Big Joe’s

Big Joe’s has been around since 1945 and has long been an institution for customer regulars within the community. They specialize in produce, having some of the biggest, best tomatoes you can ever find, but more than that, a wonderful cheese… my favorite of all cheeses… being a sharp New York. They also have custom «in house» pickled cucumbers and other pickled items jarred along with various garlic and other seasonings in a blend nowhere else to be found.
They also carry various canned specialty jellies and other items along with hanging and other flower plants.
Though Big Joe is now in his 90’s and rarely if ever present, his sons carry on his tradition of pleasant friendly helpful service and prepare many of the items exactly the same way he did.
If I could give you just one tip, it would be to try the cheese. It’s one of the best I’ve ever had.

Stopped in around mid August. Definitely more produce available. I decided to indulge my hot food fetish and I bought a large Ball jar of hot pickled cauliflower. It made it back just fine without refrigeration (at least I haven’t fallen over yet). It is stinking hot! Holy cow! In addition to the cauliflower it has peppers, garlic, dill, cardamon, mustard seeds, tiny bits of bay leaves, and all spice. There might be other stuff in there, but I can’t identify it. I will absolutely stock up on my next trip.
Update — the stuff is sooo stinkin’ hot that I can’t eat it without feeling like I ate razor blades. .. and I’m the person who orders Thai green curry as an 11 on a scale of 1 – 10. I’m going to have to get the milder version the next time. I don’t know if I just picked the crazy hot jar with some absurdly hot pepper in there, or if it’s all like this. I just know that I can’t do that to myself again. ;)