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Quality, Not Quantity

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Living in Portland, I get to be very close to the new booming organic food movement. I've never been one to support the extreme veg and/or organic diets, but the more I am immersed in the culture the more I can't help but take some of it in.

As an aspiring chef I can't thumb my nose at good quality ingredients, and yesterday I found myself in a Whole Foods grocery store. I've been there several times before doing everything I can to not spend my whole paycheck there, but this time I had a coupon! and was the initiative of my visit with Wendy. I'm always amazed at the selection and quality all in one store. On the menu for the upcoming week (Wendy and I plan everything ahead for dinner) were some soups, fish and something beefy. When we made our way to the meat counter and seafood section (they're separate!) the staff blew me away. They knew what they were talking about and the whole set up was just like a real butcher store and fish monger...they knew what they were doing and what was good and the quality was outstanding. Now I could care less whether the chickens were cage free or humanely treated (they don't have much going for them in the first place) but having meats that were hormone free and not treated with chemical junk makes me feel better. We ended up with some salmon and buffalo sirloin tip steaks. There was no pre-packaged meat, everything was behind the counter at proper temperature waiting to be taken home. Not a big deal? I found out that many grocery stores puff carbon monoxide into the sealed packages to retain the red or pink color. Yah, carbon MONoxide. Needing a really excuse of course to make grocery stores like this part of our routine led me to realize that if you plan ahead your meals and carefully select what you buy, you can have good quality food within your budget. Now I wont be shopping for everything every week at Whole Foods, but we are going to start going there for some produce and meats, leaving the basics like flour, chocolate chips and peanut butter to cheaper stores. I would highly suggest it...try it for a month. Quality is more important than quantity. Besides, how much did that red snapper at that restaurant cost last night? Think of how much you could get with that if you just did it yourself.

By the way, the buffalo we got is for a special chocolate bbq sauce we are trying, we will let you know what its like!

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