The Independent Edition

Market Fresh Supermarket Owner:  Kenny Othman Opened:  2018 Cooperative:  Krasdale Location:  570 Tompkins Ave, Rosebank, Staten Island, NY Photographed:  March 2020 This former Walgreens was converted to the independent Market Fresh Supermarket, owned by the same family that owns the Key Food on Flatbush Ave . Market Fresh also had a location in Wood-Ridge, NJ, which has since gone out of business (but will be coming to the blog here soon). There's another Market Fresh out there somewhere, but I've yet to figure out where that location is. As I mentioned, this store was a Walgreens. And the restroom in the basement still has a Walgreens garbage can! The 8,000 square foot store begins with produce lining both sides of the first aisle. Deli is at the back, with meats on the back wall. Dairy, oddly, is in the middle of the store in aisle 3, with frozen foods in the last aisle. The store, although it's not large, is very nice. It fea...

Top Tomato Superstore Owner:  Carmine Sciandra Opened:  2007 Cooperative:  none Location:  1071 Bay Street, Rosebank, Staten Island, NY Photographed:  March 2020 Here on The Independent Edition, I like to give some background on the stores we visit and their owners. This time I'm going to let the Staten Island Advance speak for me . Owner Carmine Sciandra even has his own Wikipedia page . But, uh, let's focus on the supermarket here. The 12,000 square foot supermarket is basically divided into two halves. When you enter and turn right, you enter the grocery department with dairy on the right-side wall and frozen food and meat at the back of the store. Deli/bakery, produce, and seafood make up the left half. General grocery is not this store's focus, clearly, since perishables take up more than half of the sales floor space. Like North Shore Farms , this store sells some Price Rite-branded items from Wakefern. Frozen foods are i...

Our next stop after leaving Brooklyn is Staten Island! Now we have been to Staten Island before, seeing a  Key Food Marketplace , a  Superfresh  that has since closed, and a  Met Foodmarket . But, we all know... (oh come on I have to put my song gimmick on here too???) Ahem. (Okay, so the universe found my gimmick, which was a link to the YouTube video of the song "We Can Do Better" by Matt Simons, which you can find here . Or you can see how the whole cringeworthy joke was executed over on The Market Report .) Anyway, we're going to tour EIGHT new supermarkets, see a NEW Superfresh, and RETURN to that Met Foodmarket for a full interior tour! Uh... maybe no one else is as excited about that as I am. But anyway, stay tuned for two weeks of Staten Island.