The Great Urban Race and the Value of the Grocery Store

So we decided to hit up the Ybor Farmer's Market up the road from our house instead of driving all the way to St. Petersburg this weekend. Everything was great until we got closer to our destination. People dressed up like it was Halloween. Folks running around with no regard of the fact that folks were trying to commute while they blindly jaywalked. No parking near the market. So after walking 5 blocks from the parking garage I finally took notice to what was going on, the Great Urban Race. It's some sort of urban scavenger hunt it seems. No harm, I suppose, but it did add a level of craziness that I was hoping to avoid by staying local for our produce today.

Speaking of scavenger hunts, I came across something that could have been completely fantastic, but was completely quashed by my wife. So the produce vendor was selling cleaned pineapples, and over by the garbage can was a box full of pineapple tops. I already have one pineapple plant in a pot, and another that is soaking in water until it's root's form (which hasn't been going that well). I thought, "holy crap, that's a lot of free pineapple tops!" My wife's reaction was "I don't think it's right to dig through the trash take them". Well first and foremost, the tops were next to the garbage can in a box. Additionally, they were obviously garbage, and were obviously going to end up in a landfill with the cardboard boxes. Sadly, no free pineapple tops for me. If anyone else out there is looking to start a bunch of pineapple plants, I do recommend hitting up the Ybor Farmer's Market for the hook up.

After the farmer's market we ended up at El International Meat Market on MLK Blvd. Now I've been here a few times before to get beef tenderloins, and I've never been let down. Well until today, I suppose. The tenderloin we purchased was fairly small (15$ at 5.99$ per lb) which was fine, we're not the biggest folks. The sad part was how mangled it was, most of the meat ended up going towards sandwich meat since it was sliced open and not really capable of being used for fillets. I was able to salvage enough for a small carppachio dish and 3 steaks. Again, very disappointed. But hey, we can vote with our wallet and never set foot in that establishment again.

After that we ended up at Publix for what was going to be a short trip for a few staple items. Now here's a testament to the grocery store. Even though we've been shopping at the farmer's markets for produce and specialty markets for just about everything else, we were still able to spend 100$ at the Publix. Granted, part of that was dog food and charcoal, but those are still items that you can't find at the smaller markets. This experience has made me re-think my "no more chain stores" kick I've been on. Perhaps we can start making our own dog food?