Meat Seeking Minivan

We're still on the search for good meat.

We've been trying out different grocery stores. Right down the street from our house is Macey's, which is a sort of family-oriented, stack 'em high sell 'em cheap kind of place. Good selection. Awesome south-of-the-border aisle.

We don't eat much meat, and IMHO, meat should be a little scarcer and a lot better than it is. Good meat costs more. That's OK. We roast whole chickens and eat ground bison, and try to hook up with some happy-face-pig bacon, salted, but uncured (nitrites are something I'd generally prefer to do without). Right now, there is some kind of national bison craze, so what used to be $5 or $6 a pound for ground bison is now as high as $11. It's good, but not that good. I'd rather eat 5 pounds of tofu for that much. I'll sprinkle bison-flavor-flakes on it.

We've been to Winco, Fresh Market (which I think is Albertson's in Utah) and now Harmon's. Harmon's has bison, and if you ask the guys at the meat counter, they can go in the back and get you sliced pork side meat - which is uncured bacon. It is meat of uncertain origin, which is generally sad factory pigs. I bought it anyway.

Other than that, Harmon's is just overpriced for no particular reason, and doesn't really make up for it in selection or service. It is an indistinguishably decent grocery store - though they do have samples, which is good. The employees offering the samples either have a terrifying foreman (like that angry elf with the goatee in the Rudolph stop-action holiday show) or they get some awesome commission on jam and crab salad, because they will cheerfully and relentlessly chase you ten or twenty feet insisting on all the reasons you need to buy the thing you just nibbled RIGHT NOW.

We're going back to Macey's. I have a pound-and-a-half of side meat to last until I can locate a happy-pig farm. Then we can get a shoat for side meat.

We tried to locate some loose leaf tea today, also. We're off to the Fermentation Station to get some.

UPDATE: We found some commercially-available ground bison and nitrite-free bacon at Smith's on Harrison.