Saturday, July 5, 2008

To get good food...

I love living in Brooklyn. I love all the different kinds of people, all the activities, all the different stuff going on. I love the public transportation, not having to own a car, and being around all these people. However, for a midwestern girl, there are certain aspects of city life that can be tricky to negotiate. Case in point: GROCERY SHOPPING.

Ick! I hate grocery stores. I always forget stuff or can't find it. I end up planning my meals for the week, looking at all the recipes, making a list, re-writing the list in the order that you would find the items in the store, and then going shopping. And I'm a ball of anxiety the whole time I'm in the store. I break everything down to its unit price per ounce so that I get the best deal. I can't help it! (Yeah... I know it's obsessive-cumpulsive.) And then, you have to figure out how to get the groceries home on the subway (or pay for a cab). You need to carry all the stuff up the four flights of stairs to your apartment and then put it away. Blech. Trust me; anyone who drives to the grocery store, you don't know know how lucky you are until you've schlepped a gallon of milk and a bag of potatoes home on public transportation.

But now these are all problems of the past!!! Now, grocery day is my favorite day of the week! All thanks to a fantastic little service called Fresh Direct. Now, I do all of my shopping online, send in the order, and the happy Fresh Direct guys drop it off at my apartment during a two-hour window that I select. And their produce is beautiful, the meat is lovely, and the prices are competitive. Ahhhh.... New York City.... a foodie paradise.....

A caveat: there are some who feel that Fresh Direct is not eco-friendly enough. They use a lot of packaging materials. This is true. Personally, I'm enough of a foodie that (since the groceries are so fantastic) I make sure I re-use or recycle any materials I can and then I don't sweat the rest of it.

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