Clueless in the UK

I went so long without writing a post I’d forgotten how to do it. I had promised some pictures of the neighborhood. I am not sure how well they came out but we’ll see.

First, here’s the butcher shop:

It’s a great place for fresh … uh … meat. Here’s MacBook Pro guy posing for me:

I don’t know his name. I think it’s time we were properly introduced.

The butcher shop is in the alley just up the road from us, a little alley called Flask Walk which we sometimes take on the way to school. The kids get their haircuts in there sometimes.

When my espresso machine was broken I walked across the street to Gail’s every morning. I love that place, I miss the people in there, I barely know them but one guy knew what I wanted without my having to ask by the time the 5 or 6 weeks were up. He doesn’t seem to work there anymore:

We get our bagels just up the alley to the left of Gail’s at Bagel Street:

which we pass every day on the way to Tesco, where we buy most of our daily groceries:

I have a love/hate relationship with Tesco. I love that they are 2 minutes away, have milk, fresh rolls, decent veggies, etc. I don’t like them for meat of any kind, and I just don’t like their … well, either their reputation or their logo, I am not sure which. They feel like a low-end supermarket to me, some where below Safeway and above 7/11. I think that’s being unfair, so I have concluded that it’s their logo which turns me off.

Higher end stores, in my mind but not necessarily in reality, are Sainsbury and Waitrose. We were told that Waitrose is where we would want to shop for our organics, but I find that I cannot stand that store. Sainsbury is supposed to be in the same category as Tesco yet I like that store a lot (except their meat - blech!). So, it’s off to the J.A. Steele butcher for all our meat, occasionally a Marks & Spencer will do for meat as well, and most other things are delivered from Sainsbury, and then things we need last minute, and quite often, is Tesco across the street.

Luckily right near Tesco is my favorite wine store, where I am getting to know some of the people inside:

Jeroboams means “wicked big bottle of wine”. This is where I bought my recent mixed case of wine. I’m currently into Australian Shiraz and Pinot Noir, affordable and quite tasty but I bought a coupe of whites just in case.

Here are the Greek restaurant I mentioned a while back and the EveryMan theater, which is a small theater where you book your actual seats online, and expect to bring your wine, etc., into the theater with you. Um, did I say theater? I meant CINEMA:

I am now in the habit of getting our fresh fruit and veggies from this stand which is almost just across the street from us as well. They have another inside store up on Heath street across from Tesco I also visit from time to time. When I asked if they had any organic fruit they said, Sure … Um, that’s all he said. He didn’t say, “Yes, and here’s how you can tell …” He just said that that some of the fruit was organic …

I was there recently and a woman before me asked for some blood oranges. I asked her how they were, and she said they were fantastic. She seemed to know the guy pretty well and she said, “Just give him one!” After she left the guy did offer me one. I think he is starting to recognize me as well. The fruit looks good, but is it organic? And should I care?

The last time I went down the organic path was with milk, where I concluded that the main benefit of organic milk was the way the cows were treated. Can anybody shed some light on this for me? Organic pesticides can be deadly as well, says the Organization for Wicked Big Farms of the USA. J.A. Steele’s beef is “better than organic” if you read their website, because they say that the rules for organic are bogus and not currently enforced properly. The organic industry is a cash cow for the dairy industry ;-)

In other news, there is a rumor that some high end fashion shops which are all along High Street in Hampstead will be closing. Some people are in an uproar because they are worried that they will be replaced with another mini-market. Personally I am hoping for a mini-Marks & Spencer although walking down the road to the real Marks & Spencer is good exercise. But along these lines, here is one store I am hoping will be shutdown:

Their logo is FCUK and it just pisses me off. I know that’s ironic given my history of potty mouth, but it still bothers me. It’s such a lame gimic and I can’t get over it: this store must go.

This entry was posted on Monday, April 9th, 2007 at 11:00 am and is filed under Clueless in the UK. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.