and you can use two, so you will probably get 2 jars of mixed nuts for ~$2-3, or $1.00-$1.50 each. Cheap!
   
5. Cucumbers are 4/$3 ($0.75 each), and they've recently been $1 or more at my Giant. Yea, cucumber salad!

3 Reasons for the Thirsty

1. $2.20/12 pack for Coke products, Friday 05/22 through Monday 05/25 only! My husband's tastebuds pirouette at the thought of Barq's, so he will be happy cracking some of these open in the coming weeks.
   
2. Deer Park has a Catalina deal going on: Buy 2 24-packs, get a $2 Cat, Buy 3 23-packs, get a $3 Cat, and buy 4 24-packs, get a $5 Cat. We couldn't find any insert or printable coupons to apply, but if you bought 4 24-packs at $3.88 each, after the $5 Catalina, they'd net to $2.63 each, or around $0.10/bottle.
   
3. Turkey Hill half-gallon chilled drinks (teas, lemonades, includes diets, etc.) are 3/$5. There was a $1/2 coupon in the 05/10 RP that would make these $1.16 each.

5 Reasons for Those Hosting Overnight Company

1. Kraft Cracker Barrel Cheese, 2/$5. This is normally ~$4.89 each, so this is close to half price. I have an irrational love for this cheese.
   
   Pair it with:
   
2. Nabisco Snack Crackers, which are 2/$5. There are $1/1 coupons for Triscuits and Wheat Thins each on coupons.com right now, which would make these $1.50/box. Nice between-meals hors-d'oeuvres!
   
3. Edys Ice Cream is 2/$5 (normally $3.99 each). No insert or printable coupons apply, but this is cheap still. Note: Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream pints are 2/$6. Use the $0.50/1 manufacturer tearpad coupons that were on the ice-cream doors at Wawas, doubled, to get them for $2/pint. And no, you don't necessarily have to serve this to your company. You can save it for yourself when they've left the homestead. :)
   
4. Buy any two Doritos, Lay's, or Tostitos chips - all varieties excluding baked, light, kettle, and family size - and two 24 oz. jars of Tostitos Salsa to get all four for $8 - $2 each! Save $7.98, making this a "half price" deal. Limit 1 deal per transaction. We couldn't find any insert or printable couposn that apply.
   
5. When you buy Kellogg's cereal at Giant, you can get free gallons of milk in this hot deal. Edit: the deal computes to coupons for free gallons of milk, so I've redone the tallies below to reflect that. 1 free gallon for 3 boxes of cereal, 2 free gallons for 5 boxes of cereal, and 3 free gallons for 7 boxes of cereal. If you have your $1 coupons printed from coupons.com or the 04/05 insert (exp. 05/31 so use'em!) - this can be a great deal.
   
   Cheapest Kellogg's cereal (normally small boxes run ~$3.50) are 2/$5 this week:
   
   Frosted Mini-Wheats Bite Size 18 oz.
   Special K Cinnamon Pecan 12.5 oz.
   Special K. Fruit and Yoghurt 12.8 oz.
   Corn Flakes 18 oz.
   
   I'm pretty sure that the Frosted Mini Wheats campaign coupons can count toward the Bite-Size, too (four $1/1 and a BOGO).
   
   Here's a deal off the top of my head:
   
   7 boxes Frosted Mini-Wheats Bite Size or other Kellogg's
   (at least two should be Mini-Wheats to use the BOGO coupon)
   ===========================
   Total: $17.50
   Use:
   BOGO coupon, and 6 $1 off coupons (insert, printable, or campaign)
   ===========================
   New subtotal: ~$9.00 for seven large boxes of cereal - and you'd get coupons good for three free gallons of milk (around $10.47 worth). $9.00 for 9 boxes of cereal + 3 gallons of milk milk = Enough to feed a houseful of company over the weekend, or one teenaged boy for a snack.
   
   Bonus: theoretically, your milk acquisition might count toward the Buy 6 get 1 free deal, which ends this week on 05/28 (free milk coupons from this deal are redeemable through June).