A Review: Angelo's Salvage Grocery Store

I found out this week about a salvage grocery store downtown, about five minutes from my office. Rumor was that Angelo’s often had organic and allergen-free foods. So I took a field trip today – an $80 field trip!

The store itself is not strong on atmosphere – it’s pretty much bare bones shelves with prices written on the items with a sharpie. But it’s a salvage store so that’s totally okay with me!

A few other helpful hints to know before you check out Angelo’s. The store is at 201 S College Ave (Indianapolis), just south of Georgia Street. If you approach the store from College, go past the building and the small parking lot is on the northside of the building. They do have small carts and bags for the grocery, but I’m sure bringing your own bags is appreciated. I brought two of my own (but needed a third) and the cashier helped me bag everything up. They do accept credit and debit cards, but there is a $5 minimum purchase to use a card. Lastly, their hours are a bit limited, so consider that before you go: M-F 8 am - 4 pm and Saturday 8am -2 pm.

If you need butter or cheese, especially in bulk, this is your place…at least this week! It’s kind of like a Goodwill in that regard – you don’t know what you’re going to find. Today they had plenty of butter, including Land O Lakes brand, bulk sour cream and various kinds of cheese. They also had string cheese singles 2 for a $1.

My favorite things were the sauces. This is an impulse buying problem for me. I love sauces. Marinades, condiments for dipping (remember the mustard mishap?), salad dressings, etc. I’ve never been able to eat foods “dry” – maybe that’s a Sjogren’s thing. So when I find ones that are not made with soy sauce, dairy or tons of chemicals, I snatch them up. I got several fun ones today: a roasted raspberry chipotle, tequila-lime-cilantro, Thai pineapple chili, Roasted Garlic Vinaigrette, organic tahini, Bragg’s Liquid Aminos, roasted red pepper sesame sauce and a huge thing of organic Tamari.

I also spent several minutes in the personal toiletries aisle – hand lotion, lip balm, body oils – many organic and all for great prices.

There were several varieties of canned beans and tomatoes  - big staples in our house – so I grabbed several cans of those as well. Some garbanzo, some black beans, and five cans of organic fire-roasted petite diced tomatoes ($.69 each).

They also had vegetarian and organic dog food. I was running out of time on my lunch break so I didn’t spend much time there, but I may have to next time.

I saw many brands that I normally can only find locally at places like Whole Foods, Pogue’s Run, and through Green BEAN Delivery. Whole Foods 365 brand was prevalent as well Envirokids, Late July (family size bag of chips of $1), Fantastic Foods, Stonewall Kitchen, and others.

This isn’t a “replacement for the grocery store” kind of place, but I have a feeling I will hit it up once a month or so before my regular trip to grab staples like GF pasta, rice or canned beans and tomatoes. Next time I’ll exercise a little more self-control since God knows if we get trapped in our house, due to something like…I don’t know, an ice storm…we will not be able to survive on mustard alone.