Category Archives: Shops & Markets

Mike (my husband) reports today in San Leandro Bytes that the city council will be voting on allowing a new farmer’s market to operate in San Leandro. This market would operate downtown on Wednesday evenings from 4pm to 9pm starting on May 14, 2008, and continuing through October 22, 2008. I, for one, would really like to have it!
More information at http://www.pcfma.com/markethome.php?market_id=21

I’ve written here before about how much I like Joaquin Deli before. It serves the best sandwiches in San Leandro and offers a quirky assortment of Eastern European products. Its roasted pork shoulder is also to die for.
But Joaquin Deli is closing. The building is up for sale – and there is no guarantee the new owners will want to keep the deli. Indeed, the current owners seem to think not as their flyer says that the downstairs could be used as as “medical/dental office”.
Apparently the business is not doing badly, but the owners are just tired of running it. Still, it can’t be doing that well if they’re not trying to sell the business itself. So I’m not optimistic. I’ll just have to say goodbye to those delicious sandwiches

I’ve been in San Leandro for almost 6 years now, and yet I just discovered PW Market in Castro Valley. I’ve received their flyers all along, but as they weren’t local to me I always just tossed them in the recycle bin. Then my friend Regina mentioned she was going to go there to get some pastries for our tea last Sunday and she took me along.
PW could be described as a quasi-upscale supermarket. Most of the products it carries are those that you can find at most supermarkets, but it does have great meat and deli departments. Granted, we’re only a couple of days from Thanksgiving but when we visited they had goose, pheasant and rabbit available in addition to turkeys and chickens. Their meat department features prime-grade beef (something which is hard to find at retail stores) at very reasonable prices. Their lamb offerings, however, were poorer. The two racks of lamb I saw looked sad and I couldn’t see any lamb shanks. They did seem to have a large variety of seafood, however.
We were quite impressed by their cheese section, it didn’t feature many local favorites like Whole Food does, but there was a wide variety and the one French brie we got was delicious.
Their deli offered plenty of pasta-style salads, and their bakery section though small is very nice. We got a couple of lemon bars, a little mocha cheesecake, some scones and an apple bread pudding and they were all delicious.
On the minus side, they didn’t seem to carry much in the exotic ingredient category. I couldn’t find either Jerusalem artichokes or Israeli couscous there.

for this week is FREEDEL3
(one more flyer into the recycling bin)

I just found an ad for the Crossroads World Market in Hayward. I want to throw the ad away, but I want to make sure I remember the information so I can go check it out sometime. It sells Greek and European delicacies and I definitely need to go to check it out.
Crossroads World Market
230 Jackson St. (at Soto next to DMV)
Hayward
510.582.2231
M-Sa 9-7, Su 10-5

free shipping with a 50 minimun order: FREEDEL2

La Plaza Market AKA La Cubana is a Latin market in the San Fernando Valley. My father shops there for Argentine meat cuts for their weekly asado, and they have a plethora of other products imported from all over Latin America. From Argentina they have several brands of cookies, dulce de leche, yerba mate, and even things such as flour (why?). It’s pretty cool and I recommend it to anyone in the Valley.
La Plaza Market
19239 Roscoe
Northridge, CA
818-701-5005

Casa Lucas Market (Number 2, the first one is in San Francisco) is a pretty cool Latin American market on East 14th in San Leandro. As you would expect they have a large selection of Mexican products, but they also carry an eclectic selection of other Latin American products. It’s a relatively small store, so their selection /is/ limited.
I usually go there to buy empanada shells (tapas para empanadas), they also have a nice selection of yerba mate (including in little bags) and a few canned jams and Savora mustard, for some reason. They only have small jars of dulce de leche, though. They did have Havana alfajores (no habannets, though), at $1.60 each they are expensive (about 3Xs what they cost in Argentina) but ooooh, so good.
Anyway, in today’s trip I was able to find cassava (manioc) flour which I need for my Bahian meal (they also have white & yellow corn flour, rice flour and even banana flour) and guaran

We threw a birthday party for our 3 yo last weekend, and I was too lazy (or busy), to prepare the food myself. As per someone’s suggestion I just went to Costco and got a platter of veggies, one of cut fruit and one of rolled sandwiches. I algo got a couple of big bags of chips and a birthday cake. The prices of everything were significantly cheaper than at the supermarket – though I didn’t compare sizes. In any case, we had about twice as much food as we needed for a party of 7 children and about ten adults.
The quality of the produce was generally good. I didn’t care for the papaya, but the sweet pineapple was delicious. The sandwiches went over well, though I would have liked them more with baby spinach or arugula instead of lettuce. The most disappointing part (for me) was the birthday cake. The white cake tasted like that from a mix, the chocolate mousse had virtually no chocolate taste, though the cream-cheese frosting wasn’t bad. Mike and others liked it but I wouldn’t buy one from there again. At about $15 for a huge cake, it was a VERY good deal.