Bristol Farms

IF GROCERY SHOPPING gets any easier, it might even become fun again. Bristol Farms, Pasadena's gourmet market, has opened a cook store and a cooking school next door--and they house everything a kitchen whiz needs. It makes for a natural progression from Bristol Farms, says executive chef Claudia McQuillan. Cooks "can shop for groceries and wine in the market; at the cooking school, they can learn how to prepare their purchases; then they can buy the proper equipment to cook them in."

Bristol Farms is the Nordstrom of delicatessens: a blue-chip market with wide aisles, well-made classics and such consistently kind service you'd think it was 1955. But we're clearly past the age of Eisenhower when the supermarket carries double-yolked eggs, fresh sushi and ghee . The culinary aesthetic of Bristol Farms is upscale and contemporary--a middle ground between blue-haired Old Pasadena and blue-haired Melrose Avenue.