PrintThe Best Grocery Store in NYC?
After two visits this past weekend I am ready to proclaim that Food Emporiums are the best real grocery stores (supermarkets) in New York City. Or at the very least the Food Emporium on 68th and Broadway deserves such consideration. Unlike stores like Fairway and Whole Foods, which have their obvious merits, my local Food Emporium actually has lots of hardcore grocery items and that's what you need to find in a good grocery store. I needed a can of Ro-Tel to make nachos and Food Emporium was the only store I found in my neighborhood to carry them.
Why else do I love my Food Emporium?
The same store also has automatic check-out lines, organic produce, and an interesting line of artisanal breads from Canada, Ace, some of which they bake off in the store. This past weekend my local Food Emporium had this great promotion. Buy an Ace baguette, which by the way was still warm when I bought it (it wasn't a great baguette, it tasted like a brown n' serve roll, albeit a good one), and you received a half pound of really good salami made by Columbus in San Francisco. Free salami, Ro-Tel in stock, a spacious store that well-lit, with friendly checkout folks (a particularly friendly checkout clerk alerted me to the free salami promotion when she saw I was buying the Ace baguette). That's what I call a real grocery store.
Fairway will always be my go-to market. It has a terrific selection of cheeses, breads, olive oils, and vinegars. Plus, it's two blocks from my house. But I find it comforting to know that I actually have a hard-core grocery store in my neighborhood.
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16 Comments:
The one on 14th Street has New England style split-top hotdog buns. I could love Food Emporium for that alone, but they also seem to get new and limited edition ice-cream flavors (Edy's, Ben & Jerry's, etc.) before any other supermarket. I agree about the produce; quite impressive.
Barbara Hanson at 9:22AM on 01/28/08
I live closer to the 89th Street Food Emporium, but I agree that the 68th street store is superior.
floretbroc at 11:47AM on 01/28/08
agata & valentina on 79th and 1st avenue
benji at 2:00PM on 01/28/08
The Red Hook Fairway is one of the best supermarkets I've ever been to (Stew Leonards being the most fun). I've found every Food Emporium in the city to be insultingly overpriced, or the quality of food so poor that I wouldn't serve it to my dog.
Fairway seems to have everything I've ever needed - with several options for quality/price. I also find that (for the most part) their prices are fair for the quality of food you're getting. Its not like Whole Foods, that charges 5 times as much for something labelled 'organic' which tastes worse than the 'conventional'.
Also, Fairway has decent specials. You're lucky to get $1 off your $23/lb salmon at Whole Foods.
And don't get me started on Gristedes. I feel like I need to shower after going into one of those rodent/mold/assorted filth infested stores. How/Why anyone ever shops there is a mystery to me.
Soup_Dumpling at 2:44PM on 01/28/08
I love a lot of things about Fairway. It's just that they carry a very limited selection of packaged grocery items. I love Agata & Valentina as well, but it is definitely a specialty store.
Ed Levine at 2:47PM on 01/28/08
Ed: Automatic check-out lines are nothing to be impressed with. My first encounter with them was in the late '90s in Portland, Oregon. They were buggy then (always having some problem that called for the attendant), and they're buggy still, almost 10 years later.
When you scan something, these machines require that you place it in a plastic bag situated atop a scale. If for some reason you screw this up, it thinks you're up to no good and calls over the attendant. This happens almost inevitably.
And don't even try to use one if there's a line—even if it's only one-person deep. The person in front of you will not know how to use the machine, will swipe his card wrong, put the money in wrong, or have his credit declined. Meanwhile, the person in the human-powered checkout line will be done and gone by the time you saunter up to help yourself at the machine.
Stores bill this thing as a convenience for customers, when really it's just a cost-saving measure on their part—they can put four of these things in and hire only one human to scamper among them.
The only thing these machines are good for is if you're making an embarrassing combination of purchases and you don't want to face the cashier.
Adam Kuban at 2:56PM on 01/28/08
the FE on 14th street is open 24 hours... a definite plus!
cybercita at 4:39PM on 01/28/08
re: automatic checkout lines
my favorite setup for maximizing store profits is at the gowanus pathmark where every lane but one (not counting the self-checkout corral) has a sign saying that it is for people who "prefer to bag their own groceries". i'm pretty sure that NO ONE prefers to bag their own groceries.
i don't mind the self-checkout ones if i have to buy 2 or 3 things and there is no line but i guess that's damning with faint praise.
sloppy at 5:39PM on 01/28/08
Park Slope Food Coop creates a community, rather than just being a store. Plus, they only mark up the prices by 21.5%. They support local, organic producers of food. Things that might have been genetically modified are clearly labeled. Thats why the coop is the best grocery store in the city. :)
anado at 9:38PM on 01/28/08
My 98 1/2 year old grandpa would choose Food Emporium too but I would take Fairway any day. True that Fairway is great for certain things, it doesn't always come through for ordinary staples. I was recently reflecting upon the fact that I have been living without regular trips to Fairway for a few years now and although I have been managing, a trip up to Fairway always yields some fabulous finds to supplement the ordinary. If only I lived two blocks away..
izzy's mama at 12:09AM on 01/29/08
Funny, I live within a few blocks of you, Ed (or I guess I should say I'm pretty sure I do, since I'm also a few blocks of Fairway), and I've lived here for 15 years. But I have never, ever, been in the Food Emporium (used to frequent the one near Union Square years ago though). Guess I'll have to give it a try!
When I don't feel like schlepping to Fairway (the 3 extra blocks), I duck into the Westside at 77 and Broadway. They usually have anything I need (and free cheese samples!).
And what about the Pioneer on Columbus? Scary place, that is.
Dee at 8:47AM on 01/29/08
My favorite supermarket for regular groceries is Steve's C Town at 5th Ave and 9th street in Park Slope. The new Union Market on 9th street is great, and the Fairway in Red Hood has a great selection of high end products, but for weekly load ups of canned goods, meat, milk, veggies, etc. it's got to be Steve's (friendly yet sassy teenage checkout people gossiping about the ins and outs of high school life an amusing plus).
jlbrach at 9:36AM on 01/29/08
I'm sorry, but unless their produce has markably improved in the last year since I moved to the West Coast, F.E. has the worst produce out of any of the major chains. I used to live near the 14th st. one, and man was it terrible!
Phil W. at 11:29AM on 01/29/08
it is called The Ace Bakery and it is in Toronto
blondee47 at 5:39PM on 01/29/08
i must be the only person alive who actually DOES prefer to bag their own groceries. i am kind of particular about where things go in each bag and organizing bags by where they will be going once they get to my house. also, if and when my bread gets smashed into carbogoo, i would rather just hold myself responsible. :)
onto the question: i kind of hate the USQ food emporium - their prices are ridiculous, and their selection ain't great. i would probably say fairway in red hook or PSFC, although i generally would love to be able to grocery shop without fear of panic attacks, and neither of these places is necessarily conducive to that.
man, this post makes me seem so much more type-A than i actually am...
mickeymets at 4:38PM on 01/31/08
I love Fairway. It has everything I need and more. We are considering a move to L.A. I wish there were a Fairway there. Are you listening Fairway folks?
All the best,
Linda J Atamian
NY Foodie
LadyLinda at 9:48AM on 02/04/08