Friday, July 30, 2010

Road Trip: Part 5

Here's my local honey.
As soon as we got out of the air conditioned hotel and stepped into the real weather, the humidity really hit me. “It’s like a rainforest,” I said. “A jungle.” Now, I know that Kansas City is nowhere near as humid as a tropical rainforest. I’ve been there. It’s drippingly humid. But compared to high and dry Colorado, it was humid enough for me to comment on.

And having lived in Chicago, I knew that this wasn’t a humidity that the natives would even comment on. This was normal. A really humid day was … special.

I queried the GPS on grocery stores and got a list of places…scrolled down a bit. A few sounded like they were more likely to be quik-market type places, and I was looking for a regional grocery store where I might find some barbecue sauces from the local places and see what other regional products were available.

When my scrolling let me to Cosentino’s Price Chopper, I figured that was a good bet. I’d heard of Price Chopper. So off we went. Through an industrial area…and then we emerged at a more populated area.

Hubster went in with me to get some road snacks for himself, tossed them into my basket, and fled the store. He’s not a big fan of grocery stores. I think this was maybe the second time he’d been in a grocery store with me. “Have fun,” he said. “Take your time.” Yeah, he knows how I am.

I checked out the baking section, spices, pickles, and condiments, and few other odds and ends. I bought a jar of local honey because I liked the name of the town where it came from. I was still able to carry the little basket and was heading to the checkout when I came upon a stacked display of beer from a Kansas City brewery. I grabbed two six-packs – a porter and a pale ale, and that’s when things got a bit heavy.

I started chatting with the woman in front of me about barbecue and when her mom came up to the line, she told her how I liked to go grocery shopping when I’m out of town. They both thought it was interesting. The cashier was also interested when I said I was from Colorado and we had another little conversation about barbecue.

After I was bagged up, someone ran and got me a cart since it was obvious that it would have been awkward to carry all that stuff, and off I went. People in grocery stores are usually so friendly…
Yum