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24 March 2007

Sad single man I was doing my grocery shopping yesterday when I noticed that the man behind me in the checkout was buying somewhere between 30 to 40 frozen dinners, half a dozen 4-packs of puddings in a cup, three or four family-size bags of chocolate bars, many boxes of those breakfast cereal bars, and other such processed crap, all in multiples. I bagged up my fresh chicken breasts and strawberries and milk and so forth slowly so I could try to count how many frozen dinners he was buying. I couldn't. And let's just say, the man looked like he ate that way. Ew. Being single is no reason not to live like a human being.
post by: Orange Swan at: 12:29 | 172 comments
Maybe he likes eating that way? What's it to you, really?
posted by grouse 24 March | 12:36
What makes you assume that he was single?

I eat breakfast creal bars (Special K bars are awesome) and pudding in a cup, and I think I'm living like a human being. A healthy human being, even.

I'd probably eat frozen dinners, too, if my freezer wasn't as tiny as it is.
posted by amro 24 March | 12:40
It was probably my ex-husband. On the very rare occasions he did the shopping, that's what he'd bring back. I bet that guy has a wife at home who's wondering what happened to the list she gave him.
posted by essexjan 24 March | 12:41
Oh, he could have been in a relationship, who knows. I was too put off by his selections to even look for a wedding ring. But my money's on his being single. Those weren't even different types of frozen dinners. I think it's far less likely that two people would agree to eat like that than it's a matter of one person just not bothering to put the effort into preparing decent meals.
posted by Orange Swan 24 March | 12:50
Maybe he was stocking up on some faves due to the coming apocalypse that should be here any day now. Any day. Just you wait.
posted by Zack_Replica 24 March | 12:50
I bet he didn't even know what a portabello mushroom was.
posted by chococat 24 March | 12:53
I've got a friend who used to work in a group home for teenagers from abusive situations. Every time she went to the grocery store (and it was several times a week), she'd buy, like, $300 worth of Doritos and frozen pizzas and breakfast cereal.
posted by box 24 March | 12:53
Oh, he could have been in a relationship, who knows.
Whatever, the important thing is to recognize that he's subhuman and you are better than he is. And to broadcast that fact.
posted by Wolfdog 24 March | 12:54
What's his address?

*gets crowbar and lockpick*

it's a matter of one person just not bothering to put the effort into preparing decent meals.

No offense, swan, but you sound like somebody's mother here. One of the joys af being a self-supporting adult is that you can finally dress how you want, act how you want, and yes, eat what you want.
posted by jonmc 24 March | 12:58
I'd be more likely to guess that he has a bunch of kids at home, and that he and his wife work full-time and can't always cook them dinner at night, or homemade snacks to go with lunch. I ate plenty of TV dinners growing up in a house with two busy parents, and I turned out just fine (and I was always a thin kid, by the way, if you're wondering).

I never imagined that there were people out there judging my grocery purchases.
posted by amro 24 March | 12:58
One of these days I must get around to telling you about the neo-gothic rooming house of horror I lived in during my mid-twenties, and especially about one inmate of that abode, Rex. He had a truly revolting diet. I will occasionally eat a frozen dinner and a pudding cup such as that man was buying - but I could never have eaten one meal of Rex's making. His diet was mostly composed of things like instant mashed potatoes, the really cheap awful processed sausages, jello, canned vegetables, the cheapest possible frozen dinners. It used to make me feel ill just to smell those things cooking. And yes, he was indeed very poor - but I was living on the same amount of money and I ate far better than that.

Whatever, the important thing is to recognize that he's subhuman and you are better than he is. And to broadcast that fact.

Oh fuck off.
posted by Orange Swan 24 March | 13:03
And yes, he was indeed very poor - but I was living on the same amount of money and I ate far better than that.

Good for you. But why does it bother you so much if other people don't want to?
posted by jonmc 24 March | 13:05
I love looking at people's groceries and trying to figure out what they're making, or how the stuff they're buying fits together. Apparently San Franciscans buy a ridiculous amount of tofu.

Which shouldn't surprise anyone, really.
posted by occhiblu 24 March | 13:05
Apparently San Franciscans buy a ridiculous amount of tofu.

They must be building a bomb.
posted by jonmc 24 March | 13:06
Oh fuck off.

Wow. Maybe it's time for you to step away from the computer.
posted by amro 24 March | 13:08
Whenever I see someone making what I consider to be an odd purchase... say an entire cardload of pre-processed pre-packaged food and no veggies or fruit at all, or maybe 40 boxes of frozen dinners, I make up little stories about them while I'm standing in the lineup, about their lives, and their secret lives, like maybe they're spies on a stakeout, or survivalists, or international jewel thieves.
posted by Zack_Replica 24 March | 13:11
I'm eating a pudding cup right now. And mr. gaspode is out buying sliders and sweet potato fries for lunch. (I'll feel gross after eating them but they will, ahem, help my GI tract along, which is kind of necessary right now)

Ha! TMI is fun!
posted by gaspode 24 March | 13:13
Do international jewel thieves require regular intake of Hungry Man Dinners? That's awesome. :)
posted by occhiblu 24 March | 13:14
I like seeing people buy bags of Doritos, instant meals, chocolate cereal... and a case of diet soda.

I mean, if you're going to eat like that you might as well go all out and get the regular, right?
posted by backseatpilot 24 March | 13:16
He was a serial killer, he noticed you looking down your nose at his food selection, and now he is stalking you. HTH. HAND.
posted by weretable and the undead chairs 24 March | 13:16
I'm also hungry and have nothing in the kitchen. A pudding cup would be good right about now...
posted by backseatpilot 24 March | 13:17
Hey, when you're on the lam, you can't stop to make a nice salmon brioche with new potatoes and carmelised carrots and a little garden salad and dressing - it's my own creation, don'tyouknow - as the feds could bust the gig wide open at any minute.
posted by Zack_Replica 24 March | 13:17
Well, I'm a single guy, and my grocery purchases are pretty homogenious. Mostly just pizza (freshetta), frozen French fries, sometimes bagels and cream cheese. The reason is I almost always go out to eat at lunch on campus, so the food I bring home is just for snacking on. I'm on a diet and shooting for 1,000 calories per day (although on average it's more like 1,500-1,800)

Being in shape, in my view, has a much more to do with the amount of food that you eat, rather then the type.
posted by delmoi 24 March | 13:18
Oh, see, I was hoping there was something about the dinners themselves that was necessary for jewel thieving across international borders. Like, they would cleverly fashion imitation diamonds from the foil wrappers, pearls from the mashed potatoes, emeralds from the creamed spinach. Perhaps mother-of-pearl earrings from a spork.
posted by occhiblu 24 March | 13:21
Actually international jewel theives eat Hot Pockets, since they're easily secreted away in a pocket when one has to rappell down the side of a builing in black clothing.
posted by jonmc 24 March | 13:23
Well, ok occhi, maybe you could do that, but you'd only have about two days before your oh-so-clever ruse was seen through.
*sniff* "What... what is that? It smells like rotting dinner..."
posted by Zack_Replica 24 March | 13:24
Hot Pockets'd have the advantage of keeping you warm from the wind, but, man, if you sit down suddenly...... well. Let's say the dogs would have no trouble finding you.
posted by Zack_Replica 24 March | 13:26
Yes, that's why it only works for international jewel thieves. You can't just stay in the same country after such shenanigans.
posted by occhiblu 24 March | 13:29
Makes sense... I'll bet you'd need the ''International Line of Hungry Man Dinners''™ so you wouldn't arouse suspicion.
posted by Zack_Replica 24 March | 13:34
I have an ex and a good friend who both eat mostly processed foods (and who probably appear, at times, to be "sad" and "single" based on the contents of their grocery carts, even when they're happy and attached). It's limited my food choices in the past when I'm around them (which has, at times, led to some eye-rolling on my part and the unspoken thought, "you know, it won't actually kill you if your burger comes with a slice of tomato"), but you know what? They're both dear, great people and I'm grateful to have them in my life, no matter how many dozens of containers of shitty microwavable chili they've got stacked in the pantry.

And yes, they are also international jewel thieves and I am enjoying looking at my pudding-smuggled diamond tennis bracelet glisten in the sunlight right now! So pretty. And only the tiniest specks of pudding encrusted in the setting.
posted by scody 24 March | 13:36
Wonder if they'll make a film about this. Maybe starring Matt Damon - "The Bourne Gastronomie", or "My Dinner with Bourne".
posted by Zack_Replica 24 March | 13:40
"Dinner Royale"!
posted by scody 24 March | 13:42
I always do my grocery shopping in bodegas at two in the morning to avoid criticism of my diet which consists mainly of Twix bars and Heineken.

On preview; I'd pay good money to see 'Dinner Royale'!
posted by hojoki 24 March | 13:46
"Ha!" he exclaims, as he puts the beef bourguignon on to simmer, pouring in just enough fresh merlot to surround without covering the large cubes of beef that had been slowly roasted to a chocolate brown the night before.
posted by mischief 24 March | 13:48
"Your name please?"
"Bond. James Bond."
"Your.......appetizers, Mr. Bond."

ooh. drama!
posted by Zack_Replica 24 March | 13:49
'For Your Palate Only' 'Goldsandwich' 'Spoonraker' 'On Her Majesty's Gastrointestinal Distrees'....

I got nothin'...
posted by jonmc 24 March | 13:49
Once you get in the habit of eating good food you don't go back. My workplace kindly supplies various breakfast and snack foods, which I don't normally touch as they're all frozen processed supermarket stuff of a sort I haven't even seen in a number of years. But not long ago I tried one of the microwave breakfast hot pockets, a sausage and egg number. I didn't spit out the first bite, but I didn't take a second. It tasted like it was seasoned with propylene glycol and selenium mine tailings. Five years ago I might not even have noticed.
posted by George_Spiggott 24 March | 13:55
Bond eyed the frozen dinner with distaste. "Do you expect me to eat?"

"No, Mr. Bond; I expect you to die."
posted by scody 24 March | 13:56
Uh oh, I just realized I shouldn't talk down on people who eat processed food. My cereal is SHREDDED WHEAT!!! OMG, it came out of a box! And my milk?! It's been SKIMMED and it's wrapped in PLASTIC!
posted by mischief 24 March | 14:01
Once, late at night, I was biking to the vid store to return a movie. I think it was a Sunday night, so there wasn't much life on the streets, traffic or pedestrian. So I'm biking there, and I pass a few people walking, and when I passed the third guy, I really started to take notice. I'd realised that the other two men I'd seen earlier were almost identical. They were nondescript, middle aged men wearing simple dark blue coats, dark pants and they were all carrying small brown paper bags. They were all walking in different directions and they were all blocks away from each other. By the time I had got home, in less than 30 minutes I'd passed no less than seven of them, all looking eerily similar.
So. I guess spies/thieves/aliens sometimes brown bag it too. Something. It was all a little creepy, but interesting.
posted by Zack_Replica 24 March | 14:03
Tomorrow's breakfast will be steel cut oats.
posted by mischief 24 March | 14:06
Shredded wheat? Skimmed milk and steel cut oats? There are children reading this blog, mischief, do you mind?!!
posted by hojoki 24 March | 14:09
All this processed food, hojoki, it's affected my reason.
posted by mischief 24 March | 14:11
... and to top it off, I'm making a SMOOTHIE with FROZEN strawberries and APPLESAUCE!!! Bwahahahahaha!
posted by mischief 24 March | 14:13
OMG, you're incorrigible! Wait...that sounds pretty good. Gotta try one of those.
posted by hojoki 24 March | 14:17
Good for you. But why does it bother you so much if other people don't want to?

This was kind of what I thought, too.
posted by greycap 24 March | 14:18
Maybe he is building a fort with those food blocks. Or an igloo.
posted by Memo 24 March | 14:35
I love you people.

James Bond and his mother of pearl spork will have me giggling for the rest of the day.
posted by mygothlaundry 24 March | 14:37
It makes fishing the olives out of the martini just ever so more elegant.
posted by occhiblu 24 March | 14:54
I ate plenty of TV dinners growing up

TV dinners were a treat in my house. The only time we got to have them was on weekend nights when our parents were "out-on-the-town." And yes, the only time we could have sugared cereal was when visiting my grandmother.
posted by ericb 24 March | 14:57
Oh, scody - shouldn't that be "No, Mr. Bond; I expect you to dine."
posted by Zack_Replica 24 March | 15:00
*groan*
posted by occhiblu 24 March | 15:02
Sad single man. Last night I was in line at the liquor store purchasing Veuve Cliquot champagne and couldn't stop staring at the schlub in front of me. He was buying E&J Gallo 'Night Train' and a bottle of Colt 45. Ew. Being single is no reason not to live like a human being.
posted by ericb 24 March | 15:05
yeah, sorry occhi - had to go for it. :)
posted by Zack_Replica 24 March | 15:15
It was a groan of appreciation, Zack. Really.
posted by occhiblu 24 March | 15:16
Is the general nastiness of this thread the result of yesterday's influx of new users? No? So, what's wrong with us?
posted by interrobang 24 March | 15:17
Whatever it is will pass.
posted by hojoki 24 March | 15:24
"So, what's wrong with us?"

We need to get laid.

en masse

posted by mischief 24 March | 15:27
Hallelujah, mischief.
posted by essexjan 24 March | 15:28
This thread is nasty? I don't really think so. I think we usually do a pretty good job of deflecting nasty into silliness.
posted by gaspode 24 March | 15:30
We're gonna need a list of things for the mega-orgy. Lemme see what I have...
posted by hojoki 24 March | 15:32
Did anyone think that maybe sad, single man was having a dinner party for other sad single men?
posted by LunaticFringe 24 March | 15:39
LunaticFringe: That's such a sad thought.
posted by mischief 24 March | 15:43
And what a terrible dinner party it'd turn out to be if he had only one microwave to cook 40 TV dinners.
posted by essexjan 24 March | 15:48
"Is the general nastiness of this thread the result of yesterday's influx of new users? No? So, what's wrong with us?"

Two words:






PROCESSED FOODS!
posted by arse_hat 24 March | 15:53
Hmm, I didn't think about the microwave part of it. Maybe his has shelves so he can do them two at a time?

mischief: it need not be sad! It could be the AGM of the Sad, Single Men's Empowerment Group. SSM could be very excited at finally getting to host it at his tiny, basement apartment. He was thinking the guests would eat in waves so that the dinners wouldn't have time to get cold during the cooking process. His next stop was to the LCBO (liquor store) for two 24's of Milwalkee's Best or Pabst Blue Ribbon, he hasn't decided yet.
The group was going to decide this year's goals like how to appear as pathetic as possible and discuss the benefits of the dirty undershirt as a symbol of one's descent into SSM-hood: Should it have to be earned or should a SSM get it right from the get-go?
posted by LunaticFringe 24 March | 15:54
It doesn't happen every grocery shopping trip, but it happens a couple times a month. I duck into my neighborhood Publix or Food Lion or Winn Dixie, and make a quick foray into the wine aisle or section for some vermouth and a couple bottles of burgundy, which I put in the cart first, so it will come out last, when I already have my ID out, and not have to dig out my ID with my cart still full of groceries in the checkout line, and there is some young woman, usually married, who sees me confidently putting 3 or 4 bottles of wine in the cart, and moving on. And then I hear The Question:

"Say, do you know anything about wine?"

I've toyed with smiling enigmatically, and shaking my head "No," but that seems unnecessarily cruel. One doesn't present strangers with cognitive disconnects like that, lightly.

So, unless I'm really pressed for time, I usually say "Sure. Could I help you with something?" And then they'll explain that they have some occasion coming up, that calls for wine. Often they are cooking, but when I ask them what they'll be making, it turns out they are no better cooks than they are oenophiles. So, I often wind up first planning their menus, then picking the wines (and convincing them that a bottle of wine split 2 ways over 3 courses is a severe drought), and then touring them around the store to pick out their ingredients, dictate the recipes into their Daytimers, and give them a brief discussion of the difference between braising and stewing meats.

I've often wondered how these sad married women fare with my directions for coq-a-leekie and how they liked the vouvary. I see some of them again, sometimes, in the produce section or waiting in line at the quick foods deli counter, and they return my smiles briefly, from 10 feet away, while trying to place me, and sometimes they blush in recognition, momentarily. And I feel a bit better that I helped them, these sad, married women, who smile diffidently and hurry on, and drink, without further questions (judging by the contents of their carts), a lot of vouvary, with their deli rotessiere chickens.
posted by paulsc 24 March | 15:58
So you give them all that advice but fail to tell them how to transport the wine, thus rendering all advice given utterly pointless.
posted by essexjan 24 March | 16:05
That man with all the frozen dinners could've been me, circa one year ago. Now that I've learned to cook passably, I still wind up making lots of instant stuff these days because let's face it, cooking for one sucks.

Mmm, spaghetti.
posted by DaShiv 24 March | 16:16
Cooking for one can be fun -- that's when I'm at my most inventive; a lot of things I can cook well only because I worked them out on just myself first. But washing up for one sucks. So the trick is to learn to make good things using very few utensils. Me, I love big black cast-iron skillets, and can make some pretty involved things things in them. And I have exactly one pan to clean, and you don't wash a cast iron skillet very often anyway. Typically I just scrape all the detritus out with a plastic scraper, wipe the inside clean with a little canola oil and then heat it on the stove for a few minutes to throw off any moisture and sterilize it.
posted by George_Spiggott 24 March | 16:35
This thread is very encouraging.

I suspected that all this salmon, yogurt, spinach, oatmeal and whole grains were gonna get me laid eventually.

Now I KNOW they will.

Thanks, Orange Swan!
posted by jason's_planet 24 March | 16:40
I really wish I had never clicked on this thread. My opinion of some of you has fallen like a rock.
posted by Rhomboid 24 March | 17:01
"My opinion of some of you has fallen like a rock."

Success!!!

posted by mischief 24 March | 17:17
Next up:

Colon hydrotherapy, colema or enema?
Which is right for you? And why?

posted by mischief 24 March | 17:22
Oh you tease, Rhomboid. You can't say something like that without naming names. Name some names!
posted by matthewr 24 March | 17:33
I have to admit that my general reaction to seeing a man buying loads of frozen meals and so on is usually "yeah, he's single", although they're usually the kind of guy that looks like the stereotypical single male: mid-forties, slightly unkempt, vaguely sad/tired looking. Thinking about it, though, it's probably a bit of a generalisation.

The best thing I ever saw bought in my local supermarket was by one guy and all he had was 24 cans of lager, a jumbo pack of crisps and a Bob Marley CD. I guess, barring something you can't buy in a supermarket, that was his evening right there.
posted by TheDonF 24 March | 17:35
This reminds me of a joke that's so mean that I rarely tell it, although when I first heard it I thought it was really, really funnny.

A man lines up at the checkout counter. The cashier scans his stuff, one by one. He's got one can of tuna, one tiny jar of mayo, one sandwich roll, one small bag of chips, one can of soda.

The cashier says "So, you're single, huh?"

The guy's a little offended. "Why do you assume that? Just because I don't buy a lot of stuff?"

She says "No -- because you're ugly."
posted by Miko 24 March | 17:39
If I were single, I'd never cook. I hate to cook. HATE. I hate the chopping. I hate touching raw meat. I hate the smells. I hate the waiting. I hate the cleaning up. All of it. Hate. I only do it because I don't want my offspring to get scurvy. That would be embarassing.

And pudding cups are manna. Do not malign pudding cups.
posted by jrossi4r 24 March | 17:42
Miko, that made me giggle.
posted by jrossi4r 24 March | 17:44
More stories: When I ran a residential education program, I used to have to buy certain perishable food items weekly. The local store got used to me checking out with the following shopping list:

45 apples
30 oranges
10 heads Romaine
3 pounds tomatoes
3 English cucumbers
5 gallons milk

Once, a cashier asked if I worked at the local aquarium, because for some reason she thought this was the kind of thing you might feed the dolphins.

Another time, I was working in a different residential education program. It was Halloween, we had a school group of 100 kids there, and we were putting on a big Halloween carnival evening for them to make up for their being away from home and missing trick or treat. So we had planned in advance and had plenty of candy, pumpkins, games, and stuff. On the day of the event, though, we realized we were missing a few items: a bunch of apples for apple bobbing and some more candy. Oh, and we were also doing the contest/game where you draw faces on an inflated balloon, then cover it with shaving cream, then use a disposable razor to see who can shave the balloon without popping it.

Therefore, one of my friends was sent to the local Wal-Mart on Halloween day. This guy happened to have a giant, weird crazy bushy beard, kind of Amish-farmer style, and he dressed like the rest of us who worked in the woods all week: sloppy flannels and jeans. It was on the checkout line that he realized why people were giving him the eye, in light of his grocery order: several bags of apples, several bags of candy, and 8 packages of disposable razors.
posted by Miko 24 March | 17:46
I suspected that all this salmon, yogurt, spinach, oatmeal and whole grains were gonna get me laid eventually.

Now I KNOW they will.

Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter. Which recipe does one follow to combine these ingredients into a surefire get-laid elixir?
posted by DaShiv 24 March | 17:53
Miko: I am so envious of your storytelling skills.
posted by mischief 24 March | 17:55
LOL!!@Miko
posted by hojoki 24 March | 17:56
DaShiv: Take aforementioned ingredients. Add gin. Blend. Serve over ice. *magic*.
posted by Zack_Replica 24 March | 18:02
s_r hopes buying 15 packages of trader joes tamales and lasagnas inspires less pity than buying 40 hungry man dinners.
posted by small_ruminant 24 March | 18:05
aw shucks mischief. It's really just a function of having such fun people to toss all the randomness of life back and forth with.

There is no such thing as 'too many tamales'!
posted by Miko 24 March | 18:10
I suspected that all this salmon, yogurt, spinach, oatmeal and whole grains were gonna get me laid eventually.

Now I KNOW they will.


They just might. I always love it when a man I am dating can cook and have known lots who were better cooks than me, and I'm not bad at it.

Of course I also dated a guy who, when I asked him if he liked to cook, replied eagerly, "No, but I like to eat."

There are more ways to seduce a woman than by making her a lentil burger.
posted by Orange Swan 24 March | 18:24
[suddenly craves lentil burgers]
posted by Orange Swan 24 March | 18:25
For some reason the original post makes me think of Adam Sandler in "Punch Drunk Love."

And Miko, your story made me snort-laugh.
posted by brina 24 March | 18:44
I find the very existence of lentil burgers disturbing.

(also, the whole frozen dinner versus fresh food thing comes down to this: I hear some of the meals you all desribe here and while I'm sure they're all delicious, some of us get exhausted just reading the recipies. Not everybody's into working that hard and being that creative. Dosen't make either one better or worse, just different.)
posted by jonmc 24 March | 18:47
Hell, jon, everything I cook is peasant food.
posted by mischief 24 March | 19:51
I went through a frozen food phase. I was still figuring out how to cook for myself (still am, in fact); it got me used to the idea that a meal should be more than one thing. Don't just eat a box of macaroni and cheese; eat some of that, plus a little chicken, veggie and fruit.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero 24 March | 19:53
And p.s., now I want to throw a "Sad Single Frozen Dinner" party.
posted by ThePinkSuperhero 24 March | 19:53
in the director's cut of To Catch a Thief, Cary Grant actually eats impressive amounts of frozen pizzas, puddings in a cup and Cheez Whiz.



I suspected that all this salmon, yogurt, spinach, oatmeal and whole grains were gonna get me laid eventually.

either that, or they'll give you the bowel movement of a lifetime
posted by matteo 24 March | 20:13
Isn't there some clustering fuckhole of a restaurant somewhere in Hipsteria that serves frozen dinners at like an %800 markup? Has anyone burnt that place down yet?
posted by Lentrohamsanin 24 March | 20:28
Hey, I have frozen TV dinners for lunch at work. Healthy Choice makes some absolutely delicious choices. Beef tips with portabello mushrooms; Beef Stroganoff; Chicken Marsala, etc. Mmm. Who knows, maybe the guy was just stocking up a freezer for a slumber party. Maybe he was donating stuff to a church or food bank. We have a lady who comes in at least once a month and buys stuff for needy families for her church - specific things. Four large packages of chicken legs, three small, two small packages of ground beef, eight large. Next month she wants 12 frozen Butterball boneless turkey breasts, and 6 frozen turkeys, around 12 pounds each. I'll bet she gets strange looks at the checkout, too!
posted by redvixen 24 March | 20:34
One more thing - what if he's going on a trip, and leaving an older teen behind? What could be better for the teen than TV dinners and junk food? You don't know if the man is divorced, or even widowed. That's another thing, what if he just lost someone and he's depressed and just doesn't give a damn? The world is too full of "what ifs" to make snap judgements.
posted by redvixen 24 March | 20:37
In Boston we have Well, Well, Well -- based on the Parisian flash-freeze purveyor Picard (as per David Sedaris' mention).
posted by ericb 24 March | 21:35
The world is too full of "what ifs" to make snap judgements.

Redvixen, that is so well put. It's something I struggle with and try to remind myself constantly. I can be judgemental at times, and also when stressed I have a bit of a hair trigger for annoyance. In better moments, when someone cuts me off in the car or obliviously blocks the store aisle or does something I might consider shallow or any of a number of other mildly irritating things, I remind myself that I have no idea what sort of conditions they may be operating under. They may indeed have just lost someone. They may have just lost a job. They may be working on a far bigger issue like drying up from booze or recovering from cancer or something. What a total stranger happens to think of their behavior could be very, very low on their priority list. I've certainly had times like that myself.

It's such a good premise to assume that we're all doing just about the best we can, with what we've got, where we are. It can be very hard to remember, especially when (like me) you really want to see important social and cultural changes get made (like the whole processed food thing). But it's true, what you say. Until you've walked a mile in the other person's shoes, it's too hard to judge why they do what they do, or how hard it would be for them to be making different choices.
posted by Miko 24 March | 21:40
100th comment!
posted by mudpuppie 24 March | 21:44
ericb: apart from what Well Well Well might be charging or what it says about their culture - I do admire the philosophy evident in the way they use a set number of ingredients to maximum efficiency. For instance, they offer:

Chicken Marbella, with " juicy slices of natural chicken breast";

Tandoori Chicken, with " White meat chicken...marinated in a unique blend of Indian spices";

Lemon Broccoli Chicken, with "garlic, lemon and fresh oregano...combined...with firm broccoli spears and tender dark meat chicken"; and

Jamabalaya, with "spicy all-natural chicken sausage."

Looks like they're buying whole chickens and tfinding great ways to use the entire bird, in the old-school manner. The casserole- and stew-style foods they offer also probably use a lot of the same vegetable ingredients, and also stock from the chicken bones. This is good home economy. It's the way I try to cook, too, but damn is it rare in the modern food world to use nearly all the parts of any animal.
posted by Miko 24 March | 21:47
"The world is too full of "what ifs" to make snap judgements."

The possibilities however are finite.
posted by mischief 24 March | 22:02
I had braised pork cheeks with polenta and a port wine reduction and then hanger steak with pureed potatoes and watercress, then I came home and ate a mess of Raisinettes.
posted by Divine_Wino 24 March | 22:03
Miko, I second everything you say (and that redvixen said to prompt your comment, as well) about being judgmental. I have been working for several years on my own kneejerk judgmentalism -- noticing the little ways I make assumptions about who people are based on how they look or what their preferences may be. I've been caught so wrong in an assumption, too, and it's made me feel ashamed -- ashamed to have assumed the worst about someone and had them turn around and treat me with grace or kindness. Those moments are humbling. And I've come to realize that all those outer trappings -- what people eat or wear or read or the kind of music they listen to, etc. -- just doesn't matter. There is no necessary correlation between people's outer preferences/appearances and their inner qualities. (At broader levels, of course, things like farming, food production, etc. can indeed matter a great deal. But individually, eating organic vs. eating processed, for example, doesn't say anything about whether a person is kind or unkind, funny or grim, resilient or weak, generous or miserly, or any of the endless other qualities that really make up a person's true self.)

For example, I used to be a bit of a snob about travel and education; I just assumed I couldn't possibly have much of substance in common with someone who didn't go to college or hadn't spent time outside the U.S. Then I met my boyfriend -- the most compassionate, hilarious, generous, affectionate, loving, articulate person I have ever met in my entire life. He also happens to have not gone to college and has spent all of a few days outside the U.S. Had I hung on to my old judgmental standards (which of course, at one point just seemed like "common sense" to me!), I would have passed him by. And that, truly, would have been one of the greatest losses of my life.
posted by scody 24 March | 22:19
Eat to Live?

Live to Eat?

I think that's probably the difference between check-out guy and OS.
posted by Five Fresh Fish 24 March | 22:32
Processed stuff was about all Nora ate in White Palace--the novel, not the movie. I liked it when I was younger--but it repulses me more as I age. My household things are STILL packed away, so I eat out a lot.

I admit to being an education snob, but that doesn't mean college degree--one can be extremely well-read on their own.

DaShiv--you don't.
posted by brujita 24 March | 23:25
I can't believe the hate on Night Train that I see here in this thread.
posted by ikkyu2 25 March | 02:26
I don't know about where Orange Swan shops, but the Albertsons markets around here are constantly having these "stock up" specials on frozen foods and canned stuff and breakfast cereal in which you buy $20 of certain items (which are usually $1 to $2 each) and get $5 off. Just about everything in these offers falls in the 'heavily processed' category, and I have pondered taking advantage of some of these deals - then I think about what I'll look like checking out with 20 cans of chili or 10 boxes of cereal... and chicken out. And that was without OS's disapproval.

Still, I shop occasionally at Costco and have purchased the 8-pack of frozen french-bread pizzas, which usually last over a month. And it does help if you try to make it OBVIOUS that you're only doing part of your grocery shopping at any one place (bringing a Trader Joe's canvas bag into Albertsons helps).
posted by wendell 25 March | 05:12
heh. I was just thinking that my supermarket purchases also probably look bizarre sometimes; I detest supermarkets, so I only go about once or twice a month, and then only stock up on things that I can't find elsewhere, or that are so much cheaper it doesn't make sense to get them anywhere else. So, for example, I might have a basket with four bags of coffee (my supermarket has this great, cheap coffee - as a loss leader, I guess) six ramens (because I can't find the ones I like - mushroom! - at my favorite ethnic foods shop), dishwasher detergent (because, gah!, that stuff is kind of expensive, and the supermarket generic brand works great and is cheap), and a few bottles of wine (because they often have a particular brand I like at a discount of a euro off). Anyone observing my basket during checkout would probably wonder a bit about me. :)

But, I go to the greengrocers at least four times a week, the local bread shop and local butchers once or twice a week, my ethnic foods place and the local cava (wine/liquor store, but what's important is that they have "loose wine" from various villages) once a week, the local cheese/yogurt place a couple times a week... and so on. I go to the greengrocers so much that we have this whole ritualized greeting thing going on... The main guy is all like "Ah... lovely girl! Good (as in "nice", "pleasing" or whatever) girl!" And I'm like, "How are you (formal tense)? Good? Everything beautiful?" And he's like "All is beautiful, everything is beautiful!"

And then he pretends that all my selections are particularly well chosen and brilliant. He also pretends that I'm a girl, as opposed to a venerable married lady. And that's why I go to the greengrocers all the time. Well, that, and the vegetables. :)
posted by taz 25 March | 05:41
One of the things I'm particularly looking forward to about being back in the US is the food. Last year was an orgy of olive and hummus and labneh love. But this year has been a culinary disaster. At the institute, we have a Palestinian chef who, although accomplished, cannot seem to cook without dumping a ton of cinnamon in everything he makes. Imagine sitting down to every meal, enjoying the presentation, the smells, the anticipation...only to open your mouth to the same flavor every time.

Over the last year, I've developed insane cravings for mexican food (can't get it in Israel b/c everything Mexican is made with lard), fried chicken and decent (i.e., non-kosher) steak. This week I'm in Southern Germany for a few days before I go back to Chicago to present some of my dissertation and I've been gorging myself on black forest ham, leberwurst and laugenbrötchen. Next week it will be Chicago-style pizza, jerk chicken, and ribs at the Twin Anchors.

Life's too short to eat TV dinners.
posted by felix betachat 25 March | 06:51
And I've come to realize that all those outer trappings -- what people eat or wear or read or the kind of music they listen to, etc. -- just doesn't matter.

really?


PAUL WELLER IS TEH SUXXOR!!!!!!111

huh?
posted by matteo 25 March | 08:02
At the institute, we have a Palestinian chef who, although accomplished, cannot seem to cook without dumping a ton of cinnamon in everything he makes.


it's not cinnamon, it's anthrax.
posted by matteo 25 March | 08:04
Last year was an orgy of olive and hummus and labneh love

I spent ten whole days in Jerusalem
Mmmm Jerusalem
Sweet Jerusalem
And all I ate was olives
Nothing but olives
Mountains of olives
It was a good ten days
I like olives
I like you too

I'm like taz, gravitating more toward the pre-WWII multiple-location shopping. I'm not great at organizing it all yet, but making one change at a time or so. The big market is good for canned goods (I use a lot of chicken stock, beans, and tomatoes in cans) and cat food. A wonderful produce market is nearby - the produce is cheaper (and lovely), but their other goods are OUTrageous. Still, I have recently resolved to suck up the extra 35c/quart to buy their local-dairy organic milk in returnable bottles. Their crackers and hummus are also the cheapest. There is an abundance of good fish markets here. There are two butchers. So if I get good at using my time better and planning ahead better, I can get a little further off the grid. It is a change that's important to me to make, but it is going to intentionally take more time and cost more money. I'm fortunate I have the opportunity to use my time and money in that way. There were a lot of times earlier in life where I subsisted on what was cheapest.
posted by Miko 25 March | 08:11
Count me as one of those sad, sad men. I detest cooking for only myself and I've a few weird food habits (There's probably a name for them. Needless to say - I have a strange relationship with food) so when it's time to buy food I tend to keep to the single freezable meals. I've had a couple of people looking at me funny and that's not so nice but fuck 'em.

The thing is, I feel bad enough with myself for not being Jamie frigging Oliver without having people snooting away in my basket. Those looks are just a reminder to me of how fucked up I am.

The only issue I have is that these meals are probably bad for me. From what i can tell from current scientific thinking, healthy eating only adds about two years to your life anyway so that's acceptable.
posted by seanyboy 25 March | 08:14
I dunno. I'm still a big fan of Miracle Covenience Foods. Instant Cocoa, Jell-O, Steak-Um's, Twinkies, Pillsbury Cookie Dough Logs, Tang...science and industry has gone through a lot of trouble to offer me these gustatory triumphs. Who am I to refuse them?

(It also makes me feel like it's the early 1960's, when such things were viewed as proof of American Ingenuity rather than harbingers of the apocalypse. *sigh*)

From what i can tell from current scientific thinking, healthy eating only adds about two years to your life anyway so that's acceptable.

Exactly. and they're the ones at the end, too.
posted by jonmc 25 March | 08:27
I'm still a big fan of Miracle Covenience Foods.

I'm not. I think a lot of the stuff you mentioned is nasty. But eating it doesn't make you subhuman, and I think it's one of the worst ways to judge someone.
posted by grouse 25 March | 08:30
I agree, to each his/her own. I occasionally really like to indulge in certain processed foods - my choice selections being Kraft Mac'n'Cheese and Ring Dings. I usually save these for when I'm really down and I think they'll make me feel cozier. And every now and then I just really, really enjoy an awesome MR cheeseburger with the works and with fries and malt vinegar. I eat a frozen pizza about once a week -- I'm picky about pizza, but this brand seems to be made mostly of real food and has a properly thin crust, as pizza should. It costs about $3.50 a pie and I get two meals out of it, usually with a side salad. Awesome.

Eating better may not make you live longer, but that's not why I do it. I actually just feel better physically and emotionally when I'm eating right. It's a front-line mood control thing for me, like exercise. I could still drop dead at 45 from cancer or something, but even if I knew that was going to happen I'd want to keep eating good food. But then, I also already enjoy food and cooking and gardening, so it's not a far leap to cook nice things, even though most of the time I'm just cooking for myself. I go all out.
posted by Miko 25 March | 08:39
But eating it doesn't make you subhuman, and I think it's one of the worst ways to judge someone.

agreed, grouse. and all my teasing aside, I don't judge anybody for their whole organic nuts-and-twigs trip either. (although I am serious about the change in how stuff like Tang & TV Dinners were viewed. It's kind of analagous to the way America itself was viewed. Okay that's pushing it a bit, but not much.)
posted by jonmc 25 March | 08:53
When *I* buy my fresh chicken breasts and strawberries and milk and so forth I have John Travolta fly my private learjet to Paris' Le Bon Marché...so I can do my foodshopping, and not have to rub shoulders with those filthy, tasteless plebians buying their hot pockets and tater tots. omg did that sad SIGNLE man just try to flirt with me?!! *fluffs hair -- storms-off in an exasperated huff -- prepares rant for internet website*
posted by scala di seta 25 March | 08:55
When I went to the grocery store yesterday I bought little else but a stack of about 15 frozen dinners, but they were fancy-schmancy Whole-Foods-type Indian frozen dinners--chicken biryani and palak paneer and such. They're what I take to work most days. (In fact, I'm at work today, and that chicken biryani dinner in the refrigerator is probably going to be the highlight of the next few hours of my life.)
posted by Prospero 25 March | 09:14
Oh, I have a big a thing against processed foods, and pretty much always eat like that "real food" guy has suggested (and for a long time before he suggested it) - but I don't care what anyone eats. Unless we're living together and have some kind of specific conflict.

We're pretty much working towards a dual system in my house, because my man is more attached to things I've given up (or keep working at giving up!) for weight concerns - such as bread, desserts, fatty meats. If he adored frozen dinners or fast food, I would likewise say my bit, then let him have all the frozen dinners or McDonalds he wanted; we're all adults who have the option of choosing our own stuff, which is arguably one of the two or three great things about being an adult!

Like miko, I also don't eat good food because I hope it will make me live longer, but because it makes me feel better every day. However (unlike miko), I smoke and drink alot, so you can pretty much safely dump all my "health" ideas into the "so what" bin.
posted by taz 25 March | 09:17
[NOT IN RESPONSE TO PROSPERO]

I should have previewed first!
posted by taz 25 March | 09:19
There are more ways to seduce a woman than by making her a lentil burger.


It's going to have to be one of those other ways, Ms. Swan, because I don't cook lentil burgers. Even for someone as hot as you. At chez j_p, burgers come in two varieties: beef and lamb.

I mean, I am very much the granola-crunchy. But you gotta draw the line somewhere.
posted by jason's_planet 25 March | 09:25
Oh, I drink a fair bit.

It's kind of analagous to the way America itself was viewed. Okay that's pushing it a bit, but not much.

Nah, that's not pushing it at all, jon! It's totally true. Our world of processed food is the product of a time when we believed that America would lead the way to ending hunger, providing the world with cheap, nutritious food (in the form of abundant calories). Housewives would be freed from kitchen slavery through the magic of frozen, instant, and dried products. Additives would supply missing nutrients and stave off illness from deficiencies. It was a glorious new day. Science!

Today, we've got a more sophisticated (well, a little more..) understanding of how food is used in the body, and we're also facing the costs of our own successes with industrializing food: obesity, heart disease, diabetes, food safety scares, environmental damage from farming chemicals, reduced biodiversity due to monocultures, a faster pace of daily life, and poor working conditions.

BUt as much as I crusade for change (and I do, I'm quite the whole-foods proselytizer), I respect the fact that most of the reasons we ended up here were initially well-meaning. We were trying to improve the world for everybody - the hungry, the poor, Mrs. Cleaver. Now we see how hard it is to get off the convenience crack, though.
posted by Miko 25 March | 09:54
That's quite all right, jason's_planet, I know how to make lentil burgers. A woman must know how to take care of her own needs;-)
posted by Orange Swan 25 March | 09:57
Nah, that's not pushing it at all, jon! It's totally true. Our world of processed food is the product of a time when we believed that America would lead the way to ending hunger, providing the world with cheap, nutritious food (in the form of abundant calories). Housewives would be freed from kitchen slavery through the magic of frozen, instant, and dried products. Additives would supply missing nutrients and stave off illness from deficiencies. It was a glorious new day. Science!

It's an idea that's been on my mind a lot lately, the slow weird fall from grace of my country. I was watching the movie The Big Red One a month or so ago, which is set in WWII Europe but made in the early 1980's and it's amazing the reverent awe that the American soldiers are held in. In one scene an entire village of Sicilian women cook a sumtuous meal for the squadron after the kill off a Nazi using a farm as a gunbase and later a child liberated from a death camp, puts on the Sergeant (played beautifully by Lee Marvin)'s helmet and wears it with this beautiful sense of admiration.

And yet 50 years later, that same military and by extension the whole nation, is veiwed with suspicion and fear, and it saddens me. I kind of think we let our national heroism in that time turn into hubris that doomed us. But I hope that those same qualities can make us a heroic nation again.

(it's a vague bunch of ideas and I'm rambling. sorry)
posted by jonmc 25 March | 10:05
I like the idea that my groceries might confound and confuse people. I eat everything. There's tofu in my cart AND ground beef, Acme Frozen Bag O' Crap in Wild Sauce AND organic baby spinach, white bread AND jesus bread, chef boyardee horrible things swimming in glop AND $6 a can gourmet soups. That's because I have a large and lively household who all eat different things on different schedules and at any given time the place is full of starving teenage boys who only really want to eat Acme Frozen Fast Anything As Long As It Was Once Walking Around. Then I cook a lot sometimes. And sometimes, I don't. Sometimes I don't eat meat for weeks and sometimes, I eat hamburgers and french fries every day. Moderation in all things, including moderation.
posted by mygothlaundry 25 March | 10:09
felix, the cinnamon may be a good thing.

A few weeks ago the husband was like, "OMG I was at the Food Lion and there were hundreds of shoppers with mountains of Stouffers dinners in their carts! They were half-off, it was a mob scene!" I was like OMG, why didn't you buy any?
posted by LoriFLA 25 March | 10:14
I agree with you, jon. It's because I'm from an Army family that I'm such an annoying activist type now. They brought me up with this idea of the greatness and nobility of our nation, and they all changed their lives, including laying them down, when necessary, to uphold that. Now what have we done with all that effort? In my own way I'm trying to do the same thing by being political. I would love us to be great, a beacon to the world. What we have to offer right now, though, the world doesn't want or need.
posted by Miko 25 March | 10:48
Miko, I sometimes wonder if the world even wants to be saved anymore. And I lean more and more towards thing 'No,' based on the available evidence.
posted by jonmc 25 March | 10:55
thinking 'No,' ..damn typo
posted by jonmc 25 March | 10:56
(it's a vague bunch of ideas and I'm rambling. sorry)

Jonmc, that comment of yours is one of the best things I've ever seen on MetaChat.
posted by Orange Swan 25 March | 11:04
Thanks. I hope it also explains my distrust of I'm-going-to-save-the-world I-have-a-grand-solution types, especially when ot's accompanied by 'part of the problem, part of the solution' thinking.
posted by jonmc 25 March | 11:08
taz, you are so making me miss my markets in Venice. "Ah, l'americana! Ah, la bionda!" (because apparently, in Italy I am blond and blue-eyed, despite being a brunette with hazel eyes in this country). Such beautiful, beautiful produce, and such wonderful people.

And my local produce stand was actually the produce boat, which I loved.

Is Greece the same about not taking your own produce, but waiting for the merchant to choose it for you? It took me a good year on getting back to the U.S. to stop pointing and waiting at farmers' markets, which got me marked as a lazy diva. :)
posted by occhiblu 25 March | 11:11
(because apparently, in Italy I am blond and blue-eyed, despite being a brunette with hazel eyes in this country).

That would very much depend on where in Italy you are. My Italian born mother is red-haired and green-eyed as his her monther, her father is blue-eyed, although they have relatives swarthier than Omar Sharif. and somehow, my dark-haired sister and her dark Lebanese husband produced a very blonde child.
posted by jonmc 25 March | 11:15
Well, I was in Venice, where half the population has (dyed) red hair, and natural blonds are not unheard of. Still, I was regularly called "bionda" (in a friendly sort of way) and told I had blue eyes.

There just seemed to be a mental split between "light" and "dark" and I somehow fell on the "light" side of it.

I figured it was the complexion equivalent to Italian having two words for blue, one for dark blue and one for light blue, rather than lumping them all into the same category as we do in English.
posted by occhiblu 25 March | 11:27
(And is your mother Neapolitan? I've heard there's a lot of green-eyed redheads in Naples because of the French heritage, which I think is very neat.)
posted by occhiblu 25 March | 11:28
greengrocers:

At my regular place, I pick out what I want, or I can ask them to get it for me.

Other places, I can't touch the stuff - they have to get it for me. I've never been satisfied with what has been picked out for me... which is why I really love my own particular fabulous greengrocers.

But, yeah - I think it's more usual that that they do the picking, after you've said that you want a kilo (or whatever) of X (where "x" is a certain vegetable).
posted by taz 25 March | 11:29
For me, that was actually the dividing line between the good grocers and the crappy grocers. The crappy grocers decided I was a tourist and gave me crappy produce; the good grocers actually went out of their way to pick out their best stuff for me.

I also miss the "loose wine" places. Sigh. I need to go back to Europe!
posted by occhiblu 25 March | 11:35
I don't plan to save the world, but I'm damn well going to try to leave it better than I found it.

I never knew Italians have two words for blue? What are they?

I mean, we have azure, turqoise, cerulean...blah blah, but they all definitely fall under the category of 'blue'. I love the idea of making a real distinction. Maybe that's what's meant by the 'indigo' in the rainbow; as a kid, it always struck me as odd that that got called out. As well as calling purple 'violet.'
posted by Miko 25 March | 11:35
My mother's family is from Lombardi in the north of Italy. My nonna would probably rain curses upon your future generations for suggesting that she's 'Napolitan,' which she says like 'cancer.' Although there may be some French in there since according to Pips my grandparents speak italian with a French accent.

posted by jonmc 25 March | 11:36
What's loose wine?
posted by Miko 25 March | 11:37
Ha! Yes, didn't meant to cast aspersions on your ancestry. Though I think Lombardy was also part of France for a bit.

Miko, there's blu, which is dark blue, and azzurro is light blue. I never quite got the hang of where the cut-off was. And I once had a frustrating day of trying to locate some article of clothing in turquoise at shops where (like the grocers) there is no self-service, so you have to ask for everything, and I kept asking for an item in blu and kept getting handed things in navy, then I would try to point to something in the store that was closer to the color I wanted, and I'd get a stern look and be told, with patient disdain, that that was not the color I had been asking for.

On preview: If "loose wine" is the same as it was in Italy, there's a store with big kegs of local wines, and hoses coming out of the barrels, and you order wine by the liter, and they fill up old (cleaned) water bottles with local wine for you, and so you get 2L of wine for about $4.
posted by occhiblu 25 March | 11:42
Actually, thinking back, it wasn't turquoise I was looking for, because "azzurro" probably would have popped into my head in that context; it was a light baby blue, which I kept thinking of as "blu chiaro" (light blue) and was apparently not "light blue" but instead a whole different color category.
posted by occhiblu 25 March | 11:46
Ha! Yes, didn't meant to cast aspersions on your ancestry.

Heh. Funny thing is, here in America, people I know whose families come from Naples or even Sicily still consider me a 'paisan.' Here we're all just wops. (I'm also mystified by where my dark eyes came from. My mom is green-eyed as I mentioned, as is my Irish-American father, yet my eyes are so dark that you can barely make out my pupils. There's something in the woodpile)
posted by jonmc 25 March | 11:47
about the eyes/hair thing, it's silly to think that Greek people never have blond hair or blue/green eyes, as non-europeans often assume - many, many do.

Of course, just as in the U.S., the number of fake-dyed-blondes is kind of overwhelming these days.

"Loose wine" is wine that's produced independently, not commercially packaged, often produced from one village or area. You buy it by the liter, where they fill your plastic bottle from a cask.

on preview, just what occhi said!
posted by taz 25 March | 11:48
When my dad and uncle were kids, Sam Fuller lived on the same street as them and they remember his stories. The Steel Helmet is set in Korea (AFAIK, still not on DVD/video), but based on his experiences in WW2.Grampa sent him books from his shop while he was overseas fighting. There was a retrospective of his films at the Cinematheque in the late 90's and he showed up for some of them, but he had been incapacitated by a stroke--he did shake my hand when I told him I was Lou Epstein's granddaughter.
posted by brujita 25 March | 12:38
Really? Being Angelo Bardelli and/or Joe McNally Sr.'s grandson has not earned me any handshakes yet.
posted by jonmc 25 March | 12:50
Really? Why are you telling us this?
posted by taz 25 March | 13:01
I dunno. I've always been impressed with the illustriousness of some MeChazen's and their families and all, and kind of felt bad that I had no similar tales to tell, to be honest.
posted by jonmc 25 March | 13:03
No, jon. If anyone says anything in praise (or just in reminiscence) of anything in their life/their family/their city/their favorite band - anything - you always have to chime in with how much it does or doesn't apply to you.

Can't you see how that is incredibly irritating?
posted by taz 25 March | 13:08
I apologize, taz. It was meant as a casual aside. Honestly didn't mean to derail anything. You can delete my comments.
posted by jonmc 25 March | 13:11
No offense taken...and now enough for a small city knows who YOU are. ;-)
posted by brujita 25 March | 13:17
Thanks, but I won't. The biggest thing holding you back, jon, is the weird mindthing that just made you post that comment... and all the others like it. You can hardly see a statement without thinking how it's a slam against you - however creative you might have to get to achieve that conclusion.

If I could ever convince you of anything, I would want to convince you that not everything that anybody says is something that's somehow meant to secretly put you down.

You're the one who always wants to play poorboy - nobody treats you that way. And constantly playing the "little me" card gets old, old, old. Just buck up, jon; you're the same as the rest of us.
posted by taz 25 March | 13:29
I didn't see what brujita said as a slam at all, The one who puts me down the most is me, I realize that. but i see your point and how it could come across that way.
posted by jonmc 25 March | 13:39
So my mother has been on this health kick lately and feeding me chicken liver in the mornings because apparently I am too thin and must be missing some nutrient or other, and I'm all fine, whatever, because I'm the sort of person who eats almost everything, but then she runs out of chicken livers and tells me to stop by Whole Foods on the way back from campus, and I'm thirsty so I go find some iced tea, and so I go through the line with one plastic tub of chicken livers and one bottle of jasmine tea and the (cute) cashier gets this amazing O_o on his face.
posted by casarkos 25 March | 13:50
FWIW, Fuller was SO incapacitated--there was an attendant with him along with his wife--that I'm not sure what I said got through; he didn't say anything back to me, just gripped my hand when I presented it.
posted by brujita 25 March | 13:53
Is Greece the same about not taking your own produce, but waiting for the merchant to choose it for you? It took me a good year on getting back to the U.S. to stop pointing and waiting at farmers' markets, which got me marked as a lazy diva. :)

I realize discussion on this topic was 30 comments ago, but it's impossible to keep up with this thread so I'm going to respond to it anyway.

At the Haymarket Market in Boston (which sounds really weird, but if you said Haymarket or Hay Market, no one would know what the hell you were talking about), you're not allowed to pick your own produce. Or at least you weren't when I lived there 10 years ago. And it's Boston, so they were really rude about it should you be so brazen as to try to find the piece of fruit that met your own personal needs. I finally stopped buying stuff there, even though it was a couple blocks away from work, because it was a huge ego smash every time I went. I don't like getting my hand slapped -- literally -- when shopping for apples. It happens enough in the rest of my life.
posted by mudpuppie 25 March | 14:16
I was actually trying to remember what they did at Haymarket... maybe I was well-trained for Italy there. :)

I think that was another one of those markets where you had to know who was going to search out the bad produce to get it off his cart, and who was going to search out the good produce because it was the right thing to do. It took a while to figure out which carts to stay away from.

(Though, really, all the produce was so on-the-verge most of the time that it was pointless to buy stuff you wouldn't eat in the next few days, anyway. I had friends who said that they bought stuff there because it was so cheap, they didn't mind having to throw half of the moldy parts away.)
posted by occhiblu 25 March | 14:20
Heh, casarkos! This is becoming like that game we did over a year ago (?) that had to do with the greatest freak per number of items you could check out at Walmart, or something.

brujita, that warm hand grip is probably the best thing that anyone could have given him.
posted by taz 25 March | 14:24
I particularly love my greengrocers because I can pick everything out myself... or I can get them to do it for me. If I want them to do it for me, I generally don't ask them, but stand over the greens with a perplexed look, at which point one of the guys will come over and bag me a kilo of whatever it is - but often they go downstairs to the hidden chamber, and get me the best stuff. ( This really has to do with leafy green stuff - other vegetables are much more longlasting and perky)

For the most part, I refuse to buy from the ones who won't let me choose my items. Though there is this one other place where the guy is a total angry grump, and one is not allowed to pick ... yet he has somehow come to like me, and when I buy from him, he picks his best stuff for me. I love having that kind of history.
posted by taz 25 March | 14:35
I don't understand how small produce retailers can complain that the big supermarkets are driving them out of business when most of them provide such a deficient shopping experience.
posted by grouse 25 March | 14:40
Yeah -- shopping at Haymarket is not worth it. Often times I would find a number of items of fruit or vegetable bruised and/or almost rotten in the bottom of the bag. On a visit to Boston my sister-in-law was forceful when a Haymarket vendor attempted to slap her hand. She admonsihed hime and went on selecting her own fruit. I think he was so shocked that she had stood up to him that he relented and let her choose on her own.

occhiblu -- shopping from a produce boat in Venice. That's cool.
posted by ericb 25 March | 15:08
I know I'm probably not the norm, but I would rather go to the most surly of small produce retailers as opposed to standard supermarkets, and have, and do. I just have a horrible feeling about supermarkets... as soon as I enter one I feel like my life energy is being sucked out of me.

I'm lucky, though, that I can mostly avoid them, because I'm in the city, and we still have independent small businesses for stuff like produce (and good!), and enough of them that we have choice - and we're in a country that still supports that. For now.

I actually spend a lot of my time here being grateful for stuff that has disappeared from the U.S. scene, and hoping that it won't disappear from here until after I'm dead.
posted by taz 25 March | 15:36
Jonmc, it impresses me that you are able to connect easily with people--and I wish I had that gift.

I feel inadequate when I'm in a group and words won't come.

Back to the original topic...one of the etiquette books for France made it clear that the SELLERS pick out what you want in the stalls, not you-- unless you enjoy being reprimanded. ;-)

Taz, will you have the same type of shops in your Athens neighborhood?
posted by brujita 25 March | 15:49
Regarding supermarkets and produce -- I have always been impressed by the quality of produce in chain supermarkets in L.A. -- Pavillions/Vons and Ralph's. To get similar quality here in Boston we only have Whole Foods (and local farmers' markets in the summer).
posted by ericb 25 March | 15:51
occhiblu, when I was in Venice, the bedroom window in our apartment in San Polo looked out over a small canal. There was a tiny shop across the way and most mornings, the produce boat would stop by and drop off that day's offerings. Also, the boat bringing the freakin' huge kegs of wine would stop by, too.
posted by initapplette 25 March | 16:06
ericb, I agree with you about Boston-area supermarket produce. However, suburbia has farm stands galore -- Russo's in Watertown, Wilson Farms and Busa Farm in Lexington, Verrill Farm in Concord, just to name a few -- all worthy destinations. Of course, they tend to be worthy destinations without easy public transport, and they can be pricey.
posted by initapplette 25 March | 16:12
Do not malign pudding cups.

Rossi, if I weren't already taken, I'd be building temples in your honor. You never fail to amuse me.
posted by Eideteker 25 March | 17:18
I'd like to offer thanks to the anonymous crappy-food-buyin' stranger out there who has inspired this item.

Thanks, dude!
posted by jason's_planet 25 March | 19:41
Brujita, Athens will be different. Where we will live is much more residential (where I am now, I'm snuggled up against two major open markets, and a smaller third one - it's amazing), and so I won't have so much choice. I know that there's one small, pretty fancy greengrocer - I think that their produce is organic. This is quite close, and will probably be my spot, though it's teeny-tiny compared to my current guys.

However, I assume we will have the laiki (scroll down for pix) - this is basically a market that comes to you, one day a week. This happens in pretty much every neighborhood, on different days; there are tons of venders, normally selling everything from flowers to fabric, but mostly fruit and vegetables. They take over one whole street for a number of hours, and you can basically stock up for the week, except for very perishable items.

I found a little writeup from 2002 that mentions the street and day of the laiki in my new neighborhood, though I don't know if this info is still current. I also don't know how extravagant it will be. While I was in Athens last time I went with a friend to the laiki that comes to her neighborhood, and it was blocks and blocks long and had everything you could imagine. That was very, very cool.
posted by taz 26 March | 02:02
EJGallo 'Night Train". You're kidding, that's too funny.
Tennis bracelets in spork, was it¿ Wicked. I want.

I liked Orange Swan's observations, but I want her to ask the person next time... about those dinners...nay, we all want to know more, why not, most folks are up to a few questions. And the tennis bracelet story behind them. Mr Bond, indeed.

I enjoyed the yuks. I may be single, but I'll cook for 1 *sniff*, because it really doesn't take much time to whip up a scrumptious meal. So I ran a kitchen in a bar once, but I learned at my grandmothers side and we all know granny's cooking did not suck. She is now 104 years old, Polish cooking is greasy, fat and puts, whatever, on your bones to survive the winter. She's still eating it at the home, which has Polish kitchen, except it's all blendered now. So enjoy the goddamn tv dinners while ye may, I say, if that is your want. Fish, blended. Steak, blended, it all looks the same. She always offers me her food still though and I always oblige a taste.

mischief, watch those EJGallo 'Night Train' enema's. WooooWoooooo. Hah.
There were too many wonderful quips and observations. The amish looking bearded zztop guy with the apples, shaving cream and balloons. Hey, Party guy./ —Miko, more.
This thread is a riot and tickles. You're all a hoot.
You know, the MeFites jonesing added a breath of fresh air. Y'all come back, huh.

If there's a tri tip beef frozen dinner, I'll check it out, why not.

The joke in Canada is that you cannot buy any EJGallo 'Night Train' wine at any supermarket. No booze at all. So who's laughing now, kids. Is that not the oddest¿ Positively bloody Victorian and unearthly. What a backwater.

I do love pudding cups, what am I going to do, make a honkin' big bowl of puddin'¿ YIKES. I'd probably be tempted to eat it all in one serving. Yummmm.
posted by alicesshoe 26 March | 02:06
← Oh dear. || (rant) I hate the TSA. →

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