Things I Should Never Do: Shopping at Whole Foods while Hungry

And yet, that's exactly what I did this morning. Over $100 later, I managed to buy exactly one thing I really needed.

I rarely go to Whole Foods for exactly this reason. On my way in, my list consisted of one word: "dinner." Really, what that meant was "protein." I've got more than enough vegetables and carbs. Simple enough. But this is what I left with:

- Way too many carbs: organic corn chips, pita chips, a baguette and 2 bags of Snyders filled pretzel rounds (to be fair, we did run out of the peanut butter ones yesterday, and Dixon does love them. Also, the second bag is jalapeno-pumpernickel and they don't have those at Giant. But they're good.)

- 1 spicy tuna roll (already eaten)

- 1 bottle of Terra red wine vinegar (OK, I was out of this, too, and have had trouble finding the - kind I like - O Pinot Noir vinegar)

- Way too many snacks: chili pepper hummus, lemon pound cake (on sale!), gazpacho (seriously, Kit, gazpacho???), 1 jar of Rick's Picks pickled ochra that I just realized cost almost $10! I thought they were like $3.99! Fortunately, I have already had one and they're pretty awesome. But $10?!?

- 1 $2.31 red pepper (it is shiny and flawless)

- ginger miso salad dressing

- 1 pound of Wild Alaskan sockeye salmon (the protein for dinner. The ONE THING I needed.)

Outrageous how little self-control I have.

Two interesting observations, though. First, Whole Foods now carries a lot more mainstream brands than I'd ever noticed before. Like the Snyder's pretzels, and French's mustard.

Also, there was a big sign at the entrance touting $15 family-of-four meals. No mention of Top Chef (at least not that I saw), but clearly a shoutout.

I probably should've looked a little closer at that sign. Maybe then I would've gotten myself out of there for under $50.