Miser's Meal: Costco's Rotisserie Chicken

When it comes to buying a pre-roasted chicken for dinner, Costco's wins hands down. The perfectly seasoned and rotisserie chicken comes in a plastic container juicy and tasty. The price is the best anywhere: $4.99 for the last few years now. Price-wise, you can't even get a fresh whole chicken for $4.99. Taste wise, I haven't tasted anything better. You'd think that Whole Foods with its fancy organic roasted chicken should win the taste test right? Not even close. By comparison, Whole Food's chicken that costs at least $8.99 (or more if it is organic) tastes dry and unseasoned. It may be more healthy (but I doubt it), but it does not taste great.

Albertson's rotisserie chicken isn't bad, and the price is comparable to Costco's, but to get the freshly roasted ones, you often have to wait for the new batches to just come out. Otherwise, the ones sitting under the heating lamp tends to get dry. Costco's seem to have fresh ones coming out all the time.

Of course, I bet the Costco rotisserie chicken is a loss leader for the chain because every time I head to Costco thinking I'll get a $4.99 chicken, I end up spending over $200 on everything else. Oh well. Those things are needed too.

Unhipster's Hangout: Cheap lunch at Jackson Market

My husband worked at Sony's for over a decade but didn't know about Jackson Market just south of Sony until I took him there. Jackson Market is a cool sandwich and salad place with a nice assortment of artisan sodas and cookies. Wedged in a residential part of Culver City just south of Washington Blvd and Motor, Jackson Market's permit to operate in that location must have been grandfathered in since the area is obviously residential with no other commercial businesses in sight.

In the market, you can have the folks behind the counter prepare for you made to order sandwiches: On a piece of pre-printed check list, just make your selection of bread, fillings, cheese, and vegetables. They also have some tried and true favorites as well a great soup of the day and desserts. After you turn in your order, you wait for about ten minutes. During this time, just head on over to the refrigerated drinks section and pick out your beverage. This place has all kinds of sodas from small beverage makers. You can eat at the back of the market where there is a tranquil and charming outdoor courtyard, or you can take your food elsewhere.

Yesterday, we went to Jackson Market, ordered one turkey/cheddar on ciabata to share, had a bag of Lays Wasabi potato chips and tried one of their new sodas:the Marquis 03 Energy Drink. It was buy one and get one free, so I got the Mango Ginger flavor and my husband got the berry flavored drink. The total tab came out to be around $11.00 for the two of us. It was a bit chilly to sit out in the courtyard, so we took our sandwich to the Carlson Park nearby, sat in the car and ate our lunch while watching kids play. It was a perfect lunch outing.

Jackson Market and Deli
4065 Jackson Ave.
Culver City, 90232