The funniest and cutest reactions come from young, tatooed guys that are waiting in line at the grocery store to buy alcohol. I usually say something like, “Oooh, it looks like you guys are hosting a barbecue. It’s a great day for it.” They usually just cock their head to the side, like they can’t believe that someone would just make nice conversation with them. Then they usually say something like, “Yeah, we are having a barbecue and we’re going to make ribs and John over here is going to smoke a turkey and we might even do some salmon.”
I’ve found that most people are totally open to a little friendly conversation. I’ve gotten some really great recipe and cooking tips from people standing in line at the grocery store.
One young group of fellows was standing in line with several different bottles of really cheap wine like Boone’s Farm Strawberry hill and a few other things that were similar. So I chimed in with the “havin’ a barbecue?” and they told me that they have recently started a local winery and their wine will specifically be fruit based (but not grape) and so they were comparing this cheap, awful, but fruit based wine to get more info. They were in their early 20’s, but one of the fellow’s father owned a big farm and helped his son and some investors get a winery up and running. They were currently experimenting with apricot and apple and blackberries. They wanted to make sure that they perfected some really good wine that would be accepted as legitimate fruit based wines that would not be looked down upon in the way that the Boone’s farm stuff is. Boy, I learn a lot at the grocery store.
And yesterday when my friend and I were at an Asian grocery store, looking for mushrooms, we ran into a guy (who we smiled at and spoke to) who was a local chef and he turned us on to some nifty items that had been looking at, but had no idea what they were. Turns out that they were Chinese Chives (the sign had them spelled as cheivre). Then he walked with us through the produce section and showed us some other great Asian produce and how to use it.