I can’t say enough good things about Charlottesville-based Relay Foods. I think they have such a good thing going on that I’d go work for them if they’d have me, and I am encouraging everyone I know to try their service so they stay in business!

Basically I order my groceries online, pay with a credit card, and then once a week I drive to a parking lot a minute away from where I work to pick up my order, all packaged up in a nice big tub. Behind the scenes the little Relay elves travel around to all sorts of local Charlottesville business to fill my order, saving me from driving all over town, and many of their options are locally grown and organic. Plus, their web interface is great, their graphic design makes me smile…as do the nice people who load up my groceries. I haven’t found their prices to be prohibitively expensive, but I am happy to occasionally pay  a bit more to avoid the hassle and time of going to the stores myself. As someone who loves to cook but hates the grocery store, Relay Foods is my glimpse of heaven.

All this is backstory to the real story, which is the joy I felt on Thanksgiving when I opened up the carton of these eggs that were part of my Relay order. The eggs came from Hardy Farms in nearby Keswick, Virginia, and the sheer beauty of them was my nicest holiday surprise. And they were nice and fresh, with big orange yolks that sat high above the white. I’ve enjoyed them in pumpkin pies, cookies, and last weekend, in an out-of-this world spaghetti carbonara, which also included some pretty fantastic bacon from Charlottesville’s Organic Butcher. It was my first time making this dish, but it was so good that I am trying to justify cooking a meal whose main ingredients are pasta, egg yolks, heavy cream, cheese and bacon twice in one week! Thus far my best argument is that it’s ridiculously cold and windy outside now (in fact only a few degrees warmer than Anchorage, Alaska), and I need the fat to survive the winter!