Imagine you’re hosting a dinner party and there’s a particular dish that everyone is particularly enjoying - so much so that they want to try making it themselves at home. They will, pretty much without exception, ask you for your recipe. There’s nothing wrong with this, of course, but in cooking, the recipe is only part of the equation, and arguably one of the least important parts.
The aspect of making good food that is most often overlooked by most people (even professionals) is ingredient quality. You can give them the recipe, but if they attempt to make the dish with poor quality ingredients their results will suffer tremendously. It would be like trying to recreate a garment using the same pattern, but instead of using heavyweight Italian wool, you use thin polyester; they just won't be even remotely the same end product. This can be lost on many people when it comes to cooking because it can be hard to tell the difference between a high quality product and a lesser facsimile just by looking. A great carrot may look basically identical to an insipid nutrient starved counterpart.
The problem becomes even more tricky when you start looking for things that aren't available locally, or are only available locally at unacceptably low quality. It's even more difficult to know the quality of an ingredient if you can’t inspect or taste it first hand. For this reason I’ve compiled a small list of some of my favorite online shops that sell only high quality items. These are places that I resort to frequently because the local sources are lacking acceptable quality.
Browne Trading Company
This is my go-to online shop for high quality seafood of all kinds. They are based in Maine and have a great variety of fresh, cured, smoked, or frozen seafood that is reliably excellent. Its not cheap, and shipping is often pricey as well because everything is overnighted to preserve quality. That said, as a treat for a special occasion, there is little more show-stopping than seafood that absolutely blows away any locally available competition. If you live on or near a coast then congratulations, you probably don’t need this. Must be nice. But for the rest of us poor souls Browne Trading Co. is easily worth the money every once in a while.
Yama Seafood/Local Coho
Another seafood retailer, though this one more sushi focused. I’m calling these folks out for a few reasons. The first is that their prices occasionally compare favorably against Browne Trading while offering comparable quality. Another is that they offer access to fish shipped directly from Japanese seafood markets where they essentially just send along a bit of whatever was the best that day, which I think is pretty cool. They also stock Coho salmon from an aquaculture setup based in central New York called Local Coho. This company is unique in that all their fish are processed using the Japanese ike jime technique which can provide a significant boost in fish quality. Definitely worth checking out.
Gustiamo
This shop stocks Italian products of all kinds, some of which can be extremely difficult to find outside of Italy. Here you’ll find the best quality dried pasta, rice, vinegars, olive oils, tinned fish, and other pantry items that may not even be on your radar like colatura, and estratto di pomodori. You may not think there’s much difference in quality between boxed pasta at your local grocery store and the fancy stuff sold by Gustiamo, or two different types of canned tomato, but if you give them a try you may be shocked by the gap in flavor and texture.
Grove and Vine
This website specializes in wine and olive oil, but I use them pretty much exclusively for olive oil. I don't think I'm exaggerating to say this might be the best source for olive oil in the world. They follow the olive harvest around the world and work directly with growers and oil producers to offer the freshest, most intense and delicious olive oils currently available on planet earth. Expect to pay more than you might be accustomed to for extra virgin oil, but honestly the difference in quality between the oil on this site, and the stuff that's been sitting on the grocery shelf for weeks is so stark you wont even consider them the same product after trying the good stuff.
Rancho Gordo
Legumes of all sorts are becoming a larger part of my diet in recent years, and nobody does them like Rancho Gordo. They have dozens of different varieties all expertly cultivated and harvested for optimum flavor and texture. Many of the beans on offer are also just beautiful, like a bag of little round gemstones. It's impossible to give an overview of all the diversity they offer, so I recommend just browsing the site and finding something that speaks to you. The nice thing about Rancho Gordo is, while you might still find them expensive compared to other dried beans, the prices are still pretty accessible for just about anyone. The founder, Steve Sando, also recently wrote a wonderful book on cooking with beans to inspire uses for their many offerings.
All of these sites are worth a perusal even just to see what they have on offer. If something strikes your fancy, I encourage you to take the leap and give it a shot. I can pretty much guarantee you won't be disappointed. Working with high quality ingredients may not be feasible all the time, but treating yourself to something exceptional, even if it's just a pot of beans, can ignite a passion for and enjoyment of cooking like little else.
I hope this post inspired you to level up your cooking by sourcing great ingredients, and if it did, then maybe you would be interested in levelling up your technique as well. If so, I recommend checking out our upcoming Culinary Boot Camp. Nothing will prepare you better to utilize all the premium product you have in the mail!
