My Grandmother loved to food shop. She’d go to Waldbaum’s for cold cuts, appetizing, pickles, fruit, veggies, a whole chicken to roast, eggs, cereal, cabbage, mayo, prune juice, jelly rings, coffee ice cream, paper goods, and several cans of tuna fish. Then she’d go to Pantry Pride for more cans of tuna on special and additional paper goods. My Grandfather built long narrow shelves in their one car garage for her to house all of the extras in a makeshift pantry. At any given time, just alongside of the gold Impala would be over 30 cans of backup tuna and more toilet paper than a high rise in Manhattan could use in a pandemic.
Grandma never counted her stash, but every time she was in the grocery store, she added, regardless of whether or not they had used any of the overstocked items since the last time that she shopped. She’d return from the store and shelve all the newbies, lovingly running her hands over the neatly stacked cans and rolls. She really had pantry pride. I can totally relate to this simple abundance, however, living in an apartment I certainly don’t have a garage with which to store my extras. So I am forced to use the scrunched space above the washer dryer where my golf clubs currently reside for excess paper towels that don’t fit in the cabinet above the sink. And the top of the linen closet doubles as space for extra paper goods and Ziplocs. In the City, every possible square inch of space is fair game to store something.
I do cook, so unlike Carrie Bradshaw, I can’t use my oven for sweaters, but I have to confess that I have imagined that space stacked with dry goods—rows of cannellini beans, hot chocolate canisters, low sodium chicken broth boxes, sliced almonds, chopped walnuts, cereal for one in those environmentally unfriendly Styrofoam containers, black beans, panko bread crumbs, regular bread crumbs, baking powder, baking soda and more. Ok, I guess I wouldn’t need the baking powder or baking soda since my oven would not be operational as it would be busy housing my new pantry.
I do have three tins of StarKist Tuna in my cabinet, but I never even think to use them. They are dubbed “only for emergency” cans and at the moment, I’m not stockpiling more than three. My cabinets are tidy and I can see all of the items I do have, which gives me a strange sense of comfort. So although I can’t start my own grocery store with my extras, I guess I have inherited a bit of pantry pride from Grandma. And I smile when I think of her consistently adding to her collection.
jenslittleblackbook.com 