Grocery Shopping

I know that many people think that grocery shopping is a mundane chore, but it is one of my favorite routine tasks. I had a fantastic history professor in undergrad, the late Dr. Marvin Rosen, who referred to the modern grocery store as the Museum of Food. Dr. Rosen, in his engaging and entertaining lectures on European history and Marxism, would crack jokes and jump around the room, creating a memorable narrative of 16th century England, among other topics. In one of his lectures on the development of early capitalist systems, he commented on how amazing it is that we can cruise the aisles of the grocery store and pick up everything from tumeric to quinoa, coconut to couscous, all relatively affordable to the middle classes- the Museum of Food. For me, a trip to Whole Foods and our local Indian market on a Saturday is definitely a reminder of the amazing system of global capitalism (for better or worse), and how crazy it is that I can create a menu for the week that includes Indian Spiced Seitan, made with such exotic spices as tumeric, mustard seeds, and cumin, while not so long ago people kept sugar in locked cabinets and trading spices was a driving force in many regional economies.