[Northkeep] While others were off at the war . . .

[Vickie Barbour]

Two questions.
1--By the market do you mean the new little walmart corner stores are is a private store?
2--What is a Reasor’s?
Okay so maybe 3 questions.  Did I ready correctly you have Albertsons, would you also have Tom Thumb or Krogers?

Jennifer Carlson <talana1 at hotmail.com> wrote:
I hope everyone had a good time at the war. For those of us who stayed 
home, it seems to have been a pretty quiet week. Save that there was a 
grand opening you all might want to check out.

Last Wednesday, after a seemingly endless wait, I finally got to walk 
through the doors of the new Market Grocery and Deli in the Kingspoint 
Center at 61st and Yale. I’d been panting for it to open ever since they 
broke ground, and my brother had told me about how great the Market he’d 
visited is.
It has been worth the wait.
According to the article in Wednesday’s Tulsa World, the Market doesn’t 
intend to compete with traditional groceries like Reasor’s and Albertson’s 
and Wal-Mart. This isn’t the place you go to do the weekly shopping, 
although they carry milk and Velveeta Shells ‘n Cheese. You go here for the 
special stuff.
They pride themselves on customer service. A manager, seeing me frantically 
taking notes and apparently mistaking me for a reporter, gave me several 
minutes of her time, and we had a good chat about their inventory. She had 
no idea anyone in Tulsa might be interested in historical cuisines, and was 
even more surprised at the things they carried that food historians might 
come to them for.
You probably won’t go there for the produce, unless you’re picking up 
everything else for a meal at the same time. They do carry a few unusual 
items, like fresh oyster and woodear mushrooms, Russian banana potatoes and 
baby pattypan squash, but everything else you can find at Reasor’s or 
Albertson’s. The custom salad bar, however, you will want to check out.
The deli has an obscene selection of cooked foods: lasagna (5” thick at 
least), porkloin en croute (in pastry), Thai crab balls, coconut shrimp, 
grilled portobellos, skillet corn bread and bread pudding, along with the 
more usual fried chicken, whole roasted chickens, and potato salad. They 
even have al fresco tables outside if you want to eat there. Just stop off 
in the espresso bar for something to drink first.
The meat counter will take your breath away. Largely because the prices 
would choke a horse. However, they sell gourmet, top quality, aged meats. 
You can get most of the same cuts at better prices elsewhere, though it is 
hard to find a grocery that sells French style standing rib roast (for those 
who know the difference, or care). On the other hand, they do sell such 
hard-to-find items as uncured bacon, and other packaged meats that are 
nitrate-free.
Next to the meat counter is a sandwich counter, featuring Boars Head meats 
and making all sorts of specialty sandwiches and burgers.
The fish counter has both fresh and frozen fish and shellfish – bivalves as 
well as crustaceans – and live lobsters. Need a whole snapper, salmon, or 
even a small shark? Again, the fish is pricey, but hey, this is Oklahoma, 
and you’re going to pay top dollar around here for anything that isn’t 
catfish or canned tuna.
The cheese case has all those oddly named cheeses they talk about on the 
Food Channel and Queer Eye for the Straight Guy. Tucked in this section 
they also have pates and packets of smoked salmon, including genuine 
Scottish salmon. Mmm.
And just in case you don’t have the utensils and cookware to do the 
ingredients justice, you can buy French ceramic cookware, a by-gum fish 
steamer, and proper copper pans. They also offer cedar grilling planks, 
olive wood spoons, silicone oven mitts, and so forth. I foresee buying a 
lot of Christmas presents here.
The bakery alone makes the trip worth it. Working from left to right, you 
start, next to the espresso bar, with the usual snacky type goodies – 
cookies, muffins, etc. Then a case of Joseph Schmidt truffles (pure evil), 
followed by a case of beautiful little desserts you normally only see in Bon 
Appetit or a documentary about some great European hotel: little chocolate 
cups and tarts and such, the “for a special occasion” kind of thing. Then 
come the artisan breads, those beautiful, rustic loaves that you’d give your 
eye teeth to be able to make for events. And in a rack under that 
particular display, you’ll find dinner-plate sized wheels of Scandinavian 
cracker bread. So who needs to bake bread for an event?
The dairy case has mostly ordinary stuff – milk, cottage cheese, sour 
cream, and so forth, but in the next cases over, the frozen foods, you can 
find phyllo dough. They have DiGiorno pizza, but their hot-pockets type 
frozen sandwiches include such selections as spinach-and-feta. The ice 
cream aisle was too crowded to get a look at, but rumor is they carry 
gelato.
The shelves filling the rest of the store are full of all sorts of really 
keen things. One aisle has imported foods, labeled by country of origin. 
Under “Britain” you’ll find jars of Devon double cream, tins of McMann’s 
Irish Oatmeal, teas, jams, even Violet Crumble. From other countries you 
can purchase jars of Polish sauerkraut, boxes of Turkish Delight, German 
mustards and soup mixes, Hungarian paprika (not the same as the stuff in our 
American chili powder by a long way), French cornichons (tiny pickles), and 
unrefined sugar cubes from India that, pounded or ground, would be a perfect 
substitute for the sugar in period recipes. The spices offered include 
whole cardamom pods, whole nutmegs, and pink peppercorns.
The snack food aisles include familiar and exotic chips, imported meringue 
cookies and macaroons, canolli shells, etc., etc. There’s a Jelly Belly 
display, 21 colors of M&Ms, and pretty much the complete Lindt chocolate 
line.
When you’re running through south Tulsa, take half an hour and check this 
place out. It’s the kind of place that makes you want to go home and try 
cooking something new.


Talana

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