Food in the time of a pandemic

[BeeZee]

I got the goods...almost 3 weeks after ordering from King Arthur

 

 

[Shelby]

4 hours ago, JeanneCake said:

 

Yesterday I shipped out 12# of yeast to various friends across the country; the # boxes were $3.63 from the distributor.  It cost more to ship than to buy 😄  I have 6 left from the case.  It was the first time I'd been anywhere except the bake shop, home or restaurant depot.  Utter madness; one man kept going back and forth to the counter (and I would move each time he did, 6 feet away means come prepared for heaven's sake), no mask, no gloves, nothing.  I had to repackage two of the shipments (I had been reusing the Rancho Gordo boxes, my labels were previously filled out and I brought shipping tape) and when I got back in line, the woman ahead of me was holding a mask in her hands.  No gloves. 🤦‍♀️  I myself had a mask and gloves on (I keep a box in the car), and for good measure, a clorox wipe to use on the keypad. 

UGH.  I feel your pain.  I had a similar experience at the PO a couple weeks ago.

 

Very very nice of you to share your yeast  

[weinoo]

9 hours ago, Katie Meadow said:

For my last order from Geechie Boy I got the Carolina Gold rice for the first time. I thought it was delicious. Love to know how you like the Charleston Gold. Is Charleston rice always the aromatic one? Btw, last Friday I watched Vivian Howard's latest series and she dropped in on Geechie Boy himself on Edisto Island. That was a two minute thrill, which isn't nothing these days.

I find them pretty similar; I've had both from Carolina Plantation, this is my first try with the Geechie Boy stuff.

[Allura]

On 4/1/2020 at 4:48 PM, Shelby said:

Incredibly jealous.  Really wish something like this was available around here.  

A lot of local farms have switched to produce bags or such to keep themselves going. If you have a farmer's market, it's worth looking at the vendor list and seeing if they have any new options. I'm getting a bag of fruit & 2 dozen eggs on Monday. Pickup is drive through our church lot and they drop in your trunk.

[BeeZee]

I did the grocery shopping this week, noon at Shop Rite. Reasonably well stocked, with some predictable holes. Paper goods aisle still bare, although they had a pallet of paper towels and I believe TP in a main aisle (one brand of each). Any sort of "instant" rice is gone. Small boxes of flavored rice mixes were a bit thin. No cherry or grape tomatoes at all. No Mother's Day cards at all (they still had Easter on the display). Cereal a bit thin. Baking aisle...small bags of AP flour, cornmeal, one lonely 00 flour. Fresh meat...good amount of Perdue chicken, zero Tyson. I don't buy other meats so I honestly didn't look. Dairy...big cartons of half and half, no pints. Good amount of yogurt and other dairy. People were generally respectful of distancing and everyone wore a mask of some type.

As an aside, I spent literally double what I would have before this all started. It is really apparent how not having any meals outside the home (and more "regular" dinners during the week) impacts the total cost. Freezer is full, I suspect next week will be fresh produce only.

[Martin Fisher]

I haven't been grocery shopping for five weeks but if I want to maintain my low-carbohydrate* eating and not default to survival food I'm going to need to go relatively soon.

I think I may be able to hold-out until about May 4th.

We're considering a Sam's Club membership again.

 

*Low-carbohydrate eating has helped me in MANY ways, I hate to give it up.

[gfweb]

16 hours ago, JeanneCake said:

 

Yesterday I shipped out 12# of yeast to various friends across the country; the # boxes were $3.63 from the distributor.  It cost more to ship than to buy 😄  I have 6 left from the case.  It was the first time I'd been anywhere except the bake shop, home or restaurant depot.  Utter madness; one man kept going back and forth to the counter (and I would move each time he did, 6 feet away means come prepared for heaven's sake), no mask, no gloves, nothing.  I had to repackage two of the shipments (I had been reusing the Rancho Gordo boxes, my labels were previously filled out and I brought shipping tape) and when I got back in line, the woman ahead of me was holding a mask in her hands.  No gloves. 🤦‍♀️  I myself had a mask and gloves on (I keep a box in the car), and for good measure, a clorox wipe to use on the keypad. 

Gloves are pointless. Wash your hands or gloves, whatever. 

[Martin Fisher]

7 minutes ago, gfweb said:

Gloves are pointless.

 

That's what some experts say, but it's possible to get into a lot of trouble listening to experts.

What I know for sure is, there's a LOT less surface and hard-to-get-to area on a latex or Nitrile glove than there is on a hand.

I definitely will use gloves in some situations.

[JeanneCake]

Correct use of gloves is not pointless.  The man in front of me was using a pen that was left on the counter to fill out the labels.  He went back and forth three times while I was there.  At the post office, if you need to fill out a form, it would be prudent to have your own pen or at least there should be sanitizer for your hands after use.  The key pad also gets touched a lot during the day.  If the staff isn't cleaning it between customers, washing your hands when you get home isn't going to help the fact that you touched the door handles to get out of the PO,  the door handle and steering wheel of your car,  etc. 

 

I own a bakery and our health dept is telling us to disinfect all surfaces (door handles, keypads, etc) customers may touch, after each customer.  They send email reminders every week.  We are doing contact free curbside pick up; we put the client's order on a cart, wheel the cart outside and then after the customer is back in their car, we go get the cart and disinfect it (handles, surface, each part of it) for the next order.  I know that's not possible for every business, but I'm taking every precaution I can, where I can.

 

[chromedome]

Up here many of the stores have wrapped their PIN pads in plastic wrap, and/or set out jars of Q-tips which can be used to press the buttons, and most then wipe down the terminal with sanitizer between customers.

At Sobeys, one of the two national grocery chains, the cashier sprays and wipes down the cash counter after every customer. It's a lot, but you do what you gotta.

[KennethT]

When I have to go out here, I use the tip of a key to push elevator buttons, pin pads, etc. I also keep a small bottle of hand sanitizer with me to use immediately if I have to touch something with my hands.

[gfweb]

All true, but I sense that sanitizing surfaces has as much to do with consumer confidence as it does with actually preventing infections. This is a respiratory spread virus that seems to have somewhat limited survival on objects.  It would have to go from the shopping cart to your hand and then your nose( in an infectious dose) to infect you whether or not you are wearing a glove.  If your mask is on, your contaminated hand can't reach your nose or mouth.  Masks trump gloves. If you have no hand sanitizer in your car, then maybe gloves do something .

 

What do I do? No gloves but frequent Purell. Just to be safe.

 

But my quibbling isn't important.

Edited April 25, 2020 by gfweb (log)

[robirdstx]

I had a very early time slot this morning for my curbside pickup at my Neighborhood Walmart. There were some additional items that I wanted, so after my order was loaded in my car, I ventured into the store for the rest of the items on my list. The store was basically empty of shoppers, other than the employees filling other online orders. In fact, the only other shopper I saw was my 86 year old next door neighbor. He did not recognize me when I said hello due to my mask! 😁 I had been getting low on jasmine rice and the online ordering service showed it was not in stock, but when I looked, there it was on the shelves! Back home and well stocked again!

[chefmd]

LA mart had kimchi in a tiny container or in a bucket, no middle option.  And no radish kimchi.  I might get used to a bucket size.

[blue_dolphin]

After ~ 5 weeks of no grocery shopping except for the weekly farmers market, I went to Trader Joe's during their AM "senior" hour yesterday. They were normally stocked and I got everything on my list except AP flour.  I saw on Instagram that a local bakery is selling King Arthur Sir Galahad flour so I decided to venture out again.  This bakery mills and sells their own organic flour and had repackaged the Sir Galahad in 10 lb bags so I bought one.  I've got  bread flour on the way from Central Milling which should be delivered tomorrow or Monday.

The little gourmet/import shop that I visit occasionally got in a big shipment of yeast (SAF Red and Gold Instant, Red Star Active Dry and Fleischmann's Instant, all in 1 lbs) so I may plan a trip over there next week.  My yeast is well past its "best by" date, although it's still working, I was thinking of replacing it....more critically, I'm running a little low on French butter. 

 

I still haven't tried any grocery delivery services despite the Instacart emails that I've received for ages.  The other day, I got an email from them encouraging me to sign up with them as a shopper.  No, thank you. 

 

I did do a curbside delivery at Total Wine the other day so I've got Campari back in stock and a few white and rosé wines.  Easy peasy.  Just pop the trunk, they put the box in and you're on your way. 

 

And, not food, but food-related, I just received Mandy Lee's (of Lady and Pups) book The Art of Escapism Cooking: A Survival Story, with Intensely Good Flavors. It came out last fall and is about her own cooking in isolation when she moved to China for her husbands job but the title seems quite appropriate to these times, too.  Her recipes often require more grocery procurement than I'm doing these days but I'm looking forward to reading it

 

 

[Porthos]

I ventured in to my local Total Wine a couple of days ago. My Sweetie and I are very particular about tonic water, Schweppes or nothing. I was surprised that they had plenty of regular, but were out of Diet Schweppes. I needed assistance with my Tangueray. There was  hole on the shelf for the 1.75 liter bottle and they did get one for me. I like the cost savings of the large bottle and that will last at least a half a year.

 

They didn't have any of the cigar brands-types I normally buy so I didn't get any, but that's not a problem.

 

I went there because I was out of beer and what I like to drink is hard to find in supermarkets. I ended up with 6-packs of Karl Strauss Red Trolley Ale and AleSmith Nut Brown Ale.Since I have cut way back on beer consumption (diabetes-related) that should last for several weeks.

 

I'm repeating myself, but I go out with mask and disposable gloves. When I get back to the car one glove comes off so that my keys aren't exposed to anything I might have touched, I unload what I've bought into to trunk with the gloved hand, then that glove comes off and I use hand sanitizer. If I have more stops, each new stop gets new gloves. Oh, I also carry my own disinfecting wipes and wipe down the surfaces  of the grocery cart I'm likely to touch. When I get home I wash my hands/forearms. It all may be overkill, but I'd rather practice overkill than end up sick. I touch my face a lot but not while wearing the gloves.

 

We need to be in Orange County today and our trip is planned so we can get to-go sandwiches for dinner from a great authentic Italian deli-market, Cortnia's Italian Market.

 

Edited April 25, 2020 by Porthos (log)

[Kim Shook]

Went to Publix today to get just a few things - some fresh produce and a rotisserie chicken.  They had plenty of produce.  Canned goods, bakery items, bread, and frozen things were all a little picked over, but you could certainly find what you needed if you were willing to substitute.  Meat/fish items were in decent shape, but the butcher case was empty.  Didn't need paper supplies, so I didn't check.  The elusive disinfectant wipes are still MIA.  Plenty of bleach now.  

[JoNorvelleWalker]

I just came home from Shoprite.  There were paper towels and a big display of bleach.  Not sure if there was toilet paper.  They had limes and leeks.

 

[FauxPas]

20 minutes ago, JoNorvelleWalker said:

They had limes and leeks.

 

Whew.   😃

[Tri2Cook]

I'm assuming lemons and limes aren't selling well right now locally and they need to get rid of them because both are the cheapest I've ever seen them here. So I grabbed several of each. There doesn't seem to be much of a shortage of anything here anymore but they're still keeping the "limit 1 per customer" signs on the paper products... which I'm not in need of anyway. Actually, there is one surprising shortage. For whatever reason, chow mein noodles are completely non-existent right now. I wasn't looking to buy them anyway, I just noticed it while grabbing some other noodles and thought it a bit odd.

[JoNorvelleWalker]

I don't know about the frozen north but this is typically the time of year that limes sell out completely.  I was thrilled to come home tonight with eight,  Eight nice juicy ones.

 

[Tri2Cook]

20 hours ago, JoNorvelleWalker said:

I don't know about the frozen north but this is typically the time of year that limes sell out completely.  I was thrilled to come home tonight with eight,  Eight nice juicy ones.

 

The store has an abundance right now and they're cheap (for here, still pretty expensive for everywhere else apparently). I brought home 8 limes and 4 lemons, I used two of the limes tonight for the Thai food I made for dinner. They were surprisingly juicy. I may go grab some more, the sale price is good until Thursday. They seem to last at least half of forever in the fridge.

[liuzhou]

Fortunately, we are well supplied with yeast here. The Saf yeast people have a huge factory in Laibin, a city one hour south of here and China's largest domestic yeast producer,  Angel has a plant right here in town.

 

 

Unfortunately, my oven has died!

 

Edited April 27, 2020 by liuzhou (log)

[blue_dolphin]

On 4/25/2020 at 10:02 PM, Tri2Cook said:

I'm assuming lemons and limes aren't selling well right now locally and they need to get rid of them because both are the cheapest I've ever seen them here.

 

In my local area, the majority of fresh lemons go to the food service sector and that's almost completely shut down these days.  Some growers are selling for juice (at lower prices) and others are picking less or not at all. I'd suspect that would affect retail prices in many areas. 

From the local paper: With restaurants closed, Ventura County lemon growers see reduced demand

That's the bigger growers.  At my local farmers market, prices have been steady.  Lemons generally 4 for $1.  Limes 6 or 8 for $1 for both the small Mexican or large Persian limes.

 

On 4/25/2020 at 10:38 PM, JoNorvelleWalker said:

I don't know about the frozen north but this is typically the time of year that limes sell out completely.

It's getting close to the time when supply shifts from Northern to Southern hemisphere.   Still lots on my tree if you'd like to come out and pick.  They are fully ripe (yellow) and super juicy.

[weinoo]

Lemon posset!

 

 

With mucho time on my hands, I tried the recipe for oatmeal raisin cookies (well, almost exactly) on the inside lid of the Quaker Oats oatmeal container; rolled oats, not quick-cooking. I subbed chocolate chips for half the raisins called for - they're ok, but nowhere near as good as the crispy oatmeal cookies I bake from a recipe in CI years and years ago.

 

A delivery on Saturday has lots of beautiful produce - ramps, spring onions, baby leeks, 2 lbs of nice mushrooms, etc. And yesterday I received a delivery from a place called Chef Collective - they supply cheeses, other dairy, and various assorted farmers boxed up produce. My fridge is bursting.

Edited April 27, 2020 by weinoo (log)