Yesterday was a teacher work day at school, so the girls had plans that didn't involve textbooks and scientific calculators. The two of them had a babysitting job in the AM. After I dropped them off, I had some time to kill in that region of our town. I stopped at the pharmacy to get my B vitamins, browsed through the local Hallmark to see their fall holiday items. Then went over to the grocery store to check for marked down milk, as we're down to the last few cups of milk in our fridge.
I got lucky and found 4 half gallons of milk, marked down. Then I mosied on over to the packaged deli area. There in the bin were some tofu hot dogs (nitrate free), tempeh, veggie Italian hot links, yogurt, Promise margarine spread (no trans fats, label says it has Omega-3s) and some veggie pepperoni slices. I passed on the yogurt, as I make it for less than the clearance price. I did buy the one tub of margarine, the one package of hot links, and all the tofu dogs. I didn't think the pepperoni slices were a great deal, for such a small package. I'll be slicing the Italian hot links to use for pepperoni on pizza, instead, at about 1/3 the price.
The tempeh . . . hmmm . . . I don't really know what it is or how to cook with it. Yes, I could find out online. But there's that chance that we won't like it, and even at a mark down, it may not be worth it.
Then the other side of my brain says, "just try it". Being a marked down item, it's a small financial risk to try it out, right? So if ever there was a time to try tempeh, it would be when finding it for a low price.
In the end, I decided "no thanks" on the tempeh. It looked so foreign to me, and I had no idea if it was priced really well or not (sometimes the markdowns are not such a great deal after all). But I did buy the tofu dogs.
I thought about this later. If I always had this attitude of not trying something new, simply because it looks foreign, I'd never have tried kale (which grows fabulously in our garden, and I do indeed like it), herb tea (some varieties look and taste like dried grass, but not all, fortunately), and tofu (which looks like white jello, yet it does so well in stir fry). Sometimes trying something new opens up a world of possibilities.
I guess you could say that sometimes I'm an adventurous eater, and other times I'm a bit shy with new foods. Where do you fall on the adventurous diner spectrum? Will you try something new if it's a great deal? Or will you cynically think, "there's a reason this stuff didn't sell before the sell-by date, the stuff is horrid!"
The verdict on the tofu dogs? Well, they were a lot like hot dog flavored bubble gum, a bit rubbery, but not horrible. I'd eat them again. And good thing, too, as I bought 3 packages of them.
