Originally Posted by
swag
A couple of the supermarkets near me have a salad bar, and I just use that as an ingredient bar.
Yesterday, for example, I picked up about a quarter cup of shredded carrots and maybe a couple of tablespoons of chopped onions to add to a saute I was doing. I think it cost under 50 cents, and there was nothing left over to rot.
While it's not the most cost efficient way of shopping for ingredients, I've done this, too, particularly for stir fries, if I need a small amount of an ingredients, or if the ingredient is time consuming to prep from scratch.