Do you have a favorite grocery store? I don’t do a lot of grocery shopping. My husband is our cook and prefers to do his own shopping, so I go with him occasionally. Trader Joes is a go-to…and we have discovered that some locations of Trader Joes are just too good to pass up. Our own store is nice. It is a combination of small and intimate and stocked and ready, even when it’s crowded. It tends to busy much of the time and has the usual too-tight parking lot that most Trader Joes are known for.

Yesterday we went to walk at a beautiful state beach in Laguna–and nearby there is a wonderful Trader Joes. It has all the usual TJ qualities including fresh flowers, interesting snacks, 99 cent greeting cards (that are actually good), and everything you need to make an easy, tasty dinner. In addition, it also has large stand-up freezers with doors (most other TJs have the low reach-in variety that you look down into) which also seems to mean that they have a larger selection of frozen items. They also stock artisan bread from a local bakery (yum!)–definitely worth stopping in when in the area. Yesterday we had the bonus perk of finding spring colored mini bags! I have no idea what I will do with them…yet!

I appreciate that different stores cater to the needs and wants of their clientele. And I like both the surprise and the familiar of walking into a new-to-me TJs and discovering something I haven’t seen or expected. Sometimes the next time I go into my own store, I find that item there too.

What do you like about your go-to grocery store? What do you wish they’d do differently? I like that TJs seems to want to know.