The vendors at the Kentlands were not ready at 4. Nor were they completely set up at 4:20 when I left. I did pick up some chevre from the Cherry Gate farm folks. There was a meat vendor, a plant vendor and a not yet set up coffee vendor when I left.

Cute idea and I hope it flourishes but not worth making a special trip over right now.

Sorry; I didn't ask the vendors how long their season would be. If I am there next Tuesday, I'll find out.

My favorite potatoes are now in season. Stopped at Calvert-Woodley last night and picked up some Spanish chorizo.

Psyched. Was looking forward to making Patatas a la Riojana. Even have Spanish olive oil. All that is missing is pimenton.

Last time I purchased the spice it was at WFM during a major campaign when the store was promoting Spanish foods.

Now, apparently, the company no longer carries the spice since it contains an ingredient that does not meet its rigorous standards.

Since I'll be in Penn Quarter this afternoon, I might bump into someone who can fill me in, but does anyone know what gives? What's so unwholesome about pimenton?

I don't have much time these days to schlep all the way to that wonderful Spanish store in Bethesda, but if I must, I will. Meanwhile, know of another place I can find my spice?

ortiz tuna and anchovies seem to be gone, and have they pulled route 11 potato chips from the shelves?

also, they have walled in all the inside aisles at the p street location so they are only accessible from the front and back of the store. what's that all about?

I am definitely enjoying being in Whole Foods territory again. I have one that is a manageable walk from my apartment but it is convenience store size and just too claustrophobic. A short distance away is a regular store and a little further is a large store. They have a fair amount of local produce, proudly displayed. Puzzling is the lack of local options for other readily available produce considering this display. One example is the local blueberries are fantastic right now (went berry picking earlier in the week) but they have FL berries in the stores.

At first I thought I wouldn't do a lot of shopping here because of price and the whole unemployed student thing, but then the radio spots highlighting the cost savings caught my attention. After I had a good chuckle, I took note of produce prices compared to the regular market and saw they weren't that different, sometimes higher, sometimes even, and sometimes lower with most things just looking better.

Balducci's in Spring Valley or Dean & Deluca on M Street should carry it.

Forgive me, but as I've pointed out before, there is no Balducci's in Spring Valley. Balducci's is near the top of a hill, not in a valley. The hill is known as Wesley Heights, home to American University and other Methodist institutions.

Regarding pimenton, is it my imagination that I've seen it at Trader Joe's? It might be. Anna Blume: Which potatoes are your favorites?

Well, I should qualify what I say because you'll notice that I swooned about the itty bitty potato nubbins that Zora has also been buying from some of the same folk as me, including Jim of Sunnyside Farm at Dupont Circle.

However, Next Step Produce (Heinz also at Dupont) sells what he calls Nicola (? I could swear it was closer to "Carolina" last year) and perhaps another slightly oblong thin-skinned yellow.

José Andres specifies Idaho potatoes in the recipe I follow, but I prefer these particular wax potatoes, instead. They break down just enough.

BTW, a very kind executive chef graced me w a tin of pimenton this afternoon, so now I can make one of my absolute favorites very soon.

Thanks, bioesq for answering my question!

FTR, it's back on the shelves at Whole Foods, so who knows what was behind the explanation offered by the team member who told me the spice did not meet the company's standards? (It's also available at TJ Maxx.)

The Clarendon Whole Foods has reopened a section of the store that was under renovation. (Part of the front of the store is still under renovation.) Prepared food, sushi, bakery, and cheese cases run along the wall all the way to the front of the store where the taqueria and seating used to be. The bakery case has an expanded selection of pastries, and there are new cheeses.

The cheese station that used to be in the dairy section is gone (though they're not completely done clearing out that area), and they added a second salad bar island. This area of the store feels much more spacious now (but part of that might be because it was more cramped with the prepared foods cases moved forward while the renovation was going on).

General Tso's Vegan Chicken, $8.99 / lb.

Soy Popcorn Chicken
(Non GMD Soybean Protein, Condensed Wheat Protein, Water Soybean Oil, Sea Salt,
Vegetarian Seasonings
(Soybean Amino Acids, Dry Mushroom Powder, Begetable Extract, Sea Salt),
Broccoli,
Sauce
(Shoyu
(Soybeans, Wheat, Salt, Brewing Starter
(Aspergillus Sojae)),
Sugar, Stir-Fry Sauce
(Water, Sugar, Soy Sauce
(Water Salt, Soybean, Wheat Flour),
Salt, Modified Corn Starch, Yeast Extract, Caramel Color, Flavors
(Contains Mushroom Extractives),
Mirin, White Whine, Vinegar, Mushroom Soy Sauce
(Water, Soy Beans, Wheat Flour, Salt, Sugar, Extract of Mushroom),
Garlic Onion, Ginger, Vegetable Base
(Salt, Maltodextrin, Sugar, Autolyzed Yeast Extract, Dehydrated Vegetables
(Leek, Tomatoes, Onions, Bell Peppers, Garlic, Fennel),
Natural Flavors, Maltodextrin, Potato Starch, Spices and Natural Coloring
(Turmeric),
Silcon Dioxide),
White Pepper)
Garlic, Chinese Cooking Wine, White Wine Vinegar, Sugar, Canola Oil, Chili-Garlic Sauce, Green Onions,
Chilli Flakes, Cornstarch. Contains: Soy, Wheat.

Hey, you know what? With a little super-fresh basil from my next-door neighbor's garden? Not half-bad.

Now, if anyone can nest those parentheses, they're better than I am.

Cheers,
Rocks.

I thought I thaw parenthetheth! I thought I that parenthetheth! I did! I did!!

Not sure if this is ok to post, but wanted to share that they have a $5 off $25 purchase coupon from 10/15 - 10/22. Click here for more details.

You guys might laugh but I find Whole Foods to be so overwhelming, so many choices and decisiouns to make! I remember the first time I went in there as a college sophmore, thinking it was a conventional storea and I was looking for quesso dip. Heh. I just kind of wandered through the aisles with my jaw on the floor. Even now 4-5 years later I still get that feeling wandering around feeling like there's just too many choices to make. (and then there's the sticker shock at 12 dollar hunks of cheese. yikes)

My husband I were high fiving each other for making a trip there for groceries staples to last us for 2 weeks and only spending 99 dollars or so and then we realized we'd spent 15 of that on cheese. Heh.

if you are looking for good vinegar at whole foods these days, the only smart decision is to look somewhere else.

if you are looking for good champagne, you have to choose which store first. i would choose p street and then the gaston chiquet blanc de blanc. it is locked up, and the store has reverted to the dubious policy of walking you to the checkout. a bottle is roughly $45, and if i were the criminal they are trying to make me feel like, there are some items that would be easier to pinch in the cosmetics and homeopathic drugs aisle, just for starters. frankly, the experience makes me feel dizy.

i felt like a math genius when i returned to the store for a refund on the $12.99-a-pound coffee i had purchased on sale for $10.99 only to find out when reading my receipt at home that i had been charged the full price. i was offered a refund of $2.25. when i asked the store employee how he had determined the price, i was told that it was an estimate and then he had rounded it up. i asked to see the receipt, and pointed out that i had purchased 1.3 pounds of the coffee. i had been overcharged by $2.00 a pound, and therefore the refund should be $2.60. You may be right i was told, twice eventually, as the discussion continued and heated up. discrepancies between the price on the shelf and the price at the register have declined in recent months, and the store has also instituted what appears to be a new policy: when a sale item rings up higher, they remove the sale price. smart thinking; those erroneous sale prices could stay up for months, so there must have been more complaints than mine.

if you want to feel like you're on candid camera, try to find the young african cashier at the tenley store who demands that you sing before she checks you out. i offered to have my wife dance on the counter instead, but she refused to climb up there. i was then told that if i didn't sing, she would card me on my wine purchases (one of which was a bottle of champagne marked down from about $39 to $29 but that rang up, as i noticed at home, at about $38; it is now on sale for about $38). i refused to do either. they tend to be ridiculously uptight at this location over the city's liquor laws and i am occasionally carded here even though i have legally been buying alcohol in washington for going on four decades and do not have an aging picture of myself upstairs at home. this was the first time, however, that i had been asked to sing. i just can't do justice to "que sera sera" or "row row row your boat," the only two non-religious numbers to which i can still remember the words.

Do any of the locations still carry ginger Altoids? Or anywhere else for that matter?

It used to be that the flavor was too exotic for CVS or other supermarkets, but just the thing for WFM. Now I can't find them anywhere.

I have seen those and other flavors at Target stores at the checkout display.