Desert-Island Grocery List

You know the famous question: What (insert number, up to 10) things would you take to a desert island? I’ve adapted it for the pandemic at home.

Pls. note: I originally published this in early January 2021, when the Covid vaccine was still mostly a glimmer in our nation’s eye. Now, on March 8, my husband has had both doses and our adult daughter, my sister and I have all had our first doses.

I’m crazy about the decaf beans (and pink floral logo) from Sweet Laurel in California. If I could bring a battery-powered coffee bean grinder, a French press and organic half and half in a retro glass milk bottle to a desert island, I would.

The list of things we could not live without on a remote island has included multitasking peach lip balm (I really want it, thanks to this Australian article) to a tarp and fire-starting kit, according to Prepping Planet.

But I’ve been thinking about grocery essentials during this pandemic, when so many of us have been locked down, venturing out in masks when necessary. And about which items were kitchen musts for my parents (he, Italian-American; she, Irish-American), raising four kids from the 1950s through the 1970s. Their Top 10 list, as I see it:

1. Coffee.
2. Bread.
3. Eggs.
4. Ground beef.
5. Powdered milk.
6. Iceberg lettuce.
7. Spaghetti.
8. Good olive oil.
9. American cheese.
10. Butter.