My main grocery store has a bargain bin for discarded produce.
Lots of times I can get a bag of 6-8 apples for $1, or some plums, pears; sometimes peppers, mushrooms, oranges; once in a while mangoes (believe it or not, the town doesn't seem to understand that mangoes are a fantastic fruit, they look upon them as an oddity and don't buy them, the store-staff have a habit of putting them in the bargain-bin as soon as they start to soften (just getting ripe), so I wait till they're nice and ripe and in the bargain bin, hee-hee). Most of the time, the produce is just about perfect, and only needs a tiny bit of paring-off the bad spots, and the rest is usable. I've learned from experience what is a great bargain, and what to avoid, and I've eaten well and saved lots of money by shopping from the bargain bin.