In the gourmet section the writer was offered a kumquat.
Eager to test my true mettle, I'd decided that the ingredients would have to be exclusively 99 cents or less — the gourmet section had dulled my skinflint edge.
There are hundreds of NY food blogs, but the always-excellent New York Magazine's Grub Street is my pick of the bunch, in particular, its "underground gourmet" section.
I made rice and beans one night, which we zested up with 99-cent canned jalapeños and sofrito (like enchilada sauce, with a slight burned taste); another night we had penne with cream and some pancetta I found in the gourmet section.
Other than some slightly leaden pumpkin ravioli from Jack's gourmet section — it had the sludgy, earwax-like quality of something that had been unfrozen and then frozen again — the only bump on the road was the aroma emanating from the black plastic bags that Jack's and other 99-cent stores use: they smell alternately like an electrical fire or a fish in transition.
Located at 110 West 32nd Street, near Herald Square, with satellite stores at 16 East 40th Street and 45 West 45th Street, Jack's has not only lots of freezer cases and five or more aisles full of food, but also an upstairs gourmet section with more upscale items — Buitoni and Bertagni prepared pastas, Lindt and Ferrero chocolates, Hero jams — at prices ranging from about $1.99 to $4.99.
Asides from the obvious fruit and vegetable lane, there might be something new in a gourmet section or health section: maybe a tropical fruit, an unusual vegetable, a new treat.
Cracker Barrel typically is sold in the dairy section of supermarkets alongside everyday cheeses, rather than the deli section, which features gourmet cheeses, and Ms. Gray said that humbler placement suits the brand.
Kern's annual check was now printed by a computer; the simple shed that he remembered, with an awning and a few boards on sawhorses holding bushel baskets of peaches and apples, sweet corn, and string beans, had sprouted freezers and cash registers and supermarket carts and a sizable section of imported gourmet delicacies.
Clotted cream is available in the dairy section of select gourmet markets; whipped cream can be substituted.
