Following are the results of Misc.’s quest for the best grocery stores in Seattle, by weight class. While these are my personal views, thanks for all your suggestions. These listings leave out organic co-ops and gourmet delis — I wouldn’t know how to judge such places. (For the record, Central Co-op got more votes than any other hippie store.) I also wasn’t looking for wine stores with vestigial food departments (sorry, Louie’s on the Pike). Oddly, only one letter recommended anything in the Pike Place Market (DeLaurenti’s Italian deli, with its wall of capers).
CONVENIENCE STORE: Seattle has many above-average store-lets in a genre with a pretty low average, but a particular hat tip goes to the Hillcrest Deli-Mart on Capitol Hill. A former pre-supermarket-era Safeway built in the 1920s, it’s still got a complete-enough selection of packaged goods, enough fresh stuff to bide you over until your next supermarket run, and either the best or second-best fried chicken in town; all at prices that don’t excessively punish you for avoiding supermarket crowds.
SMALL SUPERMARKET: When supermarkets first appeared as a Depression-era cost-cutting novelty, they were still small enough to fit neighborhood main streets. Every neighborhood should have one, especially if it doesn’t have a larger store (Belltown, Cascade, Georgetown, etc.). Stores like Marketime in Fremont and Red Apple in Madison Park provide everything you need (unless you’re on a special diet). Or you can stock up on staple goods at a monster store and use a store like this for perishables and restocks.
The two Ken’s (Greenwood and west Queen Anne) win overall. Lori Smith writes about the Greenwood Ken’s, “Despite its garish exterior and the number of people there who look they read the Weekly, it remains the classic example of a good neighborhood store, where they know your name, help you find stuff and don’t overcharge.” Honorable mention goes to the First Hill Shop-Rite (home of my current-fave generic cereal brand, the imitation Crispix simply called Flavorite Crispy Hexagons!).
REGULAR SUPERMARKET: Getting into the realm of the major chains, there’s still something to be said for independent spirits like Wallingford’s Fabulous Food Giant. Robert C. Mills calls it “the center of the known universe.” Situated in the foot-traffic heart of its area, with most of its parking spaces in a side-street auxiliary lot instead of out front, it combines the meet-n’-greet ambience of a small neighborhood store with the selection and prices of a big park-n’-gorge outlet. It’s also got a hypnotic neon sign that has a different sector on the fritz every night.
SUPERSTORE: Larry’s has its spots (the wall of cereal, all the imported South American soda pops). But there’s nothing quite like Art’s Family Center on Holman Road. On a site abandoned by Fred Meyer as too small, Art’s has built an extremely site-specific collection of perimeter departments around the brightest, boldest food selection anywhere.
Elsewhere, Ann Allen recommended Stock Market on Rainier Ave., a “warehouse look” store with a cafe section occupied by just ordinary folk. (“It’s not yuppie. It’s not bland and sterile. It’s what you want a neighborhood store to be.”) Steve Rohde recommended the ineligible Monroe Fred Meyer, but the venerable hypermarket chain has a new monster outlet in Lake City. And of course nothing can compare to the Price Costco experience (where shopping may be a baffling ordeal, but it’s great for larger households, cheap party catering, and especially for free samples).
ETHNIC: Uwajimaya is the name to beat in Asian foodstuffs, but some prefer the recently-grown cluster of Vietnamese stores at 12th and Jackson. One store there, Hop Thanh, has an in-store butcher presiding over the biggest all-pork meat dept. you ever saw. In more assimilated immigrant delights, smart consumers like Leanne Beach know the discount Italian goodies at Big John’s Pacific Food Importers, open daytime hours only on 6th Ave. S. near the INS office. Beach also likes how “They write out your bill by hand, just like an old-fashioned market!”
As promised in the Stranger, here are some of the original letters full-length:
Date: Thu, 17 Aug 95 17:22:21 PDT
From: THAT_GUY@eor.com (THAT GUY)
Organization: The Emerald OnRamp
Subject: Food Stores
To: clark@cyberspace.com
Favorite Ethnic Food Store: DeLaurenti (featuring a wall of capers, even!)
Favorite Superstore: The new Monroe Fred Meyer (Hate the town, but store is
great for stocking up for an Eastbound road trip.)
Favorite Mid-size Supermarket: First Hill ShopRite (I feel like I’m back in
New York when I’m in that dump.)
Favorite Checker: ‘Debbie’ at the Broadway QFC (She’s quirky yet perky.)
-Steve Rohde
aka that_guy@eor.com
Date: Thu, 17 Aug 95 13:43:10 -0700
From: Hollis Nelson <hollis@speakeasy.org>
To: clark@cyberspace.com, hollis@eve.speakeasy.org
Subject: PLENTY – the coolest, most beautiful, euphoric gourmet/organic store
There is an oasis of a gourmet food store in undiscovered Madrona called
Plenty. I must admit, I am a wine purveyor at this store, (thus the wine
selection is impeccable) but I find myself drawn this store on a daily basis. I
also happen to deliver the Stranger to them because someone in distribution at
your fine publication doesn’t “do Madrona” – but that’s a whole other tangent.
First of all, this small store is aesthetically beautiful – PCC meets
Metropolitan Home. This is due in large part to one of the owners, Rolf. Also,
not only do they have an amazing selection of specialty organic and gourmet
items, but they have Jim (former chef at Cafe Flora). He whips up the most
flavorful, dare I say yummy, unique and completely healthy meals, snacks etc.
daily. Lastly, not only do they have a beautiful enviroment, amazing selection,
and yummy food, but they have some of the nicest people due in large part to
the last of the “mod squad” owners Loree. Plenty is a must try experience – a
thousand apologies for my long windedness, but I love this place.
your biggest fan,
Hollis A. Nelson
Date: Fri, 18 Aug 1995 10:53:04 -0700
To: Clark@cyberspace.com
From: dsackett@newsdata.com (Daniel Sackett)
Subject: grocery markets
Upon reading your call for suggestions for the best grocery stores I felt
compelled to copy down your web site address and immediately began to
conceptualize how I could possibly communicate the sublime and gross
pleasures of shopping at Central Co-op. I once saw a documentary on Frank
Sinatra’s reign as a teen idol–the image of one panting fan saying “He’s
just so…sincere” comes to mind when I think of Central. Sure both Central
and Sinatra are sincere, but the experience is so much more. From a REAL
committment to putting out a wide, fresh and reasonably priced organic
produce selection (thanks ol’ Tom the wacky, art-crazed produce manager) to
a cornucopia of treats and staples that commercial stores pass over (yea
Rhondi!), to a staff that upon hearing the words “vegan” or “organic”
actually helps instead of staring blankly from the hollowness of their
bourgeois, status quo enslaved souls, to aesthetically soothing indirect
lighting, to cool check-out folk (Alex and the piscean guy with the wry
smile), to the occassional kitty-cat rendition of Old King Wenceslaus on the
PA, man, Central is IT. Besides, I like spending my money in a co-op instead
of feathering Joe Albertson’s corporate schemes. I believe I am what I
eat–including the experience of gathering food–and I’ve had many happy
moments shopping Central Co-op.
Date: Sat, 19 Aug 95 13:28:00 -0700
From: robert_c mills <rcmills@cac.washington.edu>
Message-Id: <9508192028.AA05447@burlap2.cac.washington.edu>
To: clark@cyberspace.com
Subject: Misc. Misc. miscellany
Food Giant – Wallingford = Center of the known universe
Non-surfing web use term = “sponging”
Date: Wed, 23 Aug 95 13:16:40 -0700
From: Lisa Roosen-Runge <lrr@discovery.ca>
X-Mailer: Mozilla 1.1N (Windows; I; 16bit)
Mime-Version: 1.0
To: clark@cyberspace.com
Subject: supermarket
Here’s a suggestion – Uwajimaya (hope I spelled it correctly)
I think it should be just a supermarket, but it may fall into the ethnic
category.
It is a lot of fun – there’s a cafe, books upstairs, excellent junk food
and neat kitchen implements.
I went to the one in the “International District”, but I guess they have
other outlets as well.
I have been checking in here fairly regularly, I really appreciate you
posting your columns on the Web.
p.s. I am looking forward to the final version of your book.
From lesmith@netmedia.co.il Tue Aug 29 19:31:42 1995
Message-Id: <199508300233.CAA05166@chava.netmedia.co.il>
Date: Wed, 30 Aug 95 02:37:34 -0300
From: “Lori E. Smith” <lesmith@jer1.co.il>
X-Mailer: Mozilla 1.1N (Macintosh; I; 68K)
Mime-Version: 1.0
To: clark@cyberspace.com
Clark,
Re your grocery store search, I’m going to nominate Ken’s, the grocery
store at the corner of 73rd & Greenwood in that neighborhood that’s not
quite Phinney Ridge, not quite Greenwood or Greenlake and not really
Ballard either. When my family moved there in the 70s (I’m also one of
those rare Seattlites who actually have _roots_ in the city, my
great-grandfather went to the UW) Ken’s was quiet and pokey, like the
neighborhood. As it has gone uptown and yuppy so has Ken’s and you can
now get packaged sushi and all the comforts of home. But despite it’s
garish exterior and the number of people there who look they read the
Weekly, it remains the classic example of a good neighborhood store,
where they know your name, help you find stuff and don’t overcharge.
Thanks for going on-line and helping to keep Seattle’s alternative
tradition alive. (One of the things I like about Seattle is that despite
the attempts of various establishments to promote Seattle’s various
environmental and civic amenities it’s the “other” side of Seattle that
always gets national press, cf the prostitutes of the boom era, the
general strike of 1919 and more recently the assorted group of drifters
from out of town who became “grunge”.)
And by the way, I like the Macintosh a lot too.
