This afternoon I finally experienced the glories of Super 88, Asian grocery store extraordinaire. It's completely overwhelming, with so many completely strange things, unidentifiable things, in unreadable packages, completely mysterious. Some things had English labels, which meant I could tell that I saw dried shrimp, black bean paste, hot sesame oil, and dried sea vegetable (though that in and of itself is always tantalizingly vague). Lots of smells, musty dried things, freshly cooked meat, raw fish, all mixing together in a way that reminds me of little shops in Machaneh Yehudah more than anything else. Kosher consumer that I am, I found few packaged foods I would buy, most of which I'd seen other places. So in that sense, it was a disappointment (though I admit I didn't check every can and jar, and there might be some others lurking. Still, it seems nothing coming from Thailand is hechshered.). Really, though, it wasn't: the shopping in and of itself was a delight, an exploration of possibilities, potentialities I won't take advantage of, but still can wonder about. Plus, there were fresh vegetables (I got more yu toi, and enoki mushrooms :-), and excellent prices on fresh noodles and wonton wrappers, one brand of which is kosher. Not that I'd buy a huge stack of wonton wrappers a week and a half before Pesach, but afterward, much fun.
I got home to find a delivery from Boston Organics. I'm still getting the larger box, but this one was veggies only. It has
- six onions (3 pounds)
- a pint of cherry tomatoes
- two big heads of red leaf lettuce
- a bunch of green Swiss chard
- an eggplant
- two big stalks of broccoli
- five pounds of Russet potatoes from PEI
- a bag of crimini mushrooms (a pound? a little less?)
Huzzah, this seems to be the right box for me! I'm excited about the mushrooms especially.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}