Grocery

The Buying and Selling of Food in America

By: Michael Ruhlman

Narrated by: Jonathan Todd Ross

In Grocery, bestselling author Michael Ruhlman offers incisive commentary on America’s relationship with its food and investigates the overlooked source of so much of it—the grocery store.

In a culture obsessed with food—how it looks, what it tastes like, where it comes from, what is good for us—there are often more questions than answers. Ruhlman proposes that the best practices for consuming wisely could be hiding in plain sight—in the aisles of your local supermarket. Using the human story of the family-run Midwestern chain Heinen’s as an anchor to this journalistic narrative, he dives into the mysterious world of supermarkets and the ways in which we produce, consume, and distribute food. Grocery examines how rapidly supermarkets—and our food and culture—have changed since the days of your friendly neighborhood grocer. But rather than waxing nostalgic for the age of mom-and-pop shops, Ruhlman seeks to understand how our food needs have shifted since the mid-twentieth century, and how these needs mirror our cultural ones.

A mix of reportage and rant, personal history and social commentary, Grocery is a landmark book from one of our most insightful food writers.

Salivating

What a terrific exploration of a vast industry we just take for granted and one that is at the nexus of our health. Wet well read as well.

Surprisingly Gripping

Who knew a story about grocery stores could so captivate. Days later I can't stop thinking about it.

Heinen's Story

I think the title I gave this review better suits the book than "Grocery".
This is not a book about "The Buying and Selling of Food in America". It is a book about "The Buying and Selling of Food at Heinen's". Which is great and interesting, but it is one small size chain, with very specific characteristics, and it does not cover or even make any attempt to cover "The Buying and Selling of Food in America".
In this sense, it is more like "Becoming Trader Joe" than like "The Secret Life of Groceries", which took a real effort to cover groceries retail business from multiple directions.
Now, that you know what to expect, it is a party good book, except for the parts where the author repeatedly and in length spoke about himself and about his family, which I sometimes tried to skip forward.

Fantastic!!

An absolute pleasure to listen to a book so informative, so well-researched and so wonderfully narrated! I learned so much about a world I only knew in passing, and it was so engagingly presented, I am going on to other books by this author as well as others read by the same narrator. Just loved this book! Makes me want to fly to Cleveland!

Surprised by diet advice

I loved this book in the first section; Heinen’s is a local grocery store and I loved learning about the history of grocery stores and Heinen’s. What made me return this title was about a third of the way through the author pivots to discussing new products like fat-free half and half, which from a marketing perspective was interesting, but he continues go down that path into diet and nutrition advice. The middle third of the book is his diagnosis on what’s “wrong” with how Americans eat.