Mrs. Green's FREE Holiday Cookie Decorating THIS Saturday #mrsgreens #organic #FoodieFun

Green grocer has a whole new meaning these days.   And we're excited to welcome Mrs. Green's Natural Market to the Chicago market!   This newcomer is all about organic, eco friendly, and healthy produce and products that go way beyond fresh fruits and veggies.   They also have a delectable selection of deli sandwiches, and pre-made foods. Foodies and newbies will relish the unintimidating atmosphere and friendly staff.   We'll have a big photo filled feature up shortly.   For now, we wanted to give you the heads up on a sweet event going down tomorrow morning.

ChiIL out with Mrs. Green's FREE family cookie decorating.  ChiIL Mama & Du-Jay went last week and had a blast!   But why should the bloggers & press have all the fun?!   This one's for YOU.

Healthy doesn't have to mean all granola and keifer (though we do dig those, too).   Mrs. Green's has a wickedly delicious dessert case, fantastic coffee, and more tasty treats!   They may not be low cal, but they're made with natural, fresh, organic ingredients and come in a variety of configurations to suite any allergies or dietary needs.   

It was my great pleasure to sample many of their sandwiches during their press opening and I was suitably impressed.   Their Cajun selections will give your winter blues a kick out the door, with just the right spice combos to heat things up.   You'll find a great fit here whether you love to cook or love to leave the cooking to others!

Last Saturday, I returned with my 12 year old to decorate holiday cookies, take a store tour, and chat with the staff nutritionists.   My son, Dugan, got "best big brother ever" points for specially requesting blue food coloring so he could morph a wreath into a 1st place ribbon for his little sister who was going to compete at state the next day!   She'd placed 1st all around in her last 2 meets and missed the cookie fun because she was at 1 last grueling 3 hour practice before state.   

They were so helpful and nice at Mrs. Greens they even encouraged us to take home extra cupcakes, cookies and ingredients so our gymnast could decorate her share at home!   The treats were super tasty. And the kids (and adults) had a blast being creative with the confections.



While we were at Mrs. Greens I was elated to pick up an excellently flavorful & strong cup of coffee and arnica in tablet and gel forms for my gymnast.   It's great for healing bruises and muscle strains and crazy hard to find around town.   We live by the stuff!

As we were checking out, we overheard numerous people raving about how excellent the sausage samples were, so we made our purchases and detoured back in the front door to try a few for ourselves.   Their reputation was well deserved!   We tried the bacon sausage, cracked black pepper, maple syrup, and cheddar and all were amazing.

Mrs. Greens is a warm, welcoming space and a great addition to Chicago.   I can easily see frequenting this market.   They're an excellent resource for omnivores, vegetarians and vegans.   

Come by with the littles THIS Saturday for free cookie decorating 10:30am-11:30am and check out Mrs. Greens for yourself!

What Grocery Store Is Here To Stay? #NotGoingAnywhere #ad

Disclosure:  We are happy to be working with Jewel-Osco on a sponsored campaign through January 31st and have been compensated for sharing this information with our readers.   As always, all opinions are our own.

This past weekend, Chicago social media was all a buzz with a certain grocery store's going out of business sale.   Words like frenzy and swarm were all over the 75% off sale recaps.  Some tweets compared the mobs of deal stealers to the cornucopia scenes from Hunger Games.   I stayed far far away on purpose. Why get pummeled for produce or felled for foodstuffs?!

Jewel is in my neighborhood and here to stay.   They're even buying up some of the stores the frenzied swarm so efficiently emptied last Friday.   They've been a Chi-town staple for 114 years, and they're stampede free.   Even better, they've done away with those annoying discount cards and spread the savings throughout the store for everyone to enjoy.   As a chronic card forgetter, I'm eternally grateful.

Jewel began as a group of door-to-door salesmen selling tea and coffee from the back of horse-drawn wagons. Founded in 1899 by Frank Ross and his brother-in-law Frank Skiff, the company started with $700, a rented horse, and a secondhand wagon.

Check back with ChiIL Mama early and often throughout the end of December and the month of January.   We'll be highlighting some seriously chiIL (trample free) Jewel-Osco deals for you.   Here's one to get things going

• Gift Card Promotion: buy $100 in participating dining gift cards at any Jewel-Osco now through 12/25 and get $10 off your next purchase. $10 off coupon is a catalina printed at checkout. The catalina is good through 1/1/14. Participating gift cards include: Applebee’s, IHOP, Chili’s/Brinker, Buffalo Wild Wings and Amazon Gift Cards; Promotion includes the Applebee’s & AMC Dinner gift card AND Brinker/Regal Movie & Meal gift card. 

Disclosure:  Once again, we are happy to be partnering with Jewel-Osco on a sponsored campaign through January 31st and have been compensated for sharing this information with our readers.   As always, all opinions are our own.

South Side Stony Island Poised to Save A Lot-Win a Free Bag of Groceries Here

Save-A-Lot is open and ready to live up to it's name.   There's a new grocery store at 8240 S. Stony Island on Chicago's south side and they have great prices, a sense of humor, and a heart.   This makes five new Save-A-Lot stores opening in Chicago's South Side neighborhoods, for a total of 13 Chicagoland stores.   An additional five stores are planned by February 2012.


The new stores stock some name brand staples, but predominantly carry their own brand, to keep prices low, similar in price point to Aldi stores.   We were amused at some of the names, like Mother's Split Top bread and Tickles diapers.   They feature the cheap, chuckle inducing Bubba Cola--blue Bubba for Pepsi fans and Red Bubba for Coke.   They also name many of their products after actual employees, like Kaskey's soups and Jones' potato sticks. 


ChiIL Mama had a chance to take a tour the day before their grand opening celebration.    The store is spacious, clean, and stocked with finds for families on a budget, like Splash Out juice pouches for kids' lunches and a number of cereal options like Cocoa Diamonds, Apple Bobbers and Hootn' Honey.


Save-A-Lot's parent company, Supervalu, also runs the local Jewel chain.  The grocery retailer is dedicated to providing affordable access to high quality produce, USDA-inspected meat, fresh dairy and other items needed to feed families.   They're moving in to fill a huge need in urban, food desert areas.


We were especially happy to see the decent fresh produce section, as there is a decided lack of access to affordable fruits, veggies, and healthy foods in the areas Save-A-Lot is serving.   They offer a 40% average family savings on primary food needs.   This is good news for growing children and parents trying to stretch a paycheck.   Speaking of paychecks, the new groceries hired over 100 employees from the local communities, creating much needed jobs.


We were also impressed by Save-A-Lot's community relations.   At the Stony Island grand opening, a $25,000 check was given to support the Greater Chicago Food Depository.   They also gave away colorful, reusable bags full of groceries as gifts for nearly 7,000 families, as a celebration of the new store openings.   When we toured Stony Island, a grateful recipient had just dropped off a heartfelt thank you note.


This whole weekend, shoppers can enter to win $100 gift cards.   Drawings will be held Monday, March 7th, with one winner per store.    Here at ChiIL Mama, we also have one of the gift bags full of groceries to share with our Chicago readers, courtesy of Save-A-Lot.   Enter here through Monday noon for your chance to win.