Aisle 8, Baking

"The next night, I'm smack-dab in the middle of grocery. Aisle 8, Baking Supplies, a.k.a. Ground Zero for the Holidays. Here sits nearly every baking ingredient known to America.

"My aisle's off-white tile stretches from the hip-deep freezers of meats to one of the store's Action Alleys - a kind of shopping-cart thoroughfare, clogged with a holiday baking center display.

"On the right are salts and spices; sugars white, brown, artificial, and unrefined; Jell-O products ranging from gelatin and pudding mixes to No-Bake Cheesecake kits and pudding cups; marshmallows of different flavors, colors, shapes, sizes, and, with the inclusion of Fluff, consistency; nuts in varying degrees of dismemberment; graham cracker crusts, chocolate cookies, and shortbread; canned pie fillings of fruit and pumpkin; chocolate chips, peanut butter chips, and baby M&Ms; dry milk powder; flaked coconut; cocoa; and canned milk that's been evaporated or sweetened and condensed.

"The left-hand shelves start out savory, with cornmeal, flour, gravy thickener, bread crumbs, and multiple variations on Shake'n Bake; veer into sweet with cornmeal muffin mix, nearly limitless cake mixes, cookie and bar mixes, flavor extracts, leavening agents and cornstarch; and terminate in fats with lard, shortening, and oils."

Tracie McMillan in "The American Way of Eating: Undercover at Walmart, Applebee's, Farm Fields and the Dinner Table"