Cocktail offers have suckered me twice now. Last year, I was at a friend’s birthday and we all piled into Alfie’s on South William Street for the €5 cocktail deal. After ordering a round, we found that the alcohol content was pretty puny. One person went to complain to the barman and was met with [...]

An interesting email arrived from our reader Wendy Cullinane this morning: I am on a mission because I was very disappointed to discover Lidl is attempting to pull the wool over my eyes.  I have been purchasing Lidl’s own brand of plain flour for more than 9 months.  The price averages at 82 cents per [...]

Yesterday, I posted about some good fruit and veg deals at Superquinn. So good, I thought, that I stopped in the Ranelagh branch on the way home yesterday. I went with a very specific intention: to pick up tomatoes, onions and peppers for the dinner, which were advertised as just €1 each. But as is [...]

When I buy myself lunch in town now, it is usually because I’ve been very disorganised in the morning and not had a ton of porridge or made myself a healthy, nutritious packed lunch. This happens to me all the time, because while my intentions are recessionarily pure, the reality is a frantic mess punctuated [...]

I went for lunch the other day in Brambles Cafe, upstairs in the Stillorgan Shopping centre. I know there are a few Brambles outlets around Dublin but I hadn’t been to one before. I’m also aware that they use organic ingredients and are fair trade – good for them. However, offering organic produce is not [...]

Another interesting email about Tesco, this time from CheapEats reader Bill Gunter: “I noticed more than a month ago that the Tesco at the Omni Park in Santry, Dublin was selling Epicure organic cannellini beans for €10.30 per tin. When I asked about they told me “if that’s what the price tag says then that [...]

Some wallets have a weak spot for takeaway coffee. Mine has one for the multifarious, rubbish chocolate bars and crisps strangling the tills of newsagents. They’re one of those costs I don’t tend to give much thought to: 85c here, €1.05 there. The shops know they can get away with charging us more or less [...]

Do you ever get a craving for a crispy, white roll filled with ham and coleslaw? I decided to satisfy this craving at Spar in Clonskeagh yesterday, but it left a bitter taste in my mouth. Like a lot of things, you never query the price until you’re at the till, and your mouth has [...]

Tesco in rip-off shock. Surprise, surprise. This morning’s Irish Times reports that Tesco, despite their much publicised Change for Good campaign, remain 18% dearer in the Republic of Ireland than across the border. The survey carried out by the Consumer Choice magazine found that some items were up to 37% more expensive down south. In [...]

Right now, I’m in Charlois airport, just outside Brusells, and I’m bloody thirsty. As with every airport, you can’t bring liquids past security. Fair enough. Only the absolute bastards at this airport have seen this as an opportunity to swizz and fleece their customers. You can buy a bottle of Coca Cola’s Vittel water for [...]