New Whole Foods

The Whole Foods they've been building down the street from me (about 4.5 blocks) opened last weekend, and today, Robert and I stopped in to check it out.

They had your normal WF type stuff.  I was happy that they had grass-fed beef at the meat counter (both ground beef and stew-meat-style chunks) and bought some ground beef to eat this week.  I purchased 3 different types of dark chocolate (~70%) to test out because they did not have either of my normal two brands.  I did not see any flaxseed oil, which surprised me -- I guess we'll still be going to Lund's for that.

There were two happy surprises, too.

First, they sell a rotisserie chicken that does not have lemon or other Sally-incompatible ingredients.  I bought one and ate half of it for dinner, with my hands.  At one point, I said, Robert, look, does this look paleo or what?  And intending to chomp down like an animal on the drumstick, I bit my own finger -- yikes, that hurts.  It was not the very best rotisserie chicken in the world, but it was certainly good enough, especially when you eat it with the skin.  (I know, it's crazy--of all the aspects of a neo-paleo diet, I think eating animal fat in that way is the one that most sets of my "but wait, this can't be healthy!" feelings that have been formed by growing up in the age of low-fat mania.)

Second, their bakery had an astonishingly beautiful array of pastries, and my favorites were the tiny little cupcakes, tarts, etc.  (Robert pointed out the ones that looked like tiny little coffee cups made out of chocolate, filled with a frothy "frappe," and I was like, Awwwwwwwwww.)  But I felt about them like I feel about looking at a display of flowers -- they look so pretty but they don't feel like food.  The idea of eating one was not only not particularly tempting or motivating, but actually seemed a bit weird.  I was not especially hungry at that moment, but (1) that's never stopped me from wanting pastry in the past and (2) other food in the store did look appealing.  I guess I've been not eating that stuff long enough to way ramp down my "Oh my god that has frosting on it nom" reaction.

I think it's going to be fantastic having the WF down the street.  It's close enough to be super convenient when you need something (esp. those times I haven't prepared anything in advance and am coming upon dinner time with no good idea of what I'm eating) but not so terribly convenient that I think I will go there on a whim; I think 4.5 blocks (9 blocks round-trip) is far enough that my laziness will win out most of the time.

I tried the Theo chocolate this evening; it was good, and I found that 2 squares was plenty.  I am hoping that I will easily establish the habit of taking 2 squares, instead of the 4 on the package, as the amount to eat in one sitting.  It's funny---when I was eating Ghirardelli, I always ate 3, then later, 4 squares, and even though I wanted to cut back to 2 squares, I just couldn't do it.  But once when the store was out of Ghirardelli, and so I got Lindt's, I had no problem taking 2 squares.  2 squares clearly looked like "enough" chocolate (and the size of the squares are basically the same for the two brands), but my ingrained habit of taking more squares was just too strong when facing my normal brand.  I don't think there's anything wrong, per se, with eating 4 squares of chocolate, but it's more than I need/fully enjoy having at one time, and I'd rather have 2 squares with the idea that I can always have another serving later if I want to.