Whole Foods @ The District now open

NEW -> Contingent Buyer Assistance Program
<p>Who?</p>

<p>I hope you don't mean you!</p>

<p>Each OTHER!</p>
 
Eva,


We've been to the farmer's market across from UCI on Saturday mornings for the past few weekends. We've been buying a lot of fruit from Pluot's. I don't recall which vendor it is but they sell this plum-like fruit that they call cotton candy and let me tell you... it's pure sugar when you bite into it.
 
So, back to coffee. With Graph and Bubblegum being coffeenistas (coffinados?), any chance we could get them to do local coffee house reviews? You know, a semi-comprehensive review of coffee quality, service, and other amenities (e.g., wi-fi, etc.)? That could be really useful. You could either do them separately, or, more fun, together. A "he said / she said" style coffee review, perhaps.
 
I like the farmer's markets at UCI. Parking can be a little tough. The <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pluot" target="_blank">pluot's</a> are pretty good. We saw several vendors selling pluots. Free samples are always nice too ;)
 
I was reading the same in the San Jose Mercury News, here's a memorial from the company with pictures: <a href="http://peets.typepad.com/">peets.typepad.com/</a>



 
I went to Wholefoods over the weekend and I was one of those who was doing more looking than buying. The amount of prepared food is obscene. How can they possibly sell all of it before it spoils? On one hand, I appreciate the variety, trying to cater to different ethnic groups in the area. On the other hand, it was rather nauseating to realize how much of it will probably go to waste (unless they have some kind of program to donate it to food banks or shelters that I don't know about).
 
Maybe they're just seeing what sells and what doesn't....so they can hone their choices down in the future. ? Hopefully the extra doesn't go to waste.
 
Alright, I'm not food a critic, but we know what we like and what we don't. We bought a number of WF prepared ready-to-eat foods this past week. I'll start off with what I know more of... barbeque. Itried the beef brisket at the smokehouse. $13.99/lb. Sadly, there was little "smoke" flavor to this, I imagine they are using some mass prepared gas fired smoker with very little real hardwoods used for smoking. The pink smoke ring was rather small, which should have been my first sign that it wasn't going to be "great". However, the meat was tender, just lacking in the smokiness and flavor that comes with slow, low-heat smokers. For brisket, go across the parking lot to Lucilles, even their brisket isn't as as good as their ribs.





The Brazilian churrascria, was horrible. I tried their Sirloin with garlic rice, and the rice was inedible. This was at saturday at 6pm, prime time for dinner and the rice was either under-cooked or left out so long that it reverted back it to dehydrated state. Ugh... the tenderloin, for $11.99 I think were about five small pieces of sirloin steak cut into rectangles, some were tender others were dried out, a sign of slow-business and food that's left out too long under the heaters.





We also tried out a carne asada burrito and asked for guacamole as well. Not too bad around $7-8 but I got a burrito with a small 1.5 oz container of guacamole. WTF? I wanted the guacamole in the burrito, not as a side order. They don't even give you chips so it wasn't like I could use it as dip.





The japanese foods section looked quite unappealing. I'm not sure if they are using brown rice or are flavoring the sushi rice with soy sauce, but it just looks bad. The rice is one of the most important items when it comes to eating sushi, and just from appearance it doesn't look like premium short-grain rice. My parents say that the rice is even more important than the sushi, unless all you're eating is sashimi.





We also ordered udon with "extra" chicken. So for an extra $1.75 we get two thin slices 2" by 1/4" thick flavorless chicken. Yikes.





In a nutshell, we were totally disappointed by the taste of their food. Prices are high as typical for WF, but the quality just wasn't there. I'd be interested to hear other people's experiences with their foods. I don't see how they can sustain all that prepared food or made-to-order foods. So much will go to waste.
 
and you can see how much food they have to dump at the end of the day. How awful it is seeing the food to be wasted !


I just could not imagine it - may be they have some plans for food donations to the poor nearby ?
 
I don't mind paying alittle more for certain items that are exclusive to WF. But if the same products are selling for less elsewhere. Why pay more?
 
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