No Skittles question

[vanillacourage]

The salad bar at my local grocery store has three separate signs at the front saying that food stamps can not be used on the salad bar. Is there some obvious reason I'm overlooking to explain this? Even the unhealthy stuff like Oreo fluff has to be a lot better than other options elsewhere in the store.

Is it classified as a convenience item maybe?

[Deleted]

I'm not sure what the term is, but its "ready to serve"--kind of like fast food.

[hopecounts]

Yep when I worked as a checker at a grocery we couldn't accept food stamps for our salad bar because it's classified the same as fast food/"ready to serve" or whatever so was exempt.

[basilosaurus]

The gotta earn that food! You'd best be tearing your own lettuce and slice those tomatoes yourself if you're going to suck on the gobmint teat!

But, yeah, it's "prepared" food.

[msmerymac]

Weird story - I went to Taco Bell the other day and there was a sign saying, "We regret to inform you that we can no longer accept EBT cards." My question/comment was, "When COULD they ever accept EBT cards?"

[mexicali]

In Los Angeles a lot of restaurants except EBT cards. Now I don't know if that means they can use their food stamp money or just their cash money, but they are accepted. Just recently a "buy here, fry here" type fish market put up a new sign down the street from my work.

[statlerwaldorf]

Do they have hot items on the salad bar? Refrigerated cooked rotisserie chickens are EBT approved, but the hot ones are not.

[Miss Phryne Fisher]

In some states EBT cards have a cash benefit in addition to food stamps, that is probably the deal with the Taco Bell.

The salad counts as prepared food. If the salad items were behind the counter and thrown together by a store employee, it would be covered under foodstamps (at least in FL and NY which is where I have worked retail).

[Deleted]

but the rotisserie chickens at my local grocery store are cheaper than uncooked ones in the meat dept.

.

[UMaineTeach]

Aug 20, 2012 17:57:22 GMT -5 @septimus said:

but the rotisserie chickens at my local grocery store are cheaper than uncooked ones in the meat dept.

.

the un cooked ones give you the value added gizzard, liver, heart and other giblet goodness


+o(

[statlerwaldorf]

Aug 20, 2012 17:57:22 GMT -5 @septimus said:

but the rotisserie chickens at my local grocery store are cheaper than uncooked ones in the meat dept.

.

Mine are usually too. They get around it by cooking them and then sticking them in the refrigerator until they are cold and selling them to people using an EBT card. They do the same thing with prepared soups, fried chicken, etc.

[mominatrix]

Aug 20, 2012 17:37:37 GMT -5 statlerwaldorf said:

Do they have hot items on the salad bar? Refrigerated cooked rotisserie chickens are EBT approved, but the hot ones are not.

OK, that's an insane distinction.

[basilosaurus]

Costco rotisserie chicken is $5. I couldn't buy that much raw chicken for less than $10 here. Plus I also get all the broth I make from the carcass which is probably another $8 given how crazy expensive groceries here are.

Would cold chicken count as unprepared b/c you then have to put in the effort of reheating it? Crazy.

[Deleted]

I buy the cold ones to make tacos and enchiladas. So much faster when you don't have to cook the chicken :-)