To Market, to market, to buy a...

One of the things that I groove on about living in NYC is the 24 hour supermarket in my neighborhood. It is conveniently located right on the very path I walk home from work on and so if there is any little item that I may have forgotten to pick up during my daily shopping with She Who Must Be Obeyed or if I just wish to buy myself a little snacky treat I can do it after I get out of work at midnight. You would be surprised at how many people are shopping at midnight, you would be even more surprised at how many people are shopping at midnight and talking on cell phones. You would be even MORE surprised at how boring these conversations are. Who are they talking to at midnight while grocery shopping and why aren't they talking about more interesting things, don't they know I'm listening? Anyway, this isn't about shoppers on cell phones at midnight but about some recent purchases that I thought were interesting enough to blog about, so here we go.

The box of salt cod pictured above (sans fish) was a lovely find. I'll admit that what attracted me was the box; I'm such a sucker for cute packaging. A box like this, once the fish has been eaten and long forgotten can be re-used for any number of useful things. I could store buttons in it, or loose change, or even house my bottle cap collection (yeah, like I have one) the possibilities are just endless! I have to keep the box hidden though because there is a certain little someone who has her eye on it, but she can't have it cause its mine! Anyway, I was glad to get some salt cod because I am a big fan of Portuguese Cod Cakes (be sure to read this helpful note although I'm pretty grateful that my cod was pre-boned), but then I found a recipe for salt cod hash that I wanted to try, so the Portuguese cod cakes didn't happen, BUT, I will be buying more salt fish to make the cod cakes real soon. joy!

This is the salt cod hash I made from the Saveur recipe. It was very tasty, but because I adjusted the recipe to use up a pound of salt cod I had a lot of hash. A LOT of hash. After eating it for a third day in a row, for both breakfast and lunch, I can safely say that I am done with salt cod hash for a little while now.

Here is the girl pretending to act casual, trying to distract me with her cuteness so she can steal my fish box, but I'm onto her.

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Oh boy. You know this ended up my grocery basket without my even blinking an eye. I HAD to try it. The website is interesting and informative and it offers a lot more choices of flavors than were available to me at my market but for me my choices were, vanilla, raspberry, blueberry and chai. CHAI! I just had to try chai yogurt. My first reaction was wow! This stuff was really thick, so thick my spoon stood up, and that for me was a plus because I am a lover of thick tangy yogurt. The chai flavor was subtle at first but as I continued to eat it became less subtle and a little too overpowering and I started to get grossed out. What with the really thick yogurt and the perfumy smell and taste of the chai I suddenly felt like I was eating cold cream and had to stop. Ellie loved the stuff, and ended up finishing what I couldn't, so it just goes to show, one person's yuck is another person’s yum. To be fair, I'll try the other flavors just to make sure I really don’t like the yogurt before writing it off for myself, though I’ll keep buying it for the little girl as long as she’ll keep eating it!

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I don't really need any more tea in my house but I am a tea buying addict. I buy it, try it, then forget about it, but this tea had to come home with me because this tea came in a WOODEN BOX, I needed this tea! I am generally not a fan of fruit teas, I prefer my cup of tea to be strong and I like it with milk and sugar, or if its Chinese tea, then piping hot and with no sugar. Sadly, the tea that came in this box wasn't very special, it wasn't awful, but it wasn't terrific either. I didn't really taste the apple although it smelled faintly of apples and as for the cinnamon smell and flavor, well; I'll take their word for it. It is a lovely box though, and that alone made this a worthy purchase.

Written by Deb on February 9, 2005 02:45 AM