'Eat fish and live longer' is a year-round mantra, not just for my birthday

A hearty frittata layers slices of fresh tomato, boiled organic sweet potato and Costco Wholesale's wild Alaskan smoked sockeye salmon in a seasoned egg-white mixture. I added roasted green salsa in the last few minutes of cooking under the broiler.

My pasta-and-eggs breakfast on Saturday included a thick wedge of wild-salmon frittata and leftover organic whole wheat pasta with anchovies, sardines and sliced garlic.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

Thanks to an abundance of wild-caught seafood -- fresh, smoked, salted and frozen -- I've been able to completely avoid eating meat and poultry for more than 6 years.

I rely mostly on fresh skinless-and-boneless fillets from Iceland sold at Costco Wholesale for $7.99 or $8.99 a pound, fresh whole fish at H Mart that sell for as little as $1.99 and $2.99 a pound, and wild-caught Gulf Shrimp from Whole Foods Market.

Don't overlook canned seafood, such as sardines and anchovies, those mighty little fish that can turn a simple bottled marinara into a heart-healthy dressing for organic whole-wheat pasta.

For dinner on Monday night, I enjoyed a handmade Maryland-style lump-meat crab cake from Phillips Seafood Restaurants, sold frozen at Costco Wholesale (six 3-ounce crab cakes were $16.99).

Costco also sells frozen fillets, including wild sockeye salmon from Alaska and mahi-mahi.

If you buy wild-caught seafood, you won't have to be concerned about the antibiotics, growth hormones and low-quality feed used to raise animals on the factory farms that supply the vast majority of the nation's supermarkets and restaurants.

The Jamaican national dish, Ackee & Saltfish, is made with salted cod, a fruit called ackee, and sweet and hot peppers, here served with a non-traditional side dish, sweet potatoes mashed with extra-virgin olive oil.

At Seafood Gourmet in Maywood on Saturday night, I splurged on a 2.5 pound lobster to celebrate my birthday ($48.40). I asked for it steamed, but the blackened shells at the claws suggest the crustacean was broiled, and it was overcooked.

Birthday dinner

If you love fresh, wild-caught seafood, no local restaurant can match Seafood Gourmet in Maywood, which is both a fresh-fish market with lots of prepared food to go and a restaurant.

But when the 38-seat dining room is nearly full, as it was Saturday night, there can be a long wait for your entree, and the kitchen may overcook your favorite seafood.

That's what happened with the 2.5-pound lobster I ordered steamed; the blackened shell looked like the crustacean was left under a broiler too long.

My wife complained the kitchen also overcooked the shrimp in the dinner special both she and my mother-in-law ordered:

Seafood Festival -- wild shrimp, lobster meat and crab meat tossed in a sherry wine cream sauce served over imported fettuccine noodles ($26 each with a cup of soup or salad).

A half-dozen oysters were the perfect appetizer ($14), above. Below, the salad that came with the lobster.

I also received this side dish of sauteed spinach.

My son ordered Seafood Gourmet's Catch of the Day, Red Snapper and Manila Clams over very thin spaghetti in an Amatriciana Sauce, a spicy dressing usually made with cured pork jowl or pancetta ($25).

We drank a bottle of Kirkland Signature Asolo Prosecco, a sparkling white wine from Italy ($6.99 at Costco Wholesale in Wayne).

Seafood Gourmet is at 103 W. Pleasant Ave., Maywood; 201-843-8558. BYO, closed Sundays, free street parking. Reservations recommended, especially for dinner. Website: Fish Market-Restaurant

Most of the fish you see in the market is served in the restaurant. 

On Friday morning, my wife took me to The Golden Grill, a family restaurant in Teaneck that serves breakfast and lunch 7 days. My favorite is a $7 Egg Special with broiled whiting fillet and home fries (hold the toast), above.

My wife's Spanish Omelette with toast and potatoes was $7.95.

Everything tastes better with this Mexican hot sauce.

The Golden Grill is at 1379 Queen Anne Road, Teaneck; 201-837-1078. Open 7 days, 6 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Free parking on street or in rear lot.

Most seating at The Golden Grill is in booths.

On the way home Friday morning, we stopped at Annapurna Indian Grocery, 561 Cedar Lane in Teaneck, for spice mixtures used to prepare fish, called Fish Masala ($2.49 each), above and below.

A few doors away we picked up a menu for an Indian restaurant that serves both vegetarian and non-vegetarian dishes, above.

Our Sunday dinner was pan-fried whole wild-caught Porgy from H Mart, 260 Bergen Turnpike in Little Ferry ($1.99 a pound). Four porgies (averaging more than 1 pound each) were $8.84.

I was tempted to ask the fish monger to fillet wild-caught Albacore Tuna ($2.99 a pound), but didn't think other members of the family would go for them. Large Bluefish also were $2.99 a pound.

This Costco is bigger and brighter -- but I still can't find anything

The new Costco Wholesale in Wayne sells alcohol, including Kirkland Signature wines, unlike the unaffiliated liquor store at the Hackensack warehouse, where I have shopped for years. These boxes hold three 750-milliliter bottles of Dom Perignon Champagne from France and a bonus ice bucket for a bracing $435.99, below.

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

The new Costco Wholesale in Wayne -- across the road from the old one -- has been open for nearly two months.

But when I shopped there the other day, I found members wandering around just like me, and asking each other for help to find wine, food and other items.

After I finished an errand in Clifton, less than 5 miles away, I used my car's navigation system, which took me past the old store in the Willowbrook Mall.

The new store, in the adjacent Wayne Towne Center mall, was built on the site of a Fortunoff that closed years ago and was demolished.

The exterior color scheme of the new store -- shades of brown and gray -- is a departure from the nearly all-white Costco in Hackensack.

The new Wayne store is supposed to have a gas station, but I didn't see it, just a large parking lot packed with cars and a relatively small entrance.

I imagine the new Wayne Costco is a preview of what loyal Hackensack customers can expect when a bigger Costco opens three miles away in Teterboro --now scheduled for November 2015 -- and the Hackensack warehouse closes.

The Teterboro store will have a gas station, but I haven't seen any word on whether it will carry Kirkland Signature wines.

These farmed Black Tiger Shrimp from Indonesia are eight to the pound, a size I haven't seen in my Hackensack Costco, where I have bought farmed shrimp for years. But now I only buy wild-caught Gulf Shrimp from Mexico or the United States.

Fresh-water lobster tails are previously frozen, as are cooked lobsters, king crab and other shellfish I saw at the Wayne Costco on Monday. I have tried previously frozen Dungeness Crabs from Costco and haven't liked them, but the king crab legs remain juicy after a little steaming.

The only reason for me to shop at the Wayne Costco is the large selection of wine, above and below, including inexpensive bottles of Kirkland Signature California Cabernet ($7.99 for 1.5 liters) and Prosecco from Italy ($6.99).

An unusual 3-liter bottle of Veuve Clicquot Brut, a dry champagne from France known for its yellow label, was $299.99, left.

Treasure hunt

What isn't new at the bigger and brighter Wayne Costco is the "treasure hunt" members must embark on in trying to find items they have purchased before.

It's well-known Costco employees move items around, and place new items on the ends of aisles to attract shoppers' attention.

I had a list with me on Monday, but in searching for what I needed, I came across several items that I bought impulsively:

• Kirkland Signature Coconut Juice in 11.1-ounce containers -- with nothing added -- for $9.89, a few dollars less that the Vita brand next to it on the shelf.

• A 30-ounce tin of Starbucks Hot Cocoa powder ($9.99), which makes 42 cups, if you follow the recommended two heaping tablespoons of powder per cup of milk (that seems excessive).

• Organic Dates from Made in Nature ($8.79), and canned wild Alaskan Pink Salmon (six 6-ounce cans for $12.99).

• Kirkland Signature Prosecco, a sparkling wine from Italy, for $6.99, displayed just inside the entrance, far from the main wine section.

Among items on my list, two 16-ounce jars of Grey Poupon Dijon Mustard were only $5.49 ($6.99 with a $1.50 instant coupon), and a 1-pound package of Earthbound Farm Organic Spring Mix was $4.89.

I also found 1.5-liter bottles of Kirkland Signature's wonderful California Cabernet for the equivalent of only $4 per bottle, but couldn't find the store brand of the French champagne I enjoyed last year.

This Ninja food blender and food processor at the new Wayne Costco is rated at 1.5 horsepower, compared to a 2-horsepower system I saw in a Target ad for the same $149.99. My wife couldn't find this item at the Hackensack Costco.

The food counter and number of tables in the new Wayne Costco are about the same as those in the old Wayne store and in the Hackensack Costco. One difference between Wayne and Hackensack is that the tire counter is inside the main store, but members with returns must enter through the exit, forcing them to swim against the tide of members leaving with their purchases.

Costco Wholesale, 149 Route 23, Wayne; 1-973-339-4006. Liquor department, gas station.

Sticker shock is everywhere on rare visit to Fairway Market in Paramus

I'm not ready to pay $31.99 at Fairway Market  in Paramus for a pound of lobster meat -- a price equivalent of four live lobsters. Are you?

By VICTOR E. SASSON
EDITOR

I became a big fan of Fairway Market's Harlem store, which was a convenient place to shop every time I returned to my New Jersey home from visiting Manhattan.

My favorites included Fairway's extra-virgin olive oil, pasta sauces, store-roasted coffee beans and loose mesclun salad mix, which I stuffed into a plastic bag.

When Fairway opened in the out-of-the-way Fashion Center in Paramus in May 2009 -- after years of delay -- I started going there for custom-ground coffee beans, pasta sauce and other items, but the store didn't carry the goat meat that was available in Harlem.

I was puzzled that Fairway picked what is arguably the least popular shopping center in Paramus; the owners must have gotten a great deal on the rent.

And my wife told me she preferred the taste of ShopRite's antibiotic-free Readington Farms chicken to the naturally raised Murray's birds at Fairway.

I started going there less and less, and not at all after I discovered the superior coffee beans available at Starbucks.

I realized I could get just about everything else I need at Costco Wholesale, H Mart, ShopRite and other stores, often at much better prices.

And I didn't have to deal with Fairway's superior New York attitude.

Rotisserie chickens at Fairway Market in Paramus, above, cost more than at Whole Foods Market, also in Paramus, below.

Two rotisserie chickens at Whole Foods work out to about $7.50 each. Organic birds are $12.99 each.

New to me at Fairway are hot and cold food bars, like those Whole Foods Market has had since it opened. The prepared food costs $7.99 a pound. At an olive bar, you'll pay $8.99 a pound. I'm happy with the mixed Italian olives with whole garlic cloves I buy for $3.99 a pound at Jerry's Gourmet & More in Englewood.

Fishmonger: Clean shrimp yourself

On Friday, after visiting a friend who lives in Paramus, I decided to go to Fairway in search of wild-caught shrimp.

Fairway has a great seafood department, and sure enough I saw jumbo Gulf shrimp for $17.99 a pound (16-20 per pound).

That was a little high, but thought if the store deveined them for me, a job I hate, I would get a couple of pounds. 

But when I asked, the fishmonger just shook his head back and forth in a definite "no."

I moved on to the meat department, and asked if the store now carried goat meat. I was in luck.

I was told I could find packages of cut-up goat meat on the refrigerated shelves with chicken and other poultry and meat.

The previously frozen goat meat was $5.49 a pound, and I bought three packages for a total of $25.58.

Whole-wheat pasta

After a picked up the goat meat, I went looking for the whole-wheat pasta I saw in another shopper's cart, stopping for free samples of bread with extra-virgin olive oil and an intense pesto.

The rich pesto came in a 16-ounce bottle, but was about twice the price per ounce of the 22-ounce jar of Kirkland Signature Basil Pesto from Costco.

Fairway carries several brands of whole-wheat pappardelle, penne, spaghetti and other shapes, including Garofalo from Italy.

But all of them were more expensive than the organic and conventional whole-wheat pasta I buy at Whole Foods, Trader Joe's, ShopRite and Jerry's Gourmet & More in Englewood.

Organic spring mix

Fairway also has a great produce department, but a 1-pound package of Earthbound Farm Organic Spring Mix was $6.99, compared to $4.99 or less at my Hackensack Costco.

I saw a sign for bunches of peppery arugula for $1.49 each, but when I grabbed one, it was small, about 3 ounces; that works out to a pricey $6 a pound. I passed.

Fairway also refuses to reimburse shoppers for bringing reusable bags, unlike Whole Foods and ShopRite.

Thanks, Fairway, but no thanks. You should have stayed in New York.