I hit up the Dollar Tree the other day for a few items, here's the latest analysis:
Gnocchi - I swear, legit gnocchi and it's made in Italy per the package. It's shelf stable, vacuum sealed with a best by date over a year out. No excessive preservatives. Cooks for 2 minutes max in boiling, salted water. I would definitely look into cooking it in a pan with a little water instead, but I'd have to research this. Served 4 hungry people. I will absolutely be buying a few of these for the package on my next trip, great deal at $1.25 a package.
Pizza Crusts - Pre-cooked, shelf stable, crispy pizza crusts. We tried out a couple of them and they worked fine. The kids like it. Feels like some of those super crispy “Sicillian-style” pizzas I’d get in Bergen County growing up.
Hunts Tomato Sauce (in a can) - Good value at $1.25, not great value. You can find cheaper tomato products at some grocery stores or Walmart. Didn’t like that it had high fructose corn syrup (less than 2%), but the taste and consistency was fine and the whole family enjoyed the meal regardless.
14 inch pizza pan - Did the job! Worked fine with the pizza crusts mentioned above. The pizza crusts say to place straight on the rack, no pan, but considering how crispy they were on the pan, I think the bottom would be like a cracker if I put it on the rack and maybe the top would be half cooked. May have to do some more experiments. Dollar Tree cookware is a pain, in that you need to get the label glue off of the food surface, so you’ll need some pot scrubber compound or something food safe to do that with.
Hot Sauce - One entire brand of hot sauce was just a few days from best by date, so I did not purchase. Most of the hot sauces are in plastic, not glass, You get a much better value per ounce at your grocery store. I will keep looking at Dollar Tree in case I find a deal, but in general I did not and would not buy hot sauce there. The brands looked good though, if Dollar Tree was the only convenient store or you just need a small bottle on vacation or something.
Kids Ankle Socks - 3 pairs for $1.25, entirely synthetic. Decent patterns and dark colors. Bought, would buy again. There's a definitely lack of crew socks and absolutely no calf socks at our Dollar Tree, however there are sleep shorts, panties, and "footed leggings" if you are looking for those things. The leggings were probably $3.
Kosher Salt (large grain) - Nice size container, $1.25, good enough value. Might do better at Walmart per ounce, but this was pretty good.
Iodized Salt - Great deal! On sale at $0.79 per canister, I bought 2 for baking.
Epsom Salts - Some selection, $1.25 apiece, could be good for bath bombs, soaks, or DIY laundry detergent. Did not buy this time.
Washing Soda - No washing soda at the Dollar Tree, so no DIY laundry detergent today.
Borax - $1.25 for a middling amount, ok deal, not great. Lavender scented, which is pretty much a deal killer for me. Did not buy.
Baking Soda - I have seen baking soda at Dollar Trees, but it's usually not a good deal. Did not see any on this trip.
Soap Bars - Lots of popular brands, Yardley for one. Dove as well, I believe. No Kirk's, which is my hypoallergenic go-to soap, and no Ivory which is my backup. If you're following the DIY detergent thread, also no Fels Naptha.
Anyone got a good source on affordable coffee to stock up on? Having a hard time nailing down a low price on that.
Hey, that's not bad.
Here's a simple one I discovered recently. Aldi sells these dry soup mixes. They're about $2.59 each. In most cases you just add water, maybe a couple other simple things (butter, tomato paste.) You throw it in a pot and cook it. 8 servings. Assuming a worst case of like $3 for the meal, that's about 38 cents a serving. Hard to beat that, and they're pretty darn good.
For cheap bulk coffee, you can't miss with Cafe Bustelo. Probably the best cheap brick-pack coffee there is.
(04-15-2025, 11:59 AM)gorzek Wrote: Hey, that's not bad.
Here's a simple one I discovered recently. Aldi sells these dry soup mixes. They're about $2.59 each. In most cases you just add water, maybe a couple other simple things (butter, tomato paste.) You throw it in a pot and cook it. 8 servings. Assuming a worst case of like $3 for the meal, that's about 38 cents a serving. Hard to beat that, and they're pretty darn good.
For cheap bulk coffee, you can't miss with Cafe Bustelo. Probably the best cheap brick-pack coffee there is.
Regarding the soup mix. You can't understate the convenience of those Aldi soup mixes, you're absolutely right. There are other options too. Bouillon cubes are so cheap, especially in the international aisle, they're definitely a poverty pantry staple. You can also get big containers of powdered soup mix, but you have to be careful of unit price, especially with online sales. And, the reason I came here to make this comment, you can also make soup mix powder from dollar store salt, sugar, and spices. The salt is the key, a small amount of sugar keeps it from just being a brine. Obviously if you put in things like onion powder, Italian seasoning, garlic, pepper, ginger, etc, you will get a better soup base.
On a side note, Italian seasoning is mostly an American thing, where we sell 4 or 5 herb flakes mixed together. I thought that was funny when I learned that.
And don't forget, when you are making food from dry goods and powders, you have to add a fat to get the proper flavor, consistency, and caloric count. Olive oil if you can afford it, even just 1 tablespoon. Otherwise, any cooking oil is OK. They even say on camping / trekking sites to bring a small plastic water bottle full of cheap olive oil just for the calories and add it to everything.
Another funny thing: online prepper content, camping tips, and poverty finance become a perfect circle instead of a Venn diagram pretty quickly.
Here's an easy 7 ingredient bulk soup base recipe centered around dried milk (as per another thread on this forum): https://theranchershomestead.com/cream-o...-soup-mix/
1 cup dry milk powder
¾ cup corn starch
3 TBSP dried minced onion flakes, you can also use 2 teaspoon onion powder
Just a follow-up, 3 packs of onion soup mix at the Dollar Tree for $1.25. Still probably something you can DIY, but for convenience it's not a bad option: https://www.dollartree.com/continental-c...acks/13592
I'd certainly stock a dorm kitchen with it, at any rate.
I probably don't need to tell anyone that the next aisle over is chock full of ramen packets as well, if you're hard against it (or looking for a cheap ingredient for a larger meal). Watch your sodium and don't cook in the packaging :-)
Oh man I love onion soup mixes. But yeah, in general you can get a lot of mileage out of broths and soups.
This isn't so much a Dollar Tree haul but a cooking tip: if you have a slow cooker/crock pot and you probably do, remember that in most cases you don't need a recipe to make something decent.
Do you have a bunch of canned beans, veggies, etc.? Got some tomato sauce or diced/crushed tomatoes? Maybe some ground beef? Throw it all in, drop in some spices, let it cook all day. Pretty hard to end up with anything bad, and you've potentially got a week's worth of dinner in there.
