I confess, I love to explore foods from around the world. Here in Columbus Ohio we're getting more immigrants all the time, and as their numbers rise we're also getting more stores selling to them. Around this town you can easily find foods - either styles or actual imports - from Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and now Africa. German smoked meats? Check. Proper Jewish bagels and herring, etc.? Check. Imported Italian? Got it.
I was living in the northwest part of town and in my immediate area I had an excellent Japanese grocery (Tensuke Market) and a Palestinian grocery which we used to call the Mysterious Arabs until I figured out that hey, maybe if the store's name is Jaffa then they're Palestinian. They have an oven (had to turn it sideways to get it in the back door) and if you time it right you can get pita bread fresh and hot. They'll tell you not to close the bag because the bread is still sweating. Nearby in Linworth there's a Russian grocery with Lithuanian rye bread and some dried salted fish that will raise an eyebrow. Our Somali population is second only to Minneapolis so we're getting African groceries.
Now I'm on the west side of town and in my neighborhood the "Mexican" grocery is actually Guatemalan while the "Chinese" grocery is actually northern Burmese. They have shelves of peppery sauces whose labels have an alphabet that I can't even recognize, and you'll never find them in a mainstream grocery. I have a half-finished jar of fermented green tea in my pantry, alongside some red pepper paste that WILL KILL YOU.
I can buy dried red peppers in a bag as big as a pillow, seed them and smoke them. I can get fresh-ground koefta, beef ground with parsley. (Google that any my meat grinder comes up in the images.) I can buy products with no English at all on the label, except for the nutritional information added in 2-point type on the back - I just go by whatever image they have on the label. I'll try anything with a pepper on it. I can get live frogs and eels (haven't actually done that yet). Produce sections might have bok choi, huge beautiful ginger roots (try planting some of those) Persian limes and other fruits I can't even identify.
I love it. Bring on more!
I was living in the northwest part of town and in my immediate area I had an excellent Japanese grocery (Tensuke Market) and a Palestinian grocery which we used to call the Mysterious Arabs until I figured out that hey, maybe if the store's name is Jaffa then they're Palestinian. They have an oven (had to turn it sideways to get it in the back door) and if you time it right you can get pita bread fresh and hot. They'll tell you not to close the bag because the bread is still sweating. Nearby in Linworth there's a Russian grocery with Lithuanian rye bread and some dried salted fish that will raise an eyebrow. Our Somali population is second only to Minneapolis so we're getting African groceries.
Now I'm on the west side of town and in my neighborhood the "Mexican" grocery is actually Guatemalan while the "Chinese" grocery is actually northern Burmese. They have shelves of peppery sauces whose labels have an alphabet that I can't even recognize, and you'll never find them in a mainstream grocery. I have a half-finished jar of fermented green tea in my pantry, alongside some red pepper paste that WILL KILL YOU.
I can buy dried red peppers in a bag as big as a pillow, seed them and smoke them. I can get fresh-ground koefta, beef ground with parsley. (Google that any my meat grinder comes up in the images.) I can buy products with no English at all on the label, except for the nutritional information added in 2-point type on the back - I just go by whatever image they have on the label. I'll try anything with a pepper on it. I can get live frogs and eels (haven't actually done that yet). Produce sections might have bok choi, huge beautiful ginger roots (try planting some of those) Persian limes and other fruits I can't even identify.
I love it. Bring on more!
