Day 51 of Raw - Austin's Whole Foods

If we're dreaming... PLEASE DON'T WAKE US UP!!!

If you ever get a chance to visit Whole Foods in Austin, please do! This place is absolutely fantastic. It has an underground parking garage and two huge floors to wander!! YES!! Two floors!!

Chris and I were in Austin this past weekend as vendors for the metaphysical fair at Park Plaza. We knew before we left that we'd be spending a lot of free time at Whole Foods. And guess what? They have a Raw Food bar restaurant section!

Boy oh boy were we in hog heaven!!! The first night we were there, we ordered the raw lasagne which was just incredibly awesome. Also had the Not Really Refried Bean Tostada and Almost Cheesecake - Raspberry. I thought I was going to have to rope Chris away from the cheesecake! Fortunately when I got home I found we have the recipe!!! And one for the Key Lime Pie as well...

Before dinner we tried a shot of wheat grass juice, the elixer of the Gods. It was our first experience with wheat grass juice. The health benefits for one shot of this green juice are touted as being one of the best things we can do for our bodies. You can learn more about wheat grass juice by doing an internet search. They will even show you how to grow it at home and have fresh "shots" every morning. I can say that after my shot of wheat grass juice I felt a LOT of energy flow thru my body - almost as if I'd had a B12 shot. Never have had a B12 shot, but have heard others describe it. The way it sounds is the way I felt. I wished we could have had wheat grass shots before working our booth each day. But we did have our oxy water which is extremely energizing too and lasts all day long.

The second night we went to Whole Foods for dinner, we loaded up our containers from the salad bar and dined in luxury on fresh, delicious salad fixings. YUM, YUM!!!

Here's a write up I thought you might enjoy about the Whole Foods in Austin from the Post Gazette from about a year ago:

Whole Foods goes awesome in Austin, Texas

Whole Foods opens a huge new market and entertainment enterprise in Austin

Thursday, May 05, 2005By Marlene Parrish, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

AUSTIN, Texas -- It has the complexity of an exotic marketplace, is almost as big as a Wal-Mart and serves up as much fun as Kennywood Park.
Karen Reiter, Whole Foods

Austin celebrated the grand opening of the Whole Foods Market landmark store and world headquarters in March, and Lynn Larson was there on opening day.

"I'm a real foodie, and this store is a perfect fit with my lifestyle," said the former Ben Avon resident. "A week or so ago, friends called and wanted to get together with my husband and me, but they didn't have a lot of time. I suggested we meet and have dinner at Whole Foods."
After nailing a table at the organic and natural food store, they scattered to the food islands, each selecting a dinner -- Mexican, Indian and seafood. After eating, the foursome picked out desserts, went outside on the patio, listened to live music and hung out.

All this in a grocery store?

The March 3 opening of this mega-store celebrates the company's 25th anniversary year. The Austin-born company's largest store, at 80,000 square feet, is located at Sixth and Lamar, just blocks from where Whole Foods Market began as a small neighborhood grocer 25 years ago.
Sorry, but your mom's food isn't better. She could cook better only if she cut and aged her own meat and poultry, smoked her briskets and ribs, picked produce fresh from her organic garden and orchards and made meals fresh and from scratch every morning. Her pantry would be free of artificial colors, flavors, sweeteners, preservatives and hydrogenated fats.

Here's the reality. Whole Foods Market may be the new Supermom.

Free-standing islands are interspersed in the aisles. Each one seems to confirm what we already know: Texas is big.

Some highlights:

A farmers' market display of stacked organic seasonal fruit, vegetables and flowers greets customers at the entrance. Beyond, ringing the grocery aisles, are mini-cafe islands, each named after an Austin landmark, and each featuring a sit-down counter and menu.

Lamar Street Greens -- You can hop on a stool and sip a glass of wine while a chef composes your salad. I munched spring greens with asparagus, wild mushrooms and smoked tomatoes and a Gruyere crouton.

Fifth Street Seafood -- Choose from 150 types of seafood ready to be sliced, fried, rubbed, shucked or cooked to order. I sampled hand-cut wild salmon with a lemon herb rub and chipotle butter. In the unlikely event you want salt for your food, you are handed a small cup of sea salt to pinch and sprinkle.

North Side Trattoria -- Revel in a dozen handmade pastas and sauces, ready to eat or to go.
Want to cool off with a beer? A walk-in beer cooler stocks 800 kinds. To help winnow the choices, have a seat at the beer-tasting bar.

There are more fermented dairy products than in Harrod's in London. To anchor the displays for the sale of Parmegiano-Reggiano, I counted 18 whole wheels of cheese.

Seventy cuts of meat (including venison racks and buffalo roasts) are prepared in-house. Organic meats are aged on site, and an in-house smoker prepares briskets and ribs Texas-style.
Artisan breads beckon to be stuffed with charcuterie. Empanadas and pizzas bake in the brick oven.

Vats of chili -- all meat, all bean, beef or buffalo -- are ready to ladle. At The Noodle Bar soups soothe frazzled nerves, and the Bistro Bar serves comfort food. There's a satay counter, a stir-fry nook and a juice bar. Choosing from more than 50 chef-prepared oven-ready dishes is mind-boggling.

Parisian-style tarts and tortes are the work of 14 pastry chefs, who are not too busy to concoct your favorite dessert. A sweet tooth is sated with handmade lollipops, popcorn balls, fudge and a flowing chocolate fountain for enrobing fresh and dried fruit.

My personal favorite? At the Hot Nut Bar, the push of a button starts roasted nuts in coffee bean-like grinders to dispense swirls of fresh nut butters -- peanut, almond, hazelnut. More than 32 kinds of novelty seasoned nuts are ready to be bagged to go. We liked honey tangerine almonds and cinnamon pistachios.

It's not all foodThe store features a Whole Body section of natural and organic body care and cosmetics. Sampling lotions and other products is encouraged. The chain's first all-organic clothing section is here with a private dressing room.

Even the "normal" aisles are abnormal. Lighting in the produce section is the kind you find in art galleries. Classical music plays. Store signs are made of eco-friendly wheat straw, not plastic.
Innovation goes on even after the platinum Visa has a meltdown. Wheel those groceries down to the underground parking area riding the escalator ramp. The cart's auto-locking wheels clamp safely onto the moving metal grid.

The mega-shopping experience is not for everybody, especially those who are easily overwhelmed. Not me. The multilayer, super-sensual experience knocked my socks off.
The man behind the menuJohn Mackey, 51, is the founder of Whole Foods. Mackey began 27 years ago with the tiny Safer Way Natural Foods store in Austin. Two years later, he co-founded Whole Foods. There are now 168 stores and counting, including a Pittsburgh location.
"Whole Foods thinks shopping should be fun," he says. "With this store, we're pioneering a new lifestyle that synthesizes health and pleasure."

Nobody's admitting to the cost of the new store, but supermarket real estate experts place it as high as $15 million, or about twice the industry average. A company spokesperson says all of the innovations are prototypes. If Austin shoppers embrace the ideas, some will be added to new and existing stores.

Whole Foods plans to build 58 new stores, 50,000-square-foot versions, in the next four years.
Pittsburgh's Whole Foods Market store team leader Casey Dill says at 37,000 square feet, the East Liberty location is considered a medium store. "The super-large stores are not for every city or every location. As for innovative ideas, meat and cheese aging rooms that were once considered new are now a fixture in most of our stores, including Pittsburgh."