Great Meals Start with Great Ingredients

Editors Note:  This is a guest post from Colin.


I was going to go to the store after work, and like all of us, I was running behind.  Work had magically become busy in the last 45 minutes of the day, catching up for the two hour lull after lunch when I split my time between sculpting a new Pandora Station and donating habitats to orphaned toddlers with breast cancer from the BP oil spill checking ESPN.com.  It was raining.  I was hungry, and wanted food right then.  In short, I didn't want to go to the store.

Then I remembered the one shining star that guides men like myself all over the City of Dallas to buy groceries--I had a hot grocery store.  I'm sure you do too.  While at the University of Georgia, it was hot Kroger, although, really, Kroger was just another location for the eternally hot women everywhere in Athens to be seen.  Fast forward a few years later, and I'm in Dallas, but have still found the best place to grocery shop--Hot Albertsons on McKinney.  Sure, Gay Kroger off Oak Lawn has better selection, and Milf Central Market has better quality food, but Hot Albertsons has the best patrons.  The crowd may be bigger on Sunday post-hangover/brunch, but this is Hot Albertsons on a Monday evening.  This place is not a secret.  I'm rejuvinated, and will be making a showing of the fact that I am coming straight from my demanding job (ok, Snood held me up) still wearing my expensive suit (Mens Wearhouse) and shouting "Objection!" into my iBerry so that everyone knows I'm a lawyer (I just passed the Bar Exam four days ago). 

To keep you from skipping through the rest of the adventure to find out how my plan goes, none of this happens.  I don't maintain eye contact with anyone, and my lifelong challenge to pick up a woman in front of the bell peppers once again fails. To make matters worse, I don't know what half the stuff is on my shopping list.

Here, once again, is the compressed list as it is written:

Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Kosher Salt

Fresh Cracked Pepper

1 Head Garlic

1 1/2 Lemon

Butter (potato topping)

Sour Cream (potato topping)

Uncle Ben's Whole Grain Brown Ready Rice

1 14.5 oz Can Green Beans

1 Jar Classico Basil and Tomato Pasta Sauce

6 oz Dry Spaghetti Pasta

Parmigiano Reggiano Cheese, grated

1 Large Baking Potato

6 Cherry Tomatoes, sliced in half

1 Tablespoon Crumbled Blue Cheese

1 Teaspoon Chives, thinly sliced
3 lbs Red New Potatoes
1 Package Fresh Rosemary
2 Bags Prewashed Spinach Leaves
1 Pint Mixed Berries (Blueberries, Raspberries, Strawberries Blackberries)  
1 8 oz Extra Sharp White Cheddar Cheese
3 - 4 Small Containers Non-Fat Vanilla Yogurt
BearNaked Brand Fruit and Nut Granola
1 Jar Kalamata Olives (Pitted)

1 8 - 10 oz Strip Steak. at room temperature

4 Boneless Skinless Chicken Breasts

1/4 lb Thin Sliced Hard Salami or Sopressata

1 6 - 8 oz Salmon Fillet, skin removed

2 Links Hot Italian Sausage
Wine/Beer

Here is what I see:

Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Kosher Salt

Fresh Cracked Pepper

1 Head Garlic

1 1/2 Lemon

Butter (potato topping)

Sour Cream (potato topping)

Uncle Ben's Whole Grain Brown Ready Rice

1 14.5 oz Can Green Beans

1 Jar Classico Basil and Tomato Pasta Sauce

6 oz Dry Spaghetti Pasta

Parmigiano Reggiano Cheese, grated

1 Large Baking Potato

6 Cherry Tomatoes, sliced in half

1 Tablespoon Crumbled Blue Cheese

1 Teaspoon Chives, thinly sliced
3 lbs Red New Potatoes
1 Package Fresh Rosemary
2 Bags Prewashed Spinach Leaves
1 Pint Mixed Berries (Blueberries, Raspberries, Strawberries Blackberries)
1 8 oz Extra Sharp White Cheddar Cheese
3 - 4 Small Containers Non-Fat Vanilla Yogurt
BearNaked Brand Fruit and Nut Granola
1 Jar Kalamata Olives (Pitted)

1 8 - 10 oz Strip Steak. at room temperature

4 Boneless Skinless Chicken Breasts

1/4 lb Thin Sliced Hard Salami or Sopressata

1 6 - 8 oz Salmon Fillet, skin removed

2 Links Hot Italian Sausage
Wine/Beer

It pretty much goes downhill from there.  Looking back I can break the ingredients into four categories:

What I got:  Not much, but I do have the luxury of already being stocked with the initial spices and such (pasta, red and regular potatoes; pretty much the starches).  

What I get:  The majority of the other ingredients weren't too tough--there was only one salmon cut from butcher, chicken breasts are chicken breasts, and yogurt is kind of hard to mess up.

What I ain't getting:  Olives are out.  Same with Blue Cheese.  Not too many strikes, and I figure I can substitute olives for bell peppers, and Blue cheese with feta.  I have absolutely no basis for this belief, but if there is one thing at which I am particularly adept, it is bullshitting.  I can bullshit the olives and blue cheese outta this for sure, right?  

What I didn't get:  This category boils down in to two ingredients.  One is the Parmigiano Raggiano Cheese.  I have no idea what this is.  I have no idea what part of this name is the brand of cheese, and what is the type of cheese.  I get cheese.  I understand American Cheese, Pepper Jack Cheese, Queso Cheese, and Individually Wrapped slices of "cheese."  I don't get what this cheese is and, subsequently, I didn't get this cheese.  The other ingredient was BearNaked Brand fruit and nut granola.  Once again, I get the conclusion--bran.  I even get that there are mixed bags of fruit and nut granola.  What I don't get is how in the world there can be such a substantial difference in the quality of bran that we need to go name brand.  I don't see how Matt has sampled that many brans in order to have formed his opinion that this BearNaked Brand Bran is the best.  Most importantly, Hot Albertsons doesn't have the wide selection of brans selection to make BearNaked a Texas option.  So you know what I did.  I bought Bran.  Regular, old fruit and nut granola bran.  I hope it doesn't ruin the meal.  

All in all I got out of the store for a little under $80, including a bottle of wine, and should hopefully have enough for three meals solo, and a fourth meal for four.  The one thing I didn't get, unfortunately, were any back up plans.  Lets just hope I won't need any.