Food shopping: Fish, fruit and everything else taste so much better when on sale

Pacific Dover Sole Fillet was on sale for only $6.99 a pound at Whole Foods Market in Paramus, allowing me to prepare a one-dish dinner for four for about $5 a person, below, after I added organic spinach, organic diced tomatoes, capers, grated cheese, mushrooms, extra-virgin olive oil, fresh lemon juice and pesto, all of which I had on hand.

Dinner was ready in about 10 minutes, once I layered the spinach, thin fillets and all of the other ingredients in a pan lined with parchment paper and placed the pan in a preheated 400-degree oven.

-- HACKENSACK, N.J.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

The Whole Foods Market app on my smartphone alerts me to sales and coupons at the Paramus store only a couple miles from my home.

So, it's easy for me to run out and take advantage of a discount coupon on Wild Gulf Shrimp or a sale on Pacific Dover Sole and organic pears.

On the same day I picked up the fresh, wild-caught sole, the Paramus Whole Foods at Bergen Town Center had a sale on Organic Bartlett Pears from Argentina ($1.99 a pound).

They ripened on my kitchen counter in a couple of days, and were sweet and juicy, perfect as a dessert with cheese.

ShopRite has unveiled Wholesome Pantry, a label for antibiotic-free chicken, previously sold under the Readington Farms brand; organic food, and other items free of artificial colors, flavors and preservatives.

I found Wholesome Pantry Organic Garbanzo Beans on sale for 88 cents a can at the Paramus ShopRite (normally $1.31 each), and added them to organic brown rice, organic diced tomatoes, organic chicken stock and chopped fresh garlic in an electric cooker.

This is a great side dish, but can also serve as a light dinner when topped with organic spring mix, cucumbers and tomatoes dressed with extra-virgin olive oil and balsamic vinegar.

A light dinner of salad over organic brown rice.

Costco coupons

Costco Wholesale doesn't have sales, but does mail booklets of instant coupons to members of the discount warehouse in Teterboro and Business Center in Hackensack (you don't have to clip the coupons, but they're not interchangeable).

For example, three 46-ounce cans of Dole 100% percent Pineapple Juice are only $4.09 with an instant coupon at the Business Center through Saturday.

The Teterboro warehouse sells a limited selection of skinless-and-boneless Icelandic fish fillets -- cod, haddock and flounder -- for a rock bottom $7.99 or $8.99 a pound.

Korean markets

The H Marts in Little Ferry and Ridgefield have lower sale prices for produce, rice and other items than other stores in the same Korean chain.

And the H Mart at 25 Lafayette Avenue in Englewood offers a 50% discount on any sliced dessert rice cakes left after 4 p.m.

I got $7 off a 2-pound package of Jinga-brand Assorted Rice Cakes that was marked $13.99.

But stores in the H&Y Marketplace chain can beat H Mart on some items.

This month, I found a box of 16 Ataulfo or Champagne Mangoes for $9.99 (regularly $15.99) at the Little Ferry H Mart.

These intensely sweet mangoes were available at the Teterboro Costco for about $1 each.

H Marts also are known for low prices and sales on fresh wild-caught whole fish.

Organic Bartlett Pears on sale for $1.99 a pound this month at Whole Foods Market, Route 4 east and Forest Avenue in Paramus.

Champagne Mangoes from Mexico on sale at the H Mart, 260 Bergen Turnpike in Little Ferry. Buyer beware: Parking lot is filled with potholes and often flooded.

When I found Organic Garbanzo Beans on sale at the ShopRite in Paramus, I added them to organic brown rice, tomatoes, chicken stock and chopped fresh garlic in an electric cooker for dinner.

Organic brown rice with garbanzo beans, diced tomatoes and garlic.

A 1-pound package of Earthbound Farm Organic Spring Mix, above, or Wholesome Garden Organic Spring Mix was selling for $3.69 this week at the Costco Wholesale Business Center, 80 S. River St. in Hackensack.

Costco's Kirkland Signature Organic Brown Eggs were introduced at $6.99 for two dozen, but the  price went down to $5.99 and has stayed there.

Dole 100% Pineapple Juice is free of genetically modified ingredients, and comes in BPA-free cans.

On Tuesday, I bought about 1.75 pounds of boneless-and-skinless Icelandic Flounder Fillets at Costco Wholesale in the Teterboro Landing Shopping Center off of Route 46 ($7.99 a pound), and prepared them with Asian Indian spices, organic spinach and other ingredients for dinner, above and below.

This one-dish flounder dinner for four with leftovers was ready after 15 minutes in a preheated 400-degree oven.

At Jerry's Gourmet & More, 410 S. Dean St. in Englewood, complete restaurant-quality dinners to go are cut to $5.99 from $7.99 after 4 p.m., if there are any left.