Table for One
How to Grocery Shop for One
For singles, food shopping can be a challenge. This week, columnist Eric Kim shares his best supermarket secrets.
Table for One is a column by Senior Editor Eric Kim, who loves cooking for himself—and only himself—and seeks to celebrate the beauty of solitude in its many forms.
“I rarely go grocery shopping for myself,” my colleague Rebecca Sutter tells me.
Like many single people in metropolitan cities, Sutter lives alone and looks to other avenues to feed herself (restaurants, takeout, the giveaway table at Food52), stretching out the portions over multiple days. She does this, for one thing, because cooking for one in New York City can be as expensive as those other avenues—if not more so. When she does go to the grocery store, it’s to buy basics like pasta, soups, and snacks, but never something like, say, a steak.
I don't blame her. So much of what we buy in supermarkets is packaged for at least two shoppers. There’s nothing like emptying out half a can of soup and sticking the rest in the fridge to remind you that few things in life are designed for solo cooks and eaters. Only recently have grocery stores in America begun to sell single chicken breasts as opposed to the usual two- or three-pack; pre-cut, small-portioned packs of mixed fresh vegetables, like Brussels sprouts, zucchini, and squash; and even pint containers of portioned-out mirepoix, enough for a small batch of stew.
“If only there were some club I could join,” Sutter says, “where I could be like, ‘I only need half of this carrot. Who needs the rest of it?’ CSA shares? Forget about it; I could never sign up for one because all of that produce would just go to waste before I had a chance to even look at it.”
I started this column because I was sick of cooking recipes written for two, or for families of four to six. As someone who doesn’t enjoy eating the same thing twice, it was easy to start developing the single-serving recipes I wasn’t seeing myself on the Internet and in cookbooks years ago. But as my recipes gained traction, I started to get questions from readers who also wanted tips on how to shop for those recipes—especially when grocery stores can sometimes feel alienating for those of us who have just ourselves to feed.
But we adapt. If you are, like me, forever on the hunt for little tricks to make life easier, then look no further. Here are the main things that have led me to a more consistently pleasurable shopping experience—which, in turn, has also meant a chiller cooking and dining experience for one.
1. Identify a few key flavor players.
Everyone has their favorites: a small group of reliable condiments you love and use often in your daily cooking. These should be high-impact flavor bombs you can buy in little containers regularly, so they’ll never go to waste. My pantry, for instance, is never without all of the funky, fermented sauces (fish sauce, soy sauce, and Worcestershire sauce) and umami-rich pastes (miso, black bean, anchovy, and gochujang).
This posse of powerhouse pantry staples could also include non-sauces and non-pastes like kombu (edible kelp), which makes brilliant vegan broths, and gim (roasted seaweed snack), which I keep on hand at all times. To me, gim is much less a snack and more an instant flavoring agent that adds a nutty, saline hit to anything it’s crushed into: risotto, grits, kimchi fried rice. Helps, too, that gim comes in individual packets for single-use cooking.
2. Stock up on pantry-bound carbohydrates with long shelf lives.
You don’t need me to tell you about why starches like dried pasta and rice are useful to have on hand as sturdy bases to build meals off of; the idea, even more, is that you can buy a wide variety of these and utterly stuff your shelves like you’re preparing for the apocalypse (because they won’t go bad for months, even years). In addition to the pasta and rice, I’d add to this list: quinoa, barley, farro, grits or polenta, canned beans. Whenever I’m at the store, I always buy at least one of these—if not for that night’s dinner, for the gorgeous stash of carbs I’m amassing in my pantry, like a magpie’s trove of shiny objects.
3. Your freezer is your best friend (and your second pantry).
When I’m shopping for groceries, I’m not just thinking about my immediate meals; I’m planning for the future, as well. So when I see a gorgeous salmon fillet, or perfect ribeye steaks, or chicken thighs, or beautiful, thick-cut slabs of bacon that are on sale, I buy them on the spot. Because once I get home, I know that I can just stash single portions of each in the freezer for easy thawing later down the line. This works especially well with bacon, which I usually buy by the pound, roast a couple strips for myself right then and there, then freeze the rest in two-slice pouches.
Other good things to buy fresh and freeze for later: onions, peppers, all of the berries (blueberries, strawberries, cranberries), and bread. For most vegetables, however, like butternut squash, cauliflower, and broccoli, it is important to blanch them briefly first (which stops the oxidation process), then shock them in an ice bath before storing in the freezer.
4. Make smaller, more frequent trips a part of your dinner routine.
As Carla Lalli Music writes in Where Cooking Begins, "Shop for food often and purchase only what you'll consume in the next couple of days."
I recognize that this may apply more to those who live in big cities and are able to pop into a store after work, but even my mother, who lives in suburban Georgia, drives to H-Mart a few times a week. What this allows for is more intentional shopping, which is to say: As long as you’ve taken care of #1, #2, and #3 on this list and have an arsenal of delicious staples from which to build a meal, a smaller trip can mean looking for that one piece of fish, or that one perfect vegetable, to highlight for dinner. It can also mean that you’ll be less likely to buy things you don’t need (that will inevitably go bad because you didn't have a purpose for them in the first place).
5. Buy as much as you can from the bulk section.
Though it might seem counterintuitive, the bulk bins are where you can purchase exactly the amount you need and no more. This includes many of your dried base carbohydrates from #2. Extra credit if you bring your own bags. As for produce: I won’t go into why single-use plastics are the worst, but don’t fall for the individually packaged vegetables that I mentioned earlier (no matter how temptingly convenient they look). Just buy the whole onion, the whole carrot, the whole stalk of celery. It’ll be cheaper anyway, and what you don’t use within a week you can roast and add to cooked pasta or have alongside that gorgeous salmon fillet.
6. As for the items you can’t buy from the bulk section...
Like eggs, cheese, and milk—they’re not as perishable as you might think.
- Fresh eggs can keep for up to five weeks before they go bad; plus, they freeze surprisingly well (out of their shell, of course). I always freeze the leftover egg whites when I make recipes that only call for yolks. Then, as soon as I collect enough whites, I can just thaw them and make a pavlova or meringue cookies.
- When buying cheese, remember that the harder it is, the longer it’ll last. Parmesan and pecorino, for instance, keep in the fridge for weeks. If you’re dealing with blues and goats and other soft cheeses, however, just make sure to only buy what you can eat in a week or so.
- As for milk, I always buy the smallest quart-sized jug (which is about four cups) of pasteurized milk; since I only use it for coffee, I need it be able to hold up for a little while. My Korean cousin once asked me, “Why does American milk take so long to go bad?”
- Same goes for butter, by the way. Buy as much as you need; in the fridge, it'll last you about six to nine (!) months, some sources say. (Wrapped tightly, it'll last you even longer in the freezer.)
7. Stop buying stock and keep Better Than Bouillon on hand.
I’ve always felt that the greatest scam in the grocery store is boxed (or canned) stock. I don’t know about you, but the stuff tastes like water to me. Frankly, you might as well just use water. My life was forever changed once I discovered Better Than Bouillon, another high-impact flavor bomb (see #1) that lets you make as much broth as you need, whenever you need it. A teaspoon of the umami-rich paste makes a cup of broth, which is prodigiously useful when you’re cooking for just you. This is the way I see it: If you’re not making your own stock from scratch, then why not go for the prepared stuff that at least comes pretty darn close to tasting like homemade? And anyway, this stuff is, truly, better than bouillon.
8. Don’t overlook the freezer aisle.
This is where you can pick up other building blocks for delicious meals, like frozen shrimp, peas, broccoli, spinach, potato wedges, dumplings, and even rice. And it might go without saying, but I always sleep more soundly knowing there’s a single's pizza waiting for me in the freezer. Frozen dinners are inherently cheap and inherently single-serving. If you buy the right ones, you can really max out on their cost/benefit ratio. A 10-ounce Stouffer’s lasagna, for instance, costs $2.99; round it out with a homemade side salad (especially Little Gem and radicchio, the best lettuces for solo dinners because they're mini).
But if you are ever up for the project, just make your own big batch of lasagna, or stew, or whatever, and freeze it in individual portions for DIY TV dinners throughout the week.
9. Lastly, don’t forget about dessert—for one.
I always keep a jar of peanut butter and a bag of chocolate chips on hand, for those all-too-frequent moments, late into the night, when what I really need is a gooey, comforting sweet. As long as you have these two ingredients (and a few basic pantry staples, i.e. flour, milk, eggs), you’re never more than 10 minutes away from dessert—and you didn’t even have to run out to the store for ingredients.
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Written by: Eric Kim
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73 Comments
Produce is challenging too. Fresh herbs is the most expensive purchase so freeze, grow your own. Add peeled garlic cloves, peeled ginger (so all ready to grate) and cooked rice to things that go directly into the freezer. Pass on mesclun unless you are going to eat it that night as too fragile. When I commented to a farmer at the market that I was so impressed that his lettuce lived so long he told me that that was because when I bought it at the grocery it was already a week old. Don’t buy old produce. Cultivate a love of sturdy veggies like cabbage, radish and winter squash. Make a deal with yourself that fragile produce needs to be consumed, cooked or frozen ASAP because waste is costly and ups your carbon foot print.
A whole chicken for one means roast chicken one night, a sandwich, soup, and extra stock for freezing because stock uses up so many things and isn't picky about perfection. (Bones of small portions can also be collected in a freezer bag, then used to make stock when you have to get rid of old celery, carrots, and onions. Make Instant Pot pho with drumsticks, and the extra will make a crazy-tasty sandwich the next day.) A lasagna is fairly quick to make (just ask Paris Hilton!), and will be a much cheaper frozen dinner than one serving. Soup for 8 means soup plus 6-7 servings to freeze for times snowed in. A pound of ground meat means a cheeseburger, meatballs, mini-meatloaf...or a bunch of taco meat that can become sloppy joes on day 2, 3, or 4. Embrace a little repetition and make it a challenge to cook something so different that it doesn't even seem repetitive.
But if you live in a city like NYC, I think step one would be shopping at places where you're in control of the amount you buy, like butchers that will sell one pork chop and cheese mongers who will sell a few cheese slices or a tiny chunk.
Problem in NYC, from what I remember, is appliances often too small to accommodate such cooking and storage.
Funny you say mini meatloaf because that’s next week’s column. :)
Currently I'm in a groove doing variation by _week:_ I pick a general cuisine / spice profile for a week. That means I can prep or batch cook stuff once (e.g. Vietnamese. or Italian), then eat easily and relatively quickly the rest of the week.
First, often less urgent as some (e.g., pasta, beans) last for years.
If you store in paper or cardboard, write on package.
If you transfer to a canister or other container, write on part of the package wrapper you save in the container. (It's useful to save something with manufacturer's and product name, maybe the nutrition info.)
As for milk, even in a large household, I can never go through fresh milk before it goes bad. That’s why I keep evaporated in my pantry. It’s excellent in cooking. Seriously. Try it with pasta.
Thanks for sharing, Nancy.
There is usually 1/2 head sitting available at my favorite local small market, and often there are halves of other large veggies available. (squashes, etc.) I'm much more likely to buy 1/2 head cabbage because the remains won't be staring accusingly at me in my fridge.
Never hurts to ask! Worst that can happen is they say "nope."
Thanks for reading, Gammy.
I feel like for me the main thing is, here and in life, everything in moderation.
I'm sure there's plenty of naturally occurring MSG in there, but I consider that a good thing.
Also, if I have leftover vegetables, I’ll make a soup with whatever is available and then freeze it in portions for easy lunches.
Bananas freeze well for smoothies, you just have to peel them first. Same with pineapple and mango chunks.
Agreed, frozen berries are often better. But it's always good to check the prices. At my store (in the dead of winter...) fresh raspberries were $2.99 and frozen were $5-6. I do think cherries are where frozen fruit reach their zenith, though.
(...yes.)
BACON was going to waste so I tried this & use it all the time now.
Open new 1 lb pkg of Bacon.
Peel off each slice & roll them up & stand on parchment lined baking sheet. Place in freezer a few hours or overnight.
The next day put all Bacon Rosettes into zip bag or Foodsaver resealable bags & suck out ALL of the air.
Date & mark bag with contents. Put back into freezer
When you need a slice or 2 remove desired amount from bag, rinse with some cool water until pliable. Place on your skillet that's on a low setting. Cook to desired crispness & enjoy!
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