While Chris does admit that he can be controlling when it comes to deciding on trips, even where we are going on our Saturdays exploring New York City, he is also quick to point out that he rarely decides what we are eating since I do 99 percent of the cooking, and thus I usually decide what we eat and let him know after I’ve started prepping. I mean, to be fair, if he says he feels like a certain type of food, I am happy to accommodate it, but he rarely does.

But the really funny thing that always happens whenever we go grocery shopping together is comparing what I put into our cart vs. what he puts into our cart. For the most part whenever I go grocery shopping, regardless of what store/market I am in, the bulk of my purchase is always fresh, perishable foods, which translates as primarily fruit and vegetables (if we’re at Costco, I’ll purchase meat to stock our freezer quarterly. Costco is the primary place I buy meat at, and occasionally at Whole Foods. I buy almost all my seafood at Whole Foods). Occasionally, I’ll pick up a whole grain or whole wheat bread, some tortillas, and of course oat and/or cow milk and juice when we are running low, but fruit and vegetables are my primary purchase. So when we are loading items into the cart, I’m mostly adding fruit and vegetables, or some pantry staple like dried beans or rice. But when Chris thinks about grocery shopping… he’s mainly thinking about a few categories:

1. Juice (no orange, ever)
2. Milk (cow or oat; he gets upset if he sees that I’ve purchased almond and/or soy)
3. Chocolate (he prefers Aussie or British chocolate, but occasionally likes to try chocolates imported from Belgium or some other chocolate renowned country)
4. Mixture or banana chips (if shopping at a South Asian grocery store, or some kind of ‘to tide you over’ snack pre-dinner time)

This is why I jokingly have told him many times that not only he is my baby, he’s a baby when it comes to grocery shopping: he likes to pick out the “non-essential” items that are more like snacks and treats rather than the “real food” for our diet. 😀 He’s like the kid who accompanies his mom during grocery runs, adding in the “extras” like random snacks and sweets covertly while mom is busy checking items like vegetables or fruit or grains on her shopping list.