Fat Times for Fancy Foods

Gourmets galore are eager to tickle their taste buds

It must take more than a recession to dampen demand for English rhubarb and fig preserves or reindeer meatballs from Norway. Though inflation has forced supermarket shoppers to cut corners and frantically clip coupons, gourmet food shops that cater to the sophisticated palate have never been busier.

Boston's venerable Malben's, which stocks more than 5,000 items, including 70 or so different cheeses and eight brands of fresh coffee beans, reports annual sales gains of 15% to 20% with no signs of a slowdown. In New York City, the Todaro Bros, specialty shop for imported pasta, meat and cheese has just doubled in size. Lenox Square, one of Atlanta's tonier shopping centers, has just added a whole corridor of gourmet stores like The Best of Europe, which is run by a Czechoslovakian couple and features ten kinds of sausages, as well as ten salamis, and homemade sauerkraut. Even Sears has concluded that the heartland is ready for its version of haute cuisine. The company's Christmas catalogue this year has 14 pages of ads for such delicacies as Yugoslavian ham and Manzanilla olives tucked in alongside the ads for pantsuits and power tools.

The gourmet business is obviously prospering on the small clientele that is willing to pay $30 per lb. for Scotch salmon or $345 for a 14-oz. tin of fresh Russian Beluga caviar. But the shops are also attracting large numbers of middle class customers who believe food is more than just fuel.

Gourmets of moderate means often scrimp on basic foods like breakfast cereals so that they can splurge on exotica. Jamail's, the premier gourmet store in Houston, offers this kind of shopper a spectrum of choices from Van Camp's pork and beans to shark meat pate. Moreover, epicurean dining need not be exorbitant. Fine Italian pasta at $2.10 per lb. makes a cheaper meal than American beef tenderloin at about $4 per lb. Says Frank Cloudt, who owns a gourmet grocery in Atlanta: "People would rather have an exquisite beef stew than a mediocre steak."

Gourmet shops have also benefited from the trend toward two-income families. When the husband and wife come home too tired to cook and yet unwilling to pay inflated restaurant prices, they often pick up dinner at gourmet shop takeout counters. At Pasta, Pasta, Pasta in Los Angeles, a family of four can walk out with a freshly made lasagna dinner for $8.95. A comparable meal in a restaurant could cost $50. Le Marmiton in Santa Monica sells provisions for the perfect picnic. Its Basket for Two Lovers, for example, includes cold sirloin in aspic and a salad of mushrooms in olive oil, garlic and lemon juice.

Much of the appeal of gourmet foods lies in the gracious ambience of the shops. The typical store is still small, family operated and full of friendly aromas and advice. For this reason, shop owners do not fear competition from Sears and supermarkets that are also starting to stock epicurean items. Says Dutch-born Dirk Ten-Bosch, who owns Maison Gourmet in Atlanta: "People come here because they like to be featherbedded. I mean pampered."

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