Costco Kirkland and other discount sources for baking ingredients??

As far as KA flour, WalMart prices are very good.

Costco seems to have all kinds of dried fruit at tremendous savings. I buy their unsalted butter, too.  No complaints.  Pam

CostCo carries a durum flour called "Mumbai Gold" but I haven't used that. Another member here mentioned buying some so perhaps they'll add their experience to conversation. I've used the Eagle Mills All Purpose w/ Ultra Grain that sells for around $6/ 20#. It's not bad but not great by any means other than price. Their other flours, an AP and a bread flour are both bleached and bromated. All their flours are produced by Conagra.

They do carry Red Star Active Dry Yeast at $3.69/2#. At that price, you can afford to buy an airtight container to use for storage of your yeast in the freezer. I've had mine in the freezer for over a year now and it still works well.

CostCo's prices on Pam spray oil and for their store brand EVOO are very good as is the price for Agave sweetener. I have seen some parchment paper at one time but haven't seen it for about four months. The plastic wrap is also a very good buy if you use it around the house.

I'm continually impressed with the quality of the Kirkland products.  I also own a ton of the Mumbai Gold durum flour.  It's very good.  Local Costcos around here don't seem to carry yeast.  I wish they did.

FF 

If you live near Amish communites ( Pennsyvania, Ohio, Indiana, etc.) they have a large number of bulk stores that carry a complete inventory of baking supplies. Every type of flour, Hi Gluten flour runs .42 cents a pound.

Xmas baking fruit at either the Savon Foods bulk or at the local wholesale outlet, which will take orders from anyone, its cheaper if you have a business liscense I suppose, but in any case its cheaper than the local store shelves.

The only problem is its limited in selection of many things, but I can buy butter there, and other dairy products, and do. I buy the butter portions for my home use, these keep better than butter in a butter dish, and being portioned into little dishes keeps the butter waste from crumbs etc down a whole lot.

I have also bought other things there, like aprons (nice white ones with long ties) and a bench scraper for under $5, which anyplace else was over $15, so its worthwhile to investigate whether or not you can buy from them.

I think they will sell to anyone, but if you want to buy in huge quanties, you have to have a buisness liscence, in order to be legal if reselling.

You can also buy things like paper bags, plastic shopping bags, and things for putting goods into, like clear clamshell containers etc.

Its also a good source for canned goods at usuallly cheaper prices than the store shelves. And of course flour and baking powder and .... who knows what your store might have.

I buy some things in the bulk bins at Whole foods and they are actually inexpensive that way.  They have potato flakes--you can turn that into potato flour in your food processor.  I buy vital wheat gluten, a lot of whole grain flours, various grains that go into breads like coarse cornmeal, rolled oats, sunflower seeds, etc, and coarse salt from their bulk bins as well.  I like that I can buy just the amount I need so I don't have to have a pantry of 30 different flours that go bad before they are used up.  I've never had an issue with freshness from the WF bins. 

I always think of Whole Foods as "whole paycheck" but it's very reasonable when you buy their bulk products.  And, their 365 Brand items are very reasonable as well.  I find their  bread flour and white whole wheat as good as King Aurthur and about $2 less per 5  pounds.  Trader Joe's also has nice white and white whole wheat, but they are often out of stock.

Honey is nicely priced at Trader Joe's, as well as canola and olive oils.  I'm sure Costco has big containers,  don't like to buy too much honey at once because it crystalizes.  I don't buy large quantities because I don't have much storage room or freezer space.  My husband already complains about how much room my bread ingredients take in our pantry cabinet. 

figure out more storage space for you. I'm not waiting, I had a coat closet turned into a space for my larger items, like my roasters, my big crock pots, and my huge bowls, all of which I do use, just not everyday! So they needed someplace to live. The closet was beside a door that isn't used, so that worked for me, the broom closet in the hall turned into storage for some of my baking stuff, some other items of kitchenware, and some canned goods. The cupboards in my kitchen are rather useless in comparison to my old kitchen, and I am hoping to replace them in the next couple of years, and to add to them, by turning a wall in the dining room into cupboards. The space is useless otherwise, as the deck door is directly across from the kitchen to dining access, so you can't set the table there, it has to go on the larger side of the room, which is open plan to the living room, so I plant to turn it into space I can actually use!

I agree that the bulk bins are wonderful, if you have ones that actually have a selection, the ones here in town are mostly candy, and pasta, and fruit drink etc, no real baking supplies except for chocolate chunks for candy making. A bit thin, to get a decent selection I have to drive 80 miles to the next town in the next province so its an all day trip and I always come back with tons of stuff to store, as that is where the Costco is too!

Stan Ginsberg
www.nybakers.com

that is great, and the only thing I ask is do you ship to Canada?

I think its great that you are doing so well, and have a nice product line, the bench scraper is identical to the ones the cash and carry here has, and the same price. I couldn't belive it when looking in their catalogue and finding them, as I had been pricing them all over the net, at over $15 plus shipping and with ugly plastic handles. I like wood!

The fact that you have some of the 00 flours and the semolina and durahm at reasonable prices is nice too, as long as the shipping wouldn't kill me! I know you can use flat rate boxes from the post office because I have gotten some oils from the company in the states that handles them (essential oils not cooking) and its much cheaper shipping than the fed ex which won't deliver here, as I have no city address to drop it off at. $60 dollars cheaper to be exact, which is a lot when you are doing exchange on US dollars even at 5 cents a dollar.

I too have not found a Kirkland product I don't like.

I tried the Eagle brand unbleached flour, but don't care for it, because of the whole wheat flavor.

But otherwise, we love shopping there for certain items.

As others have already said, not everything is cheaper, nor worth buying in bulk, but there are certainly bargains to be had.

I just bought a small camp oven/stove for our emergency supplies. Runs on propane, has 2 burners and a small oven.

We are attempting to have a 2-3 month supply of food in case of emergency, or financial meltdown. A real concern in America, the question being, not if, but when.

Costco also has quite a selection of freeze dried long term storage emergency foods, although they rarely stock them in the stores, just go to their online store.

Our local stores carry very little in the way of flour, so I go to Amish country for mine.

I just picked up a 50 pound bag Friday for $15.00.

We also belong to BJ's Wholesale, and Sams, so we find different deals at each store.

No Whole Foods around here, you folks are lucky.