Grocery shopping

[fresco]

Hey Squeat, is your Safeway still a freakshow and dating spot after midnight?

elyse,

I assume it is. I try never to go there because it is only a matter of minutes before I become completely filled with intense rage. Everything about Safeway galls me -- don't get me started, I could go on for a long time!

(And Soba, not to pick nits, but in case any visiting eGulleters want to check out the show for themselves, the intersection is actually Church and 14th and Market.)

Cheers,

Squeat

I grew up with Safeway in Alberta, but it has never made much, if any, inroads in eastern Canada. In fact, I thought it was pretty well headed for oblivion.

[Mayhaw Man]

First let me say that I shop for all non food items like a man. Unless I absolutely need help I will refuse it and I will wander endlessly in circles before I will finally ask for direction (Rachel Perlow will be glad to back me up on this ).

That being said I love to grocery shop. I have a great vegetable stand in my little town where I get local produce (and most of it is really local, you will regularly see some guy in a junky ass pick up dropping off greens of various sorts and my beloved small okra). There is a great meat market in the nearest town of any size that has some pretty cool upscale items as well. We have a Wednesday and Saturday farmers market that has an amazing array of stuff (including a craft dairy that has Creamline milk that they sell for about 1/2 the price it goes for in the few stores you can find it. THey make great creole cream cheese as well).

We have a bunch of great seafood markets in the area and if they don't have anything I have a couple of sources to just call and see who has what and I go pick it up at the dock or their house. For most other grocery needs there is an excellent small, family owned chain of groceries located mostly in small towns in South La. called Rouse's Family Market. They are almost as cheap as Wal Mart on staples and a hell of a lot less crowded. We also have a place in the FQ in New Orleans so I get a chance to go to Whole Food and Dorignac's pretty often. That takes care of pretty much everything.

Paper goods and household stuff usually is bought in bulk about once a month at Sam's (Wal Mart's Wholesale deal, it is like Costco).

We eat well at the Mayhaw household and generally have a bunch of guests (very informally, they just know to show up around feeding time, like some kind of deer in the backyard coming to a feeder everyday at the same time ) and I enjoy feeding them too. I do 95% of the kitchen work and I like to bake as well, so everyone is happy with this arrangement. I can knock out a pretty decent meal in about an hour (I'm thinking about trying to start a new program. It will be called Cast Iron Chef. Whaddya think?) Mrs. Mayhaw is no slouch in the kitchen, but she really only enjoys cooking when it is a big production and she makes a huge mess that she has no intention of ever cleaning up , so we all prefer I take care of it. Besides, I get home at 3 and my schedule is more conducive to getting a meal on the table before midnight.

[Al_Dente]

i hate when it's amateur night at the grocery store, and it's filled with people who don't know how to negotiate aisles and carts.

happenned last night, as a matter of fact. i was stuck behind a sunday driver and his girlfriend. in the tight corners he's periodically stop his cart right there to amble off and look at food.

finally i politely said excuse me, and maneuvered around him. then i heard him say "GOD. some people are in such a rush..."

Then you should have said "yeah? well some people have their heads up their..."

Bad grocery cart drivers make me INSANE. What is going through someone's head when they just leave the cart in the middle of an aisle obstructing the way? Nothing, apparently...

This is one of the reasons I hate "everyday" grocery shopping. I very much enjoy the trips to various markets and specialty stores.

[Mayhaw Man]

Bad grocery cart drivers make me INSANE. What is going through someone's head when they just leave the cart in the middle of an aisle obstructing the way? Nothing, apparently...

Perhaps we should have grocery cart driving school. I will be happy to teach it for a small fee. I would be doing my part to make the world a better place and making a handsome profit.

Upon course completion the students will be able to step up and have their id's made. On the next trip to the store they will be able to strip their card through a machine and a cart will then be released to them through the opening of a highly advanced locking mechanism.

These id's will be issued in the same building where my new id (working along the same lines as the grocery cart license) for potential purchasers of spandex is located (it will be much easier to get a cart card than a spandex card )

[Al_Dente]

Bad grocery cart drivers make me INSANE. What is going through someone's head when they just leave the cart in the middle of an aisle obstructing the way? Nothing, apparently... 

Perhaps we should have grocery cart driving school. I will be happy to teach it for a small fee. I would be doing my part to make the world a better place and making a handsome profit.

Upon course completion the students will be able to step up and have their id's made. On the next trip to the store they will be able to strip their card through a machine and a cart will then be released to them through the opening of a highly advanced locking mechanism.

These id's will be issued in the same building where my new id (working along the same lines as the grocery cart license) for potential purchasers of spandex is located (it will be much easier to get a cart card than a spandex card )

Seems like a perfectly reasonable plan. If you need any VC let me know.

[tryska]

Bad grocery cart drivers make me INSANE. What is going through someone's head when they just leave the cart in the middle of an aisle obstructing the way? Nothing, apparently... 

Perhaps we should have grocery cart driving school. I will be happy to teach it for a small fee. I would be doing my part to make the world a better place and making a handsome profit.

Upon course completion the students will be able to step up and have their id's made. On the next trip to the store they will be able to strip their card through a machine and a cart will then be released to them through the opening of a highly advanced locking mechanism.

These id's will be issued in the same building where my new id (working along the same lines as the grocery cart license) for potential purchasers of spandex is located (it will be much easier to get a cart card than a spandex card )

as an old coworker at the last gym i worked at was fond of noting...."spandex is a privilege. NOT a right."

but yes there definitely needs to be grocery cart school. i love it when the card-carrying grocery-shopping professionals are doing their thing (usually a weekday afternoon). It's like a well-choreographed ballet, with lots of smiles and nods and excuse me's and thank you's. then the amateurs roll in and the needle on the record screeches to a halt.

[torakris]

If I have to take both children, it's a chore. If it's only one child, it's tolerable. If I get to go alone, I try to make it last as long as possible.

I feel the same as Heather!

except I have 3 kids and I will only take all 3 of them shopping about twice a year and then I always swear I will never do it again!

My youngest will start preschool/kindergarten in April and I am already dreaming about leisurely food shopping, stopping by a book store to browse for and hour or two, stopping to get a coffee that does not turn to ice by the time I get the first sip.....

yet I digress...

back to food shopping

[megc]

Bad grocery cart drivers make me INSANE. What is going through someone's head when they just leave the cart in the middle of an aisle obstructing the way? Nothing, apparently... 

This is one of the reasons I hate "everyday" grocery shopping. I very much enjoy the trips to various markets and specialty stores.

I get frustrated by bad grocery cart drivers, too.

I prefer, as I "shop for one" most of the time, to use a basket. It makes manoeuvering around the store much easier and it limits my purchases to some extent (I am a student on a budget). When I'm in a place like Fairway, a basket is much easier to deal with than a big cart! And when I go to speciality shops, a cart really isn't an issue - for instance, my fish market is across the street from my house and I just carry my purchases home in a bag.

I've always loved grocery shopping, since I was a little kid. I used to love going with my Dad to shop for food at the local supermarket. He and I would have a great time buying food together. Nice memories.

[Alex]

Like megc, I've always liked to grocery shop. When I was growing up in Queens we had two grocery stores just a couple of blocks from our house. Grocery shopping also was a good excuse to wander up and down the block and visit the candy store, the music store, the hobby shop....

Ms. Alex and I are fortunate to have a fine local supermarket about ¾ of a mile from our house: aged beef, decent seafood and produce, good breads, a pharmacy, a post office counter, B & J's by the scoop, helpful staff, open until 11, and seldom more than two persons in line ahead of you. We tend to pick up what we need for the next day or two rather than stockpiling for the entire week.

[Cusina]

We eat out far less often these days because cooking has become so much fun.

It's that E-Gullet Effect again!

As I unloaded my cart at the local grocery last night I realized just how far I have come. Almost everything I purchased came from the natural foods dept. or was fresh meat, dairy and produce. I didn't even walk through the center of the grocery store except to pick up a bag of PB cups for a baking project my daughter requested. Those aisles of prepared stuff don't apply to me, making my shopping trip much shorter. This has made my trips to the store much more interesting. It's like a field trip in search of the best and the brightest for our table.

Definitely wasn't the case a year ago, B. eG.

[jo-mel]

=lamb,Dec 8 2003, 01:28 PM]

I organize in each according to food group.  Kinda like a filing system for food.     

It takes me a long time to put away after shopping.  But at least I know where everything is.

LOL! I'm probably too organized for my own good, but I, too, have foods in groups and certain things go in certain drawers, or stacked with like things. I use those little lazy susans so that I can keep organized.

God help when DH puts the milk where the juice belongs! I have so darn much in the refrig, that I have to be organized.

What was that movie, where the family put things away by color? HeeHee ---at least I don't do that!

[jo-mel]

=Mayhaw Man,Dec 8 2003, 03:18 PM

Perhaps we should have grocery cart driving school. I will be happy to teach it for a small fee. I would be doing my part to make the world a better place and making a handsome profit.

I hope your 'grocery cart driving school' goes nationwide, and includes little kids with those little carts with the flags! And --- please include the chatterers!

When I go down an aisle, I play games with myself, while muttering under my breath. I'll see someone ahead of me, and I say to myself "Watch them go to the middle of the aisle just as I try to pass" --- and they usually do! Or the aisle with two people who stop beside each other at the same time --- blocking passage. I think it is because I expected them to stop at the same place that they did. (not that I'm paranoid. )

Of course, my cart etiquette is above approach!! LOL!

[Suzanne F]

I love food shopping in "boutique" food stores; but I also love going to supermarkets -- especially the huge ones in sterile suburbs -- just to see what they have. I have been know to include supermarkets in the sights to be seen when I travel. You can tell a lot about a culture from their supermarkets.

Remember the scene in "Moscow on the Hudson" where Robin Williams goes to the grocery store for the first time and faints at the sight of so many brands and varieties of coffee?

I even love my monthly visits to the big Pathmark (and still, occasionally, to the Food Emporium). There are always some scary new products to marvel at (mostly with, "Why on earth would anyone want to eat THAT???"). And there is INSPIRATION. Sometimes a hunk of meat calls my name and whispers seductively, "Wouldn't you like to make pernil with me?" Or the poor little last-day-of-sale mushrooms whimper to me, begging me to take them home and have my way with them.

At the checkout, I thrill at parlaying manufacturers' coupons and store coupons and discounts. (The best I ever did was a reduction of 25% off my original total, at a Grand Union in Wilmington, Vermont.)

Once home, my organizational skills (for which read: anal obsessive-compulsive behavior) comes to the fore. Divide, package, and label the meats for the freezer. Put up stock with the newly-purchased reduced-price chicken pieces. Transfer all the dry staples out of their dangerous cardboard boxes, into cozy jars. Date-label each and every can and bottle, before rotating them to the back of the cabinets, behind the older stock. And, of course, update the freezer/fridge/cabinet contents list on the computer for posting on the freezer door and inside the cupboards.

And start the list for next month.

Now: don't you all feel so much more NORMAL?

[fifi]

I am cooking for one most of the time and I stop in the typical Kroger or Randall's about every other day and just see what appeals at the moment. There really isn't a great store anywhere near me so most of it is pretty boring and because I have to. I do have a pretty good HEB fairly close by but it is a bit of a pain to get to so I really only go there if I am after produce. they are much better than the others. The lack of really cool groceries in this area (Clear Lake/NASA) is really surprising. While this is mostly middle to upper middle class suburbia, it is very diverse. I think that is due to the high proportion of engineers, NASA types as well as petrochemical industry, and they come from all over the world.

All of the really great stores that are so much fun are a VERY long drive away. I at least have a huge Hong Kong Market sort of on the way back from my office. There is a smaller one about 10 miles away that I will use when I haven't planned too well. And there is a terrific Fiesta just down the road from the office. I am like a kid in a candy store in that one. It is a big new Fiesta (some of the older and smaller ones are kind of ratty) and when you go in and the bright halogen lights are shining down on that gorgeous produce it is like a fairy land. I will plan ahead to go to those for a weekend cooking session. The only Costco here is about 50 miles away in NW Houston. I have never been there. I do have a pretty good Sam's. All of the other fun stores (Whole Foods, Central Market, all of the really interesting smaller ethnic markets) are "inside the loop" so those are excursion trips as well.

Don't get me started on Houston's lack of farmer's markets. That is another rant for another day.

[bloviatrix]

I love food shopping in "boutique" food stores; but I also love going to supermarkets -- especially the huge ones in sterile suburbs -- just to see what they have. I have been know to include supermarkets in the sights to be seen when I travel. You can tell a lot about a culture from their supermarkets.

Remember the scene in "Moscow on the Hudson" where Robin Williams goes to the grocery store for the first time and faints at the sight of so many brands and varieties of coffee?

I even love my monthly visits to the big Pathmark (and still, occasionally, to the Food Emporium). There are always some scary new products to marvel at (mostly with, "Why on earth would anyone want to eat THAT???"). And there is INSPIRATION. Sometimes a hunk of meat calls my name and whispers seductively, "Wouldn't you like to make pernil with me?" Or the poor little last-day-of-sale mushrooms whimper to me, begging me to take them home and have my way with them.

At the checkout, I thrill at parlaying manufacturers' coupons and store coupons and discounts. (The best I ever did was a reduction of 25% off my original total, at a Grand Union in Wilmington, Vermont.)

Once home, my organizational skills (for which read: anal obsessive-compulsive behavior) comes to the fore. Divide, package, and label the meats for the freezer. Put up stock with the newly-purchased reduced-price chicken pieces. Transfer all the dry staples out of their dangerous cardboard boxes, into cozy jars. Date-label each and every can and bottle, before rotating them to the back of the cabinets, behind the older stock. And, of course, update the freezer/fridge/cabinet contents list on the computer for posting on the freezer door and inside the cupboards.

And start the list for next month.

Now: don't you all feel so much more NORMAL?

Oh my god, I think we're related.