Mexico comes to Virginia

We recently heard about an International Food Market that has opened in Norfolk. We were told that it has "everything", so we took a drive to check it out. It is an Asian-owned market, or at least it appears to be, but we were amazed at the variety of items from Mexico or Latin American countries.  For an hour or so, it seemed as if we were in our local market in the Centro. The only thing I could not find was our favorite brand of boxed milk, LaLa.
                 
                                                             (all photos from my iPhone)

There were 2 very long aisles with Latino products, mostly from Mexico
-everything you could imagine- canned goods, spices, condiments, sweets,
ground yellow corn meal of different textures, tortillas of all sizes, frozen or not,
all sorts of fruit drinks,  and yes, the REAL Coca-Cola in glass bottles made with sugar and not
high-fructose corn syrup.

The produce was as good or better than some of
our more upscale grocers and less
expensive.

 mayonesa with lime, anyone?

artichokes, tomatillas,  large green prickly things, cactus, and tons of
jalopeñas and habaneros, and limes 6 for a $.

 El Yucateco chipotle hot sauce, made in
Mérida, Yucatán
(one of a dozen or so brands)

large, beautiful, yellow, orange, red and
green peppers from Mexico- and packages of
dried leaves of all sorts, including
aguacate leaves?

Buying unrefrigerated eggs

We bought our very first eggs from the small supermarket on calle 60.  We've read quite a few comments on various blogs about the fact that, in the Yucatán, eggs are not refrigerated prior to selling. We eyed the shelf displaying eggs in the typical container, without a top, sealed with a clear wrap. I noticed a few people picking up the carton of a dozen eggs and reading a label attached to the package. I assumed they were checking the expiration date. On further inspection I realized that the date (fecho) on the carton was the date the eggs were packaged and presumably hopefully laid. I say this because the dates on various cartons were anywhere from one to three days prior to the current date. I picked a carton with the previous day's date (the freshest), we finished shopping and headed home.

How could millions of people in Mexico eat these unrefrigerated eggs day after day without some horrendous gastrointestinal disturbance? From what I've read about this issue, once you refrigerate them, keep them that way. If out at room temperature for more than a couple of hours, the eggs will sweat and this allows bacteria to enter the egg through the shell.  Look for a date no more than three days from the current date and you should be fine.

By the way, the eggs had a deep golden yolk, tasted fresh, and were delicious.