DIET changes and moving

Diet changes certainly add to the challenge of moving especially when your used to a certian type of food. Going from fish and greens to meat and potatoes has shown a mixed reaction from my body.

Challenges:
Quality fresh fruits and vegetables
Fish
Organic Foods & Supplies
Healthy Restraunts
Cultured Foods

Quality fresh fruits & vegetables
I don't know about you but spending money on "fresh" fruit and vegetables has yealded costly. The fruit is picked too early and molds or rotts before it ripens. I have thrown out more fruit than I have almost eaten. When you do get good fruit, it's expensive but tastes wonderful. This is not just a local issue but nationwide. The local farmers market is the only way to go here. Now during the winter we go back to either canned fruit or the cardboard crap they sell in the stores.

Fish
This one has proved obvious. One cannot get "fresh" fish this far inland without paying $17.00 a pound for a $2.00 fish. When you come from the coast where FRESH fish is abundant you know what fresh is. The grocery stores here seem to treat their fish with something that masks the odor but not the texture or cloudyness of the liquid. Nice try... There is a fish store here that I have not purchased at only becuase the prices are shockingly overpriced. The frozen fish is imported from Tailand and other far off countries and when defrosted smell like the dead fish. The only fish I have gotten here worth eating is at the restraunts, it has the closest taste to fresh fish. So when I eat out, it's fish I seek first.

Organic Foods & Supplies
Trader Joe's & Whole foods market were top of my list back home. The nearest stores are about 3 hours away, too far for my hoopty car to make the trip. So the only "whole foods" type store in town is also pretty expensive and has little selection. Their dairy cooler is usually too close in expiration for me meaning they don't move products fast enough. There are a couple of main stream grocers here that offer organic alternatives to things such as kechup and chicken but not all in one store, so a few trips are needed.

Healthy Restraunts
Almost every fast food chain that exists is here along with the typical restraunts. Even the smaller local joints offer the same basic foods, burgers, overpriced salads, fried stuff and goopy sandwiches. The local fave here is called a horseshoe. My stomach churned to look at it when I moved here. Imagine a bottom bun with a heafty burger patty loaded with fries and topped with a cheese sauce. The secret is in the cheese sauce, so they say. A coronary on a plate! There are a few little hippy joints peppered around town that have things such as the illusive avacado or a bean sprout here and there but their hours of operation are odd making them difficult to visit.

Cultured Foods
It is true, you can't get good Chinese food in the mid west, let alone sushi, forget it! Although Osaka came here offering Japanese cuisine that is pretty damn good. What I would do for a great Greek restraunt with authentic Greek food and maybe even a little music. The Chinese restraunts are pretty much all the same, along with the Mexican. We need more REAL cultured restraunts!