There are people who travel for art, for architecture, for the vague promise of self-improvement. And then there are those of us who cross borders for a bag of frozen orange chicken and a seasoning blend that tastes like it was engineered in a lab designed to make restraint impossible.

I fall into the latter camp. Not casually, not ironically. I am, for better or worse, a food person in the fullest sense. I cook the way some people scroll, constantly and a little compulsively, chasing flavours, tinkering, adjusting, tasting again. The kitchen is where I spend my time and attention, which is probably why a grocery store managed to get this far under my skin.

For the past few years, any trip south has followed a familiar rhythm. Land, check in, and then, with a kind of low-grade urgency, locate the nearest Trader Joe’s. Boston, New York, a quiet stretch of Vermont, even Syracuse in the summer, it didn’t matter. The store was the destination, everything else a supporting act. I would go in with a list and leave with something closer to a haul: Mandarin Orange Chicken, a block of Unexpected Cheddar, a sunscreen that whispers luxury while costing less than lunch, dark chocolate peanut butter cups that make a convincing case against moderation, and at least two jars of Crunchy Chili Onion because one is never enough.

It’s the seasonings, though, that first pulled me in. Onion salt that somehow tastes fuller than the sum of its parts. A salmon rub that makes you feel like you know what you’re doing. These are not pantry staples so much as quiet little victories, the kind that make a weeknight dinner feel like you meant it.

I haven’t been back in a while. Call it a principled absence, or just fatigue with You Know Who. Either way, the distance has done nothing to dull the appetite. If anything, it’s sharpened it into something closer to ritual. In the absence of the real thing, I’ve taken to following Trader Joe’s Talia, who posts a steady stream of new and returning products with the calm authority of someone who understands exactly what’s at stake. I don’t know her, she doesn’t know me, and yet there I am, watching updates about freezer aisle arrivals as if they were breaking news. (more…)