We think the holidays just don’t seem right unless there’s some type of seafood on the table. Cocktail shrimp, grilled lobster tail, king crab—we love it all! This year celebrate the season with this week’s secret ingredient: oysters. Available in shell or freshly shucked, Whole Foods Market’s oysters are sourced and shipped to market several times a week for optimum freshness. Join Mark Law and guest chef Alex Seidel from Denver’s highly acclaimed Fruition restaurant as Alex shares his twist on a treasured holiday classic, oysters Rockefeller.
The 6th Annual Let’s Talk Coffee has just ended in the beautiful southern coffee region of Armenia, Colombia. One of our most unique coffee supply partners, Sustainable Harvest Coffee Importers, organizes this event in different coffee producing countries in Latin America in order to bring together coffee farmers, exporters, importers and roasters from all over the world. The goal is to find a common language to help support the entire specialty coffee supply chain. This year nearly three hundred attended from twenty countries; the theme was “Certified Quality” and people from as far away as Ethiopia, South Africa, Tanzania, Ecuador, Mexico and Brazil represented their coffee producing nations. For Allegro, this represents a golden opportunity to meet one-on-one with our supply partners, hear their concerns, share our accomplishments and further understand what the relationship between farmer and roaster means. Each year the event has grown and thanks to the hard work of Sustainable Harvests staff, this year was extraordinarily successful.
Whoa, is it already December 19th?! The holidays have crept up faster this year than ever before and I haven’t even started making all the wonderful homemade gifts I’d been planning on. My lofty goals of handknit scarves with matching hats and little oil paintings for all my loved ones are seeming more and more out of reach each day. But I’m still all for homemade and filled with love – so what’s a girl to do? Thankfully, some of my favorite blogs are filled with inspiration for making excellent, creative gifts.
December memories have many meanings to different people.
For many of us who deal with food on a daily basis, other than eating it, keeping up with the crops and the seasonal harvests going on around the world is key.
Especially in the midst of a busy holiday season, it’s easy to forget the basics. Every day, Whole Foods Market offers excellent ways to help you shop smarter and within your budget. Did you know we offer case discounts or that you can ask for samples of our food? Have you taken one of our value tours – showcasing lower cost items and tips on how to shop healthfully and within your budget? Check out this week’s customer tips from The Whole Deal™ to see the everyday value you may have been missing.
Remember, each week, we choose tips to be featured in our weekly The Whole Deal™ blog post. Every chosen tip gets a $25 gift card, so submit your tips and recipes here.
Belinda:
I have two daughters, ages 4 and 1. My 4 year old is a VERY picky eater. I used to buy things that I think she would eat, but often times it’s something she ends up not liking. I would also try to fix dishes I think she’d like but she usually ends up turning it away. This causes alot of waste through trial and error, and a frustrated mom who usually ends up eating much of the left overs or having to throw some of it out. This can get expensive over time.
My tip is this — I love to bring my girls to Whole Foods to just sample the food in every department. This way if they like something, I know I have a sure winner and that is usually what I end up making that night for dinner. I have also purchased lunch, snacks, treats, etc using this method. No food is wasted as we already had a taste test ahead of time at Whole Foods! You can’t lose — if my daughter doesn’t like a sample… we simply move onto the next! And the best part – the samples are FREE! Whole Foods hardly ever has the same sample twice, so every trip to the store is a new experience.
Catherine:
I have started asking about case discounts, and this has saved me quite a bit of money. I realized that there are items that I buy large quantities of, that I might as well buy a case of at a time to save considerable money. There are also items that I buy every month regularly, so it is smarter to buy more at once and get a discount. You can ask in just about any department, including even produce. I eat a lot of raw foods and raw vegetables, which can be expensive, and if you buy by the case, it is a lot cheaper. Or if you have a big family or even a one-time gathering, it’s smart to ask about discounts. It never hurts to ask.
I also ask about special-ordering certain cheaper cuts/types of meat and fish in the meat and seafood departments. The seafood department especially, is very nice about special-ordering anything. And in the meat deparment, they will often cut things for you, take the skin off for you for free, etc. I try to be more creative and think outside the box to save money, and it pays off. I recommened always asking about anything!
Leann:
First and foremost, shoppers should sign up for the Whole Foods Value Tour, an hour-long trip around the story by a knowledgeable staff member, during which bargain items are highlighted and pointed out, and department heads are introduced. This was a big help to those of us who find grocery shopping in a large supermarket filled with so many wonderful items to be a tad overwhelming!
As the weather gets colder, the thought of a warm cup of tea sounds pretty good to plenty of folks. Tea’s popularity has increased immensely in the last few years. It’s viewed as medicinal and therapeutic and many people have begun to make it part of their daily routine. However, tea still somewhat carries the stigma of a cold weather beverage. This is one of the reasons that at Whole Foods Market we look to launch new tea items when the weather turns brisk (we also launch new iced teas when the weather starts to warm up), so If you’re looking for some new teas to try, you’re in luck as we have some fantastic new ones available in our stores now.
Enjoy a bit of summertime courtesy of Florida, Southern California, Central and South America.
Late season domestic raspberry- Oxnard, California
It wasn’t too long ago when winter meant you had to say goodbye to berries – or, if you were forward thinking enough you could tap into your stash of frozen fruit you put away during the summer. Or if you were a fresh berry snob (like me) or could never quite manage to not eat all of the berries you bought in season (like me again), you would be resigned to suffer through the winter berry famine. These days variety, technology, and effective global transportation have transformed commercial berry production – all of a sudden we have winter berries.
Health magazine asked six prominent health experts to pick the top 10 healthiest grocery stores from the nation’s largest chains. Topping the list? Whole Foods Market! (Why else would we be telling you, right?)
They explain their choice:
Whole Foods has the whole package — from an extraordinary selection of fresh conventional and organic fruit and vegetables to delicious prepared foods with healthy ingredients and clear labeling. (Most other stores offer mystery meals that may very well be loaded with butter.)
And Whole Foods puts a premium on products that are grown or produced locally (read: super fresh). There’s also hard-to-find grass-fed meats, ready-to-cook organic and free-range chicken, and a well-stocked selection of just-caught seafood. The desserts are pretty good for you: Every item in the bakery is free of artificial colors, flavors, sweeteners, preservatives, and trans fats.
Our judges also raved about Whole Foods’s snacks, singling out the store’s own dark chocolate, fresh-cut veggies, and nut and seed mixes. Alan Greene, M.D., a Palo Alto, California–based pediatrician and one of our panelists sums it up best: “The store celebrates great, healthy food from start to finish.”
It’s great to be recognized for doing what comes naturally to us.
Having food allergies or special diet needs can be especially challenging this time of year. Sometimes I just want to scream “Can we please have a gathering without food?!” Of course, that’s not going to happen and I really do realize that “breaking bread” together can be a wonderful experience. But it just so happens that bread is made from wheat, which is a no-no for my daughter and don’t even get me started on my husband’s food restrictions (no grains of any kind, dairy, sugar, starchy vegetables, tofu, etc.) Can you say “cook every single meal at home?”
I was so excited when Whole Planet Foundation asked me to edit videos that were shot in Nicaragua and Honduras. I spent two years in Nicaragua as a Peace Corps volunteer, so as I watched the raw footage, I immediately thought of people and places that will always be near and dear to me. I could tell so many stories about people I met and places I’ve seen, but the tone of those stories would not be one of sadness or hardship. The stories, much like those of the Whole Planet Foundation borrowers, would be about people who are gregarious, generous and proud. The stories that we are sharing with you are stories that are all too common in Central America. It’s a wonder that many of these countries still exist given that they have faced so much adversity in the recent past, between civil wars and natural disasters. Maybe even more incredible is the resiliency of the people and their determination to achieve a better future through hard work and perseverance.
Welcome to Whole Story, the official blog of Whole Foods Market.
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We’re lucky to have a whole bunch of smart, passionate people doing incredible things in areas like organics, supporting local growers, green practices, fair trade, micro-lending and all kinds of food related stuff. We’ll use this blog to share some of the cool things going on around here.
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The 6th Annual Let’s Talk Coffee has just ended in the beautiful southern coffee region of Armenia, Colombia. One of our most unique coffee supply partners, Sustainable Harvest Coffee Importers, organizes this event in different coffee producing countries in Latin America in order to bring together coffee farmers, exporters, importers and roasters from all over the world. The goal is to find a common language to help support the entire specialty coffee supply chain. This year nearly three hundred attended from twenty countries; the theme was “Certified Quality” and people from as far away as Ethiopia, South Africa, Tanzania, Ecuador, Mexico and Brazil represented their coffee producing nations. For Allegro, this represents a golden opportunity to meet one-on-one with our supply partners, hear their concerns, share our accomplishments and further understand what the relationship between farmer and roaster means. Each year the event has grown and thanks to the hard work of Sustainable Harvests staff, this year was extraordinarily successful.
