Welcome back to my autism-aware shopping trip through the grocery store. Week by week, I'm showing you what the store sells, prune down the selection to what's safe for me (because autistic people can have very sensitive systems) and point out various "gotchas" the store tries to make you buy- stuff you didn't come for and don't need.
As a reminder, I shop with the following conditions in mind:
- dairy-free
- low sugar
- avoid ultraprocessed junk
- avoid food coloring
- conditional vegetarianism
- avoid high histamine foods
- awareness of gluten-free options and sugar-free options
Last week we met the baking aisle and the milk and cheese parts of the dairy aisle. We learned there about eleventy billion types of sweeteners, and most of them are bad for autistic people, found two different "snack" sections in the dairy section, and yet another in the baking aisle. Sensing a trend?
Onward, to the pasta, "world foods," and taco aisle!
I like a lot of things in this aisle, at least in theory.
As promised, the pasta section. Many brands, many types of noodles, decision paralysis central. Almost invariably this is all ultra-processed. Whole grain noodles exist, but on account of them having a stronger flavor than the typical ones, there isn't as much demand or selection.
There are some alternatives if you're health conscientious or gluten-free, but I have yet to have really good reports on any particular type of wheat noodle substitute. At any rate, at least there's something available.
Tortillas and taco kits, and also my finger at the top there. Oops. Tortillas and taco shells, like pasta, mainly come in nutrient-deficient varieties and in various sizes. A couple whole grain options are available, but again, you may not be able to get exactly what you were looking for.
Next, assorted taco seasoning packets and sauces. You always want to check the latter for their sugar content, because unfortunately that's where the sugar sneaks in. Imported items typically have less sneaky sugar, but it's always smart to check.
How many kinds of refried beans does a person need?! But this is also pickled peppers, bags of rice, and cans of whole beans. Notably, many of these varieties of refried beans have lard (an animal product) mixed into them for extra flavor. I have to buy the vegetarian type.
Aww, but we were doing so well... Hello, sugar bombs! Coca Cola from Mexico (ie: sweetened with cane sugar, not high fructose corn syrup), and various less US-recognizable sugary drinks. To my great and abiding disappointment, the peach nectar drink up there has very little to do with actual peach juice. As I mentioned during the first installment of this grocery store exploration, juice is also sugar bombs. But, I have a soft spot for peach juice because I drank it every morning when I visited Greece for a couple weeks in school. Every day there was an adventure, and so I miss the flavor.
Cheese products (spread, sauce, or perhaps "ooze") plus many kinds of canned salsa and guacamole. Maybe it's because I lack imagination, but I'm pretty happy with a mild salsa, and if I want something fancier I'll make it. I dunno. At any rate, many brands, many options.
Back to the pasta side of things: it's the choice paralysis-inducing selection of red sauce. Off my picture, I can count 14 brands of sauce, and I'm pretty sure there's at least 6 more down the way. You'd think red sauce would pretty much just be savory, right?
Yeah. Red sauce is sugar bombs. Depressing.
The good news is that there's still some you can find in this vast sea of options that are low sugar. You just have to hunt really hard for them. I try to get mine with 3 grams of sugar per serving or less.
Apropos of literally nothing, here's the gluten-free section. Why the pasta aisle? Why right in the middle? Is it to make gluten-free people grumpy because they have to walk by so much gluten to get there? I have no idea.
The section is mostly snacks, which is even worse... but down at the bottom you can find the Cup For Cup brand baking mixes, which I used to make a pretty okay pie crust from this year for my gluten-free black razz pie. You'll also note some extra pasta options, "bread crumbs," and premade pie crusts and cake mixes.
Right back to the pasta stuff without batting an eye. I really don't understand the logic in these arrangements, but here's the parmesan cheese and extra fixings for your pasta sauce. Including canned mushrooms. Ew. Also on the lower shelves, pizza options. Pizza sauce, pizza kits, and premade pizza crusts, including a gluten-free cauliflower option.
What's that you say? There weren't enough snacks in this aisle? Don't worry, the powers that be agree with you!
Ahem. So, this is (I guess) the rest of the world foods section. We had the sugar bomb drinks earlier, but now we also have various British and pan-European snack options. It's just as well I wasn't hungry when I took these pictures, because I've had several of those Stroopwaffels on airplanes and now I kind of want some.
The first picture is more pan-Asian snacks and convenience foods, including sugar bomb drinks at the bottom, wasabi peas, Pocky, and savory snacks.
It doesn't matter. It's all ultraprocessed and nutrient-free.
Bleeding into the pan-Asian snacks is the Asian sauces section. No particular care is given to what part of Asia was involved with which sauce, as teriyaki sauce (Japanese) is just a single shelf down from kimchi (Korean) sauce, and just a few more shelves down is Indian curry of various types. Slightly more care is given to these things in Asian food stores in the US, but not much. On behalf of my entire country, I apologize for our incredible ignorance of the differences between Asian countries.
And because we definitely didn't have enough snacks on our trip through this aisle, here's some imported candy, sweets, and just enough pantry essentials to let the store pretend it's offering things besides snacks.
Based on the matzos and latke (potato pancake) mix, I guess this section is meant to serve Jewish cooking needs as well, though I'll have to keep an eye out for anything in the meat section calling itself kosher. Nothing comes to mind, to be perfectly honest.
Next aisle: canned and bottled stuff! Beans, pickles, canned veggies. Also salad dressing, ketchup, mustard, BBQ sauce, etc.
Canned tomatoes of many varieties, with and without flavorings. Diced tomatoes, slices, stewed chunks, and sauce. You can find versions with Italian herbs mixed in, or Tex-Mex versions with seasonings and even jalapeno pepper chunks. Tomatoes are either a high histamine food or a histamine-releaser food... and either way, I mostly avoid them. You're going to hear me talk about histamines a lot in this aisle.
Canned vegetables. The number of options here is a little dizzying. Industrial canning unfortunately tends to destroy some of the nutritional content of vegetables, so my mother tended to use fresh or frozen versions rather than these. But I've had canned green beans in hot lunch at school. Ick. Canned vegetables are also higher in histamines, which means I'm better off avoiding them. I think the only exception to my blanket "nope" for this aisle is canned corn, which I'll use if fresh isn't available.
Corn isn't a vegetable, by the way. It's a grain.
Beans. Protein source for vegetarians everywhere. I only recall eating kidney and refried beans growing up, but that's most likely because I didn't pay attention. There are a staggering variety of beans. This last year or so I've learned to appreciate cannellini beans, but there's still great northern beans and pinto beans and a lot more. Baked beans are typically sugar bombs, by the way.
Vinegar. This is a very high histamine food, and so is pretty much anything made with it. It also wrecks my spouse's guts, so despite all the interesting flavors on the left, we just keep walking. My mother says you can substitute lemon juice for vinegar in many recipes, and it's much kinder to the gut. I've yet to try this trick, but it seems potentially valuable.
Pickles. Again, a high histamine food. Histamines make me feel like I'm dying, a bit. And the foods high in them taste bad to me, so I typically avoided them anyway. It's a shame because fermented foods can be really good for your gut. They can help restore a balance of bacteria, or even introduce new beneficial bacteria.
Gravy type sauces. I actually have no idea how difficult it is to make gravy from scratch because I typically only see gravy packets and such, like these. I also don't eat gravy much because it's almost invariably full of inhumanely handled animal products. It's definitely tasty when I do get to have it, though.
Hot sauce, steak sauce, barbecue/barbeque sauce, ketchup, and mustard. Watch the sugar content on the BBQ sauce and the ketchup. Even a couple grams in a tablespoon serving adds up very fast in meals.
Bread crumbs. Yeah, there's a whole section just for bread crumbs. Including gluten-free ones. What can I say? USians love our breaded and fried foods.
Rice! Everything from the typical nutritionless, fiberless white rice to brown rice and wild rice, or mixed varieties. It's mostly white rice, because that's the staple and people aren't used to rice with actual flavor.
Did you know there's hundreds of types of rice? I can name Jasmine and Basmati rice but there's also Jata, Kebo, Gharib, Ariete, Hieri, Murni, Khushbu, and a ton more. There's types used to make rice wine, glutinous and non-glutinous types, red and black rice, aromatic rice... Rice also comes in long grain, short grain, and medium grain varieties. While all the varieties I named above are from other countries, even the US has dabbled in creating rice varieties.
You can only find a few kinds of rice here, but it's enough to serve most USians. On the far side of this section and at the top: convenience rice meal starters. Basically, rice package with seasonings and/or sauce powder. Toss in a protein and a heaping helping of vegetables and you basically have a meal.
The convenience rice section bleeds right into the convenience pasta section, which is the same sauce powder/spices deal, but with noodles instead. Obviously, your options for gluten-free are limited... although they're not nonexistent. The other thing to watch out for here is cheese. We love dairy in the US, and cheese features prominently in this section. If it's not parmesan or cheddar, it's some kind of cheese ooze (Velveeta) or similar ideas.
I actually don't hate Velveeta, as it's much lower dairy content than most of what's in this aisle. It's relatively safe for me and my spouse (who is lactose-intolerant) to consume, so we keep some onhand.
The problem, of course, is that like white rice, regular noodles convert very quickly in the gut to sugar, so eating noodles is nearly as bad for you as eating sugar straight. Which is why these meal starters, while comforting to have around, are very firmly in the "sometimes treat" territory.
Honorable mention to the several feet wide section for the health-conscientious-but-still-likes-Mac'n'cheese crowd. The stuff here ranges from organic (eh) to goat cheese or pseudocheese (for dairy-sensitive people) to gluten-free noodles.
Suddenly, salad stuff! Croutons and salad dressing. Mostly the latter. Croutons, bacon bits, onion bits, and etc. are fine, but I never bother with them. Salad dressing, on the other hand... is a trap. People eat salads because they want to be healthy, right? Yeah, now look at the calorie counts on these.
Two tablespoons of this, and you might as well have just had bacon crumbled over your salad. Also, dairy! This ranch isn't sugar bombs, but let's look a little further...
Yep, there it is. 90 calories for 2 tablespoons, but 8 grams of sugar. Yikes. Literally the first ingredient is sugar.
Happy medium? 130 calories and 4 grams of sugar for 2 tablespoons. Also this dressing seems to be full of vinegar and pickles, which is a bad plan for me and my histamine issues.
So, if salad dressings are a trap, what do you do instead if you don't like the flavor of greens?
I typically opt for olive oil, salt, and pepper, honestly. Olive oil is noted to be good for you, and the salt and pepper adds enough that I don't get offput by the bitterness of the arugula or whatever else.
That's aisles 12 and 11! Next time, soups, crackers, nuts, granola, and we inch ever closer to the actual snacks aisles. Because, y'know, there weren't enough snacks in the rest of the store.
