I wouldn’t give up your holiday dinner reservations at Fore Street, Back Bay Grill or any of our other great Portland restaurants.  Nor should you cancel your holiday catering orders from Aurora Provisions.  But for perfectly good basic prepared food,  take a look at the new Hannaford Kitchen at the Forest Avenue store where everything from full dinners, sandwiches, pizzas, pastries, sushi, stir fry and more are cooked onsite.

The various food stations at Forest Avenue Hannaford

If you’re a food purist or devoted locavore these new food kiosks and counters at Hannaford will not cut the mustard.  Still, if you want the barest facsimile for Asian stir fry, pizza, mile-high sandwiches, even what the store calls signature grilled cheese sandwiches and daily dinner specials then they are available aplenty.

Also a new item at Hannaford is that they make their own mozzarella right at the store.  It’s the real thing and has about a 3-day shelf life.  It’s pretty good.

Handmade mozzarella at Hannaford

And sometimes the store has a unique product.  Recently I found black walnuts at the store.  These are hard to find, but Hannaford has two brands, Hammons ( the better one @$7.99 for an 8 ounce package) and Fisher black walnuts @2.59 for 2 ounces.

Hammons wild black walnuts at Hannaford

Beyond the Hannaford world, where to shop now has some high points.  The desultory aisles of Shaw’s are hardly ground-breaking. Change at that chain goes at a glacial pace.   But sometimes I shop there for the basics because the stores are never crowded.  One little item that caught my attention is a premium butter made by Land O Lakes.  I’ve tried it in baking and it’s terrific.  It’s an 82 percent high fat European style ($3.99 for half pound) butter.  Cabot used to make one (@ about $4.99 per pound) but no longer. I’ve not seen it anywhere else but at Shaw’s.

European style butter by Land O Lake at Shaw’s; sold salted and unsalted

For local dairy, the Portland Food Co-op has a fine selection including Houlton Farms Dairy, Swallowtail, Balfour, Tide Mill and many more offering quality cheese, milk, cream and butter, especially a cultured butter from Vermont that’s pretty precious

Whole Foods seems to have fallen a notch or two in both price points and diversity of gourmet products.  It’s still a fine store, but they’re trying to be more magnanimous and appeal to shoppers across the board.  I’ve noticed that they occasionally have some specialty items.  One was black garlic, a unique ingredient usually found in Asian markets.

Their meats are good but expensive. For my dime I generally choose meats from Pat’s Meat Market or Bisson’s. But  for special locally raised  meats I go to the The Farm Stand in South Portland or Rosemont.  I recently wanted pork cheeks (a wonderful cut of meat).  This is one of those unique cuts carried by nose-to-tail butchers like Rosemont or The Farm Stand. It’s great for braising.  I used it in a main course of cheeks braised in veal and ham stocks and a good dose of Kentucky bourbon.  Served over Anson Mills grits, the dish was very special.  See Wednesday Food for the recipes.

Braised pork cheeks in bourbon, veal and ham stock reduction over Anson Mills grits