The Almighty Costcolio Wants it ALL

I need a Costco intervention. I made a run today, and I could probably list ten types of too-big-items-I-never-needed-in-the-first-place I almost bought.

The platter of prosciutto and mozzarella in little bite-size rolls…I still want to go back and get it.

I made a decent score, with some reluctance. The prices on beef were good today, so I went against policy and bought a loaf of New York strips. Usually I buy rib eyes, but I find that Costco rib eyes usually have a big island of solid fat in the middle, which adversely affects the bargain. The beef is good, but that wad of fat is somewhat annoying. So we’ll see how strips taste, after a week of aging. At $5.29 per pound, they would have to be awful for this to be a bad deal.

I need to start buying pork loins. They’re huge and cheap, and what is a pork loin? A loaf of tasty boneless chops.

I found a wonderful item. Kirkland Champagne. From France. REAL Champagne, supposedly. It’s $25 per bottle. I didn’t buy it, but I felt the pull. Wine Spectator gave it a 90. How bad could it be? My favorite Champagne, at prices ordinary humans can afford, is Bollinger Brut. I wonder how it rates on the Wine Spectator scale. I’m still waiting for Kirkland beer. They say it’s on the way.

I bought Costco gas for the first time. Not a fantastic deal, at $3.94 for premium. But at least it was convenient.

My biggest problem with Costco is my South Florida location. Florida Power and Light is the worst power company on earth, and only a fool would rely on a deep freeze here. You can count on losing your power for several hours once or twice a year, with or without hurricanes. If you can’t freeze a lot of food, Costco doesn’t work optimally. Sad. I freeze a few things, but I can’t do what I would really like to do.

I got a crazy idea today. I decided I was going to satisfy a lifelong curiosity. I was going to buy one or more S.W. “Red” Smith products and try them. You’ve seen this stuff, sitting on the counter at convenience stores. Big jars of red mystery fluid, containing eggs or sausages or pigs’ feet. My mom used to love those pigs’ feet.

I have never been brave enough to try that stuff, but curiosity is killing me, and think what a conversation piece one of those jars would be. But it turns out Costco doesn’t sell them. I had Costco confused with Gordon Food Service.

Some day.

The Smith factory is about 20 miles from me, believe it or not. So if I gave them a bad review, they might drive down here and pound me.

I bought red potatoes. They were so cheap that even if I have to throw out two-thirds of them, they’re still a good deal.

It’s too bad the local Costco doesn’t sell ground chuck, which is my favorite type of ground beef. I’d get ten pounds, mix garlic and salt in, and freeze some third-of-a-pound patties. Burgers just aren’t as good, when the salt and seasonings are only on the outside. Before making patties, I could also let the meat sit in the fridge until it got a little brown. Let’s face it. Slightly funky burgers are better than fresh ones.

Here is an informative quote from a story about the Smith company, which belongs to people named Foster:

Complying with USDA regulations for all meat businesses, the Fosters recently hired a lab to test the shelf stability of their sausage by having a piece injected with listeria, a bacteria that sometimes grows in meat and dairy products and can be fatal to humans.

”After a particular amount of time soaking in our solution, it actually killed the listeria,” Jonathan Foster said. “It’s the perfect hurricane food . . . depending on your taste.”

Maybe I don’t need a freezer. Maybe I need a big barrel of vinegar.

The company is now run by two brothers. Here’s a ringing endorsement:

”If you didn’t grow up eating them, say as a child, you probably won’t become a customer,” Jonathan Foster said, adding emphatically that pigs feet are not an ethnic food, but a regional delicacy favored in the southeastern United States.

In fact, the brothers themselves haven’t sampled the product.

”We keep telling each other that late one Saturday night we might dare each other to do it,” Foster said.

Good God, boys. You have to do better than that. Maybe I should run up there and talk to these guys.

Talk me out of going to Gordon Food Service.