A decade or more, bread along with cereal was a family staple since it was one of the least expensive food items on the grocery list.  However, the 69¢ loaf is all but gone on regular store shelves.  But there are alternatives, where homemakers can find bread and bakery goods at bargain prices.

• Markdowns at your local bakery stores.  My grandmother and probably yours always bought day-old bread and other goodies at the local bakery store.  These savings still can be found at local bakeries and can run from rolls to coconut cream pies, depending upon their clientele and specialty.  Usually day-old is a 50%+ markdown, but can be more.  MDM has found that the best time to get the bargains from the local bakery store is on Monday, after the weekend.  Whatever is not sold on Saturday is usually placed in the day-old or reduced section by Monday, Tuesday morning at the latest.

• Grocery stores use to have reduced items in their bakery departments, but this has become increasingly hard-to-find because of certain liability issues.  However, it doesn’t hurt to look or to ask for reduced bakery items.  Oftentimes, you will find these items in a cart off to the side in the bakery department or on shelved carts with a sign "reduced for quick sale."  Some stores make available bread past their expiration date to farmers and hunters because it will be fed to animals or used to lure them, and is not considered for human consumption.

• Bakery Discount Stores or Outlets.  The plethora of these stores is a recent phenomena with the majority coming into existence after the price of grain skyrocketed.  Usually bread is pulled from the grocery stores after 3 days and sent to a discount store, or a bread maker’s outlet store.   Not only will you find various breads, you will find bagels, pastries, jams, jellies, pudding mixes, spices and other foodstuffs. Besides the usual 50%-60% markdowns, there will be daily specials such as 3 or 4 loaves of white bread for $1.  Plus many stores have frequent buyer cards that are stamped for every purchase you make, either in number of items, or for every $3 or $5 you spend.  Once the card is filled, you can redeem it for a dollar amount off your purchase.   Along with this, certain days of the week, like Wednesday, are designated double stamp days, or "twofer."  Holsum Bakery, Sara Lee, Master Bread-Taystee, and others fall into this category and have their own outlet  or "thrift" stores.  Most will accept food stamps.  Check your local yellow pages or go to Bakeryoutlets. or Holsum Bakery Outlet, in addition to other online sites.

• Dollar stores like Dollar General are expanding offerings by adding bread.   Super Valu’s Save-A-Lot format acquired Deal$ last year. 

• Bread Machines.  The final suggestion MDM would make to lower the cost of bread or bakery problems is making your own in a bread machine.  There are packaged mixes for the more expensive artisan breads.  You can even make your artisan breads from scratch; however, you may have to finish the product by hand and do the final baking in an oven on a baking stone or tiles.  Leftovers not consumed straight away should be frozen or dried out since homemade bread does not contain preservatives and will mold sooner than store bought.   

So, you buy the reduced or bargain bread, how can you best utilize it for maximum cost-savings?

1. You can use it as you would use regular bread products, sandwiches, bagels,wonder®blintzes, and so forth.  Unless purchased from a bakery that has no preservatives, bread will not grow mold immediately.
2. You can freeze the extra bread, if you buy in bulk, to use later.
3. You can add moisture in a microwave with the bread to rehydrate and soften it.
4. You can use it in many recipes requiring oven drying the bread such a stuffing, bread pudding, bread crumbs, MDMhas found baquettes to last a long time and to use a food processor to make bread crumbs for meatballs, and coatings for pork chops and chicken.  Since baquettes dry out naturally, break them into smaller chunks before pulsating them in a food processor.
5. You can add them to bird seed for birds that remain over the winter months.

There are a number of recipes that require the removal of crust and oven drying slices of bread, the possibilities are endless– 

  So,  Lessen the Cost of the Pain and Increase Your Eating Pleasure!

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