Wild Oats or Whole Foods?

I also prefer Wild Oats, the produce is hard to beat.
Our Whole Foods shop is nice, but mostly too crowded with
single yuppies who are so utterly indecisive in what to buy, and block the isles forever.

Out here, Whole Foods is much better established. I loved the Wild Oats in Santa Fe, but the one we have nearby is anemic. It's cheaper than Whole Foods as well as being on my way home from work, so I'm stopping there more and more.

All Whole foods are over crowded with yuppies, the well-established, the absolute snotty and the image conscious who are utterly indecisive about what to buy.

Some Whole foods are better only because of the employees-- where I'm living now, in Baltimore, the employees are pretty miserable, combine that with the upscale clientele and it makes for a shopping experience to endure. Plus, whoever runs the hot bar isn't a very good cook, so the food is always dried out, and repetitive-- like macaroni and cheese.

When I lived in Washington DC the Whole Foods was pretty great, despite the yuppies-- a huge hot bar with a great selection of food. In the mornings they'd have baked Yucca. Man, that was good.

Wild Oats has a better menu if you want to grab something to eat there-- I always liked their pizzas, and their deli has a lot of variety. Alas, there is no Wild Oats in Baltimore.

The Wild Oats in Sante Fe spoiled me-- remember that salad bar? They had so many gorgeous varieties of greens, some I'd never seen before. And they cooked all the food on the spot, so when I got an egg and potato burrito it was made no more then 5 minutes prior.

I was living in the Midwest and they has a Wild Oats there, but it didn't come close to the one in Sante Fe, still it was better than Whole Foods, without a doubt.

Huh.

Before I moved here, back last April when I was housesitting for Dys and Diane, I spotted a Wild Oats, and thought, hey, I'll check it out. Yackkkk.

I took my time going over to Whole Foods once I moved here.. it is way across town, sure, more yups there. My memory of an early Whole Foods in west Los Angeles was of aisles of things proporting to be healthy and full of trans fats. I don't suppose I can back that up now, but that was my impression.

I am also a several decade shopper at Trader Joe's, which I am more bored with than most others who post about it on a2k seem to be. I kept not really liking the taste of stuff there.

So, back to Whole Foods, I didn't rush to get there.
I have been missing my little Co-op, with the great meat and fish, both ecologically speaking and for taste, the pretty great produce (great I reserve for street markets). The co-op here is lame compared to the one in Eureka - which is too bad, since it is fairly handy.

Finally I made the trip to Whole Foods. Great store, best I've been to, perhaps ever, and this from someone near hostile as I walked in the door.

There is another good store here called Sunflower. Closer than Whole Foods, good over all, but a step below re range of available items.

I remember in LA... noticing that grocery stores in iffy neighborhoods seemed to have burned potato chips, etc. I think there is a hierarchy of market setup re the products offered, which, since I've lived in very mixed neighborhoods for a long time and have a developed interest in food - and good food doesn't always follow money - so I find this distribution sort of sad and selfdefeating.

Never been to a Wild Oats.

The Whole Food Flagship Store is about a mile from my house. Takes up a whole square block. Corporate office is above the store. Don't shop there regularly, just for something fancy.

I like Central Market best...Just more comfy there.

I am new to these places in Abq and people have been nice to me in all the stores, from Brooks, to Raleys, and up the ladder.

The thing is, a handsome fellow came over to me at Sunflower this afternoon while I was pouring a wee cup of free Pinon grind coffee, murmured it was late for there still be coffee, and what great earrings I was wearing.

I gotta say, this is not usual in Eureka. Made my day, in a way.

Osso - you're fresh meat!

I think - by the way - that people around here are hungry for the sight of dangling earrings...

Ha! We've got local cooperatives. Local produce whenever possible, way cheaper than whole foods (cheaper than the regular supermarkets for staples), and chock-full of poor stinky hippie goodness.


Ha!





Ha ha!