Pricey produce prohibits purchases ....

[jbonne]

I'm sorry...I don't know how to answer you. I'm not sure what you mean by 'regular retail'. In my neighborhood, GG is regular retail.... We don't have a nearby, convienent supermarket chain.

i may be a bit rusty, but ... regular retail in NYC might be Gristede's, D'Ag, Food Emporium, &c. even the bodegas and Korean groceries, though there may be a price premium at some.

there are, admittedly, a paucity of larger markets in lower Manhattan.

[jbonne]

I'm really bad with remembering prices, but let me try my best.

way better than i could remember. and interesting -- seems the prices there are actually undercutting our local farmers market, though ours is probably the priciest in the city. (at least gauging by morel prices, which is my nonscientific benchmark.)

may be the first time i can ever recall anything being cheaper in NYC. though the bodegas used to sell saffron for $1.75/packet. hard to find that here.

[hathor]

though the bodegas used to sell saffron for $1.75/packet. hard to find that here.

For saffron, and lots of other spices, head over to the Indian markets...Lexington and the high 20's. There is an amazing market...on the East side of Lexington, called something like Markets of the World, fancy front to the store. Inside is just amazing! Gazillions of spices, beans, nuts, etc for very reasonable prices. However, my personal challenge is to get one of the check out ladies to smile...man, they are stonefaced!

[jgarner53]

I've stopped buying produce at my supermarket (Albertson's). I can't even manage to buy it at Whole Foods because I think it's so outrageous. For one, the Albertson's quality is usually poor, and the prices high. Not to mention the lights they display it under so you pick what you think is a bright red pepper, only to find it's barely red and tinged with green!

We have a great mom & pop produce market about 10 minutes' walk from home. Prices and quality there are much better, and they're largely seasonal, so no Chliean grapes at $6/lb in January. Huge bunches of the freshest basil for $1, 3 or 4 for $1.19 ruby grapefruit, small lemons for 10 for a buck, etc.

And Saturday mornings I go to the farmers' market - NOT the expensive, yuppy one at the SF Ferry Building, but a smaller one in a not-so-chi-chi part of town that's closer to home. The herb guy sells basil (3 or 4 kinds), mint, shiso, and a whole host of other things for 50 cents a bunch. I pay $1.75/lb for peaches, but there are peaches there for $1/lb. (The ones I get are tree ripened, huge, and sweet as can be, so worth every penny to me). Tomatoes - $1/lb for beautiful red, ripe honeys, dates for $2/lb -- whether you want deglet noor or medjool; figs are $2-3.50/lb, but are still just starting to come in.

Produce is expensive if you just buy it in the supermarket. It's one of the few exceptions I can think of to the old axiom, "you get what you pay for."

[FunJohnny]

And I also wonder how it is that local Asian and Mexican get such good produce and sell it so cheaply... maybe it is all about turnover... us anglos don't buy much fresh produce, so the selection sucks... so we don't buy the sucky fresh produce... so there's no market for fresh produce... and it becomes a specialty luxury item and is priced accordingly, even though it still sucks.

Yeah -- In Northern Virginia with its ethnic diversity we're fortunate to have our pick of geographic food shoping -- everything from Lebanese Halal butchers (great lamb!) to Latino within easy shopping distance. The Latino market, for instance, has lemons and limes for a fraction of what Safeway charges. The Asian markets, either Korean or Vietnamese, have great produce that's fresh and cheap, although maybe not the selection that you can find at Whole Foods.

[jbonne]

And I also wonder how it is that local Asian and Mexican get such good produce and sell it so cheaply...

total speculation, but i'd guess that they may be buying direct from the terminal markets or using ethnic distributors, either way taking a much smaller markup than large, distributed retail.

i don't know enough about supermarket economics to know what items are loss leaders, but i'd guess produce is one area where they can recoup losses on other items. remember that the average supermarket has a margin of about 1-2 percent profit, so they're looking for cash where they can find it.