Hot Lunch: Whole Foods Market

A recent Tuesday found my brother and me picking through the precooked items at Whole Foods Market, each arranged with a painterly eye toward attracting young, hungry and adventurous diners. Most any taste can be satisfied here, meat lovers and vegans both. After I rang up a meal priced at $7.99 a pound, regardless of items, my biodegradable tray contained a wedge of mushroom and beef meatloaf topped with a sweet barbecue sauce, vegan cucumber salad with purple onions and dill and a cooked-down succotash called Mexican Corn and Tomatoes. A bottle of Green Dragon Tea gathered beads of condensation at our table near the grinding and whirling of Whole Foods’ coffee counter.

Towne Center at Cedar Lodge

7529 Corporate Blvd.

218-0452

Open daily, 8 a.m. to 10 p.m.

Visa, MasterCard, AmEx, Discover

The food was nice, better than you can reasonably expect from dishes cooked en masse and served cafeteria style. The meatloaf retained the earthy tone of the mushrooms, and the cucumbers provided the sort of pleasant and refreshing high note that makes cold salads such a hit during our infernal summers. The Mexican corn dish was much too heavy with the spicy smokiness of chipotles, but that hardly mattered. My brother and I were at Whole Foods because it is our grocery store for single people. The food is good, but we go to brush elbows with the single girl and her friends putting raw sugar in their 16-oz. lattes, to make small talk in the wine aisle, and to establish that little shred of credibility that comes with a curious or approving glance into your basket from a passing single.

For more by Frank McMains, including blogs from his trip to China, click here.