I live in Maleny - scene of the great "No Woolworths" protest a few years ago. Despite the protests Woolworths went ahead and seems to always have cars in the carpark.
Maleny is definitely a town divided when it comes to this issue - you are either a Woolworths shopper or an IGA shopper. And where you buy your groceries defines the person that you are. If you shop at IGA you are a community minded person. If you shop at Woolworths you are a sell out. So being what I consider a community minded person I am a loyal IGA shopper and I am proud of that.
The trouble is though when it comes to things like Buttermilk..... I can't get that at the IGA. So I have had to make some compromises about the brand of products that I am used to. I can handle that....
The other problem is the cost. We are now living on one wage and I am having to be a bit inventive about my grocery list and meal plan each week. (Any suggestions of cheap meals would be really welcome.....)
So every time I get the final total from my IGA shop I think how much cheaper that would have been at one of the two big chains.
But the protest did change my beliefs. This is what I believe - in this country we have two huge companies controlling our grocery market. And these two companies are putting the squeeze on our farmers and food producers. They are demanding perfect looking food which means that farmers and producers are wasting a lot to meet the standards of these two big companies. These farmers and are also using a lot more chemicals to comply with this pressure to produce perfect looking food. And they are paying them peanuts for it!
This is my belief and therefore I make the following choices about my grocery shopping:
- I will buy all of my groceries from either IGA or Aldi
- I will buy all my fruit and veges from the local growers market or fruit stall
- I will buy all my meat from the local butcher
But where to get my buttermilk................?
4 comments:
I have a link to how to make your own buttermilk. You just have to buy it the once and then use that one thing of buttermilk to continue making your own. Then you will never have to try and find it again (or compromise on your supermarket standards).
http://www.mynewoldschool.com/2009/06/17/term-research-project-buttermilk-and-other-cultured-thingies/
or you can ask at your local growers market - we normally do all our shopping at IGA ( unless its a run in and grab milk cuase Iga is 20 mins away) and iga is much much cheaper for us - but we have a really big huge one and it carries buttermilk, you might be able to ask them to stock it.
you can make your own buttermilk!!!
If you are using buttermilk for baking, yoghurt makes a great substitute..and is easy to make at home. Otherwise, like Sarah Lou said, try the IGA...or I think I've even seen buttermilk 'powder' in the health food shop. :)
(PS I'm an Aldi and IGA shopper myself..no big chains for me, thankyouverymuch!)
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