What do you think of Ruler Foods?

You're talking about the Kroger equivalent of an Aldi store? Well, let's just put it this way. I do love to shop Aldi, but ever since a Ruler Foods store went up in my area I have frequented that store more often than the Aldi store.

And this is not to say anything bad about Aldi. Aldi is a great place to find affordable and quality groceries.

But Ruler Foods has a very similar concept. It's a lot of their brand stuff, and the prices are actually quite good—on most items of course—and I really like the concept of having to put in a quarter to get a cart. One thing I have observed at both Ruler Foods and Aldi Stores is that there is almost never a cart left in the parking lot.

That being said it's kind of cool when some schmuck DOES leave his cart behind in the parking lot since I happen to be a bit of a money loving fool, and for me...it's free quarter time.

And then there is the quality of the food. It's actually quite good if you ask me and compares well to any store brand and even Aldi brands you might find. One thing that does set Ruler Foods apart? Their meat prices and their meat selection is actually way better than Aldi Stores, and in some instances even beats most of the prices at other more notable food chains.

For example, while it is 73/27 hamburger meat, the 5 pound tube is mostly cheaper than the other guy's. The last time I bought one of these I paid about $1.88 per pound. Their 13 ounce packages of Polska kielbasa and smoked sausage regularly runs about $1.99. Their 24 ounce bricks of cheese average about $4.88. A dozen of eggs fluctuates a bit, but hovers around 79 cents to 89 cents. They actually recently upped the price to about $1.10 and they sat there and they quickly lowered the price back down. If you happen to be a milk drinker, a gallon of milk costs about $1.89.

Beware the sliced cheese however...

If you have ever followed me I always stress about unit price over total price. The average package of sliced cheese is 8 ounces. But Ruler Food's sliced cheese packages are only 6 ounces. And if you take into account the unit cost, it's cheaper to buy sliced cheese somewhere else.

But their shredded cheese at $1.79 for an 8 ounce package is actually not bad at all. All of the shredded cheeses are fine except for the mozzarella which does not seem to want to melt right. But the yellow cheeses are just fine.

You can buy a can of pasta sauce, if that is your thing, for about 89 cents. Doctor it up a bit if you need to. Hell, with the price of their produce, the hamburger meat, and even mushrooms, you could make a nice little sauce for a fraction of the cost of even a jar of Ragu.

Speaking of spaghetti sauce mind you, I have a little bit of a really good recipe to make your own sauce if you want to check that out—why buy jarred when making spaghetti sauce from scratch is so much better, so much cheaper, and easy as hell to make?

All in all if you like Aldi stores you're really going to like Ruler Foods. Going one step further, if you like Save-A-Lot Stores, Ruler Foods and Aldi Stores are both much cleaner stores, and to be honest, seem to have better selections and typically better prices. They also tend to be in slightly better locations as well.

Ruler Foods is certainly worth a look if you want a pleasant shopping experience, a clean store, great choices from brand name to store brand, and certainly great prices to make it all extra special.