(Not that I’m actually reviewing grocery stores, mind you, but you never know what I’ll get up to!)

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Once a month, when I have to go to one of my many clinic appointments, I visit a Meidi-Ya import grocery nearby. These days, chronic pain and a fairly debilitating panic disorder usually mean groceries delivered to my doorstep, but since I already have to haul my majestic ass halfway across town, I figure that I may as well enjoy stopping in and dreaming of having enough room—and enough money!—for everything from row upon row of beautiful, matching jars, filled with every sort and variety of herbs and spices, to imported cheese from around the world, and one of Tokyo’s hardest-to-find treasures: frozen ravioli!

For those who aren’t familiar with it, in a lot of ways Meidi-Ya is your garden variety, overpriced import shop in Japan. I’m sure the wine section alone pays the store’s rent many times over, picking the pockets of Japan’s more upscale immigrant population, desperately searching for a taste of home at three times the price. In my case, in addition to the occasional sweets and treats from my erstwhile homeland, I like that they have a larger baking section than the average store…even if the products I so desire do still come in the ridiculously tiny bags so common in Tokyo supermarkets.

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They also have the most gorgeous and vivid displays of fruit and vegetables, where I usually spend most of my visit, shifting my weight from leg to leg…just pondering. As a lifelong lover of vegetables, I find it a challenge not to spend my whole budget on a bunch or two of beautiful, multicolored carrots or teeny tiny jewel-like tomatoes, positioned just so. The way the light glints off of them, it’s as if they’re calling out to me to take them home, even if I know they’d all be gone in only a few bites.

(Fear not! I haven’t succumbed yet!)

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Today’s point of interest was yuzu which were literally larger than my (admittedly small~ish) head. While I am a fan of Japan’s patron citrus fruit, I don’t like it quite that much, so I was only slightly tempted to buy only that, and leave the store toting my specially boxed prize. I was, however, greatly tempted to give in to my weirdo foreigner urges and risk arrest by dancing around with one of ’em on my head, like a lone-fruited Carmen Miranda.

Thank the gawds for bad knees!

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What’s your favorite grocery store in Tokyo, import or otherwise? And what can you never resist buying? Let me know in the comments!