Save a Lot Market

A long time ago this supermarket on the corner of Saturn and Coronada used to be Alpha Beta. That's telling you my age there, ha ha. Then it turned into a Safeway, then Albertsons, then closed about a year ago.

The once shuttered stored was recently reborn as a "Save a Lot" market and opened earlier this year...


Bert had been there a few times and said it was nice inside complete with a food area, one for tacos, seafood and fresh tortillas.

As you walk in, you will see the drinks and food bar on your right side. I knew I wanted to try one of the aguas refrescas; it was pretty hot the day of our visit. Cathy told me that if I saw a "green" one, it would be some sort of spinach drink mixed with a fruit juice. The white was "horchata" (rice), red was "jamaica" (hibiscus), and the orange was "melon" (cantelope).

This was a spinach and pineapple drink ($1.75 for the small). Cathy's version at Otay Farms Market was similar, using spinach, kale cucumber and another type of fruit juice (one visit was orange juice, another type apple).

This was a little different for me with this spinach drink. It felt kind of "healthy" drinking it as I could taste the bits of spinach that weren't completely blended. Bottom line, I liked it!

I won't bore you with photos of the market's interior since I didn't take any (I'll leave that up to Cathy when she makes her inevitable revisit). Unlike Mercado International, this wasn't strictly a store with Mexican/Hispanic items. It was a regular grocery store which was supplemented with the Mexican bakery and mini food court area.

We sat down to sample some of the "pulutan" I got from Kababayan.

I didn't dump the whole bag on the table (I was a bit wary since we were eating food from another place in there), but here was a few pieces of the fried stuff:

The guy gave us three small containers of vinegar and chopped up garlic and chili flakes. This was the dipping sauce which went really well with the fried chicken skin (there are two big pieces shown), the dilis and the bulaklak (the piece in the back).

Of the trio of fried items we sampled, I think it's safe to say that we enjoyed the fried chicken skin the best! Hands down1 I liked the fish second and dead last (for me) was the bulaklak. It was a bit too chewy for me and a little too greasy. Plus, knowing it was part of an intestine wasn't helping either.

Throw your health consciousness away if you eat these. OMG, you can see the oil starting to stain the paper bag!

Save a Lot Market
Coronado Ave
San Diego, CA 92154
(619)

There is no website

Next, we would try our luck with a local donut instutition and perhaps get some mariscos at a local taco truck...