[RightOnTheLeftCoast]

"I don’t shop in the hippie stores like joe’s or Whole Foods..."

You don't know what you're missing.

I've rhapsodized about TJs elsewhere on this thread. It's a great place. Their frozen pizzas from Italy are out of this world, and inexpensive. As for Whole Foods, that's where we get most of our meat and veggies. Buy the stuff on special, it's no more costly than a supermarket's, but way more flavorful and higher quality. Example: I needed three pounds of ground lamb and they only had one, so they pulled out a big, beautiful boneless lamb breast and ground it on the spot. I'd noticed before that their ground lamb is much, much leaner than any other I'd purchased elsewhere, but no less flavorful. Now I know why.

[mowowie]

last time I was at a Joes in Framingham, MA a few years ago i noticed that all the ice cream was covered in frost and frozen to each other. all the non-brand name food on the shelves looked old and dusty. bottles were covered in dust like they have been sitting a loooong time.
i have a thing about eating old, non-brand name food so i just walked out.
I have a buddy who completely loves the place and eating their weird stuff.
the dude bairly has a penny to his name but that dont stop him from loading up on the stuff each week.
to each is own i guess.

i used to do computer work and Wholefoods was a client for a few years.
sitting there for a few hours was like a trip to the zoo or a freak show or something. i do not miss that!!
one thing about WF is their meat section is awesome, if you got the cash that is.