The Fresh Market, the area’s latest upscale food shopping venue, is scheduled to open tomorrow in Congressional Plaza on Rockville Pike. The 26,200-square-foot space, which formerly housed a claustrophobic Whole Foods Market, looks more open and airy, with a green-and-white striped awning over the deli and cheese section, wooden trellises at the check-out, and room “vignettes” (a den, library, old-fashioned kitchen and more) that sit on a high ledge that runs around the circumference of the store.
The Fresh Market, founded in Greensboro, North Carolina in 1982 by Ray and Beverly Berry, has grown to 112 stores in 21 states. The Rockville store is the fourth in Maryland; there are also Fresh Markets in Towson, Annapolis and Baltimore.
Staff were still filling the produce bins and finishing up the baked goods when I stopped by, and the offerings seemed like a cross between a Whole Foods Market, Balducci’s and a regular market. In other words, the new store carries a full line of Annie’s organic cookies, but you can still buy Pepperidge Farm Milanos; there’s Kashi cereal as well as Cinnamon Toast Crunch.
Other features include a large produce section with more than 400 items, many of them organic; a bakery with 30 freshly baked breads and 14 different pie selections, fresh seafood, ready-to-serve entrees and more than 200 imported and domestic cheeses.
The bakery department looked particularly appealing, with two kinds of Whoopie pies (chocolate and red velvet), lots of quick breads (French vanilla, cranberry orange walnut, pumpkin, banana, to name a few) and tons of muffins, cakes and cookies.
Ready-to-eat foods included chicken pot pies and smoked eggplant enchiladas; a full line of fresh sausages were in the works for the meat department (Granny Smith Apple chicken sausage, bratwurst, mettwurst), a hot food bar will include Indian, Chinese and Southern specialties, and for jelly bean and licorice-lovers, there’s an expansive vintage candy section.
The Fresh Market, 1649 Rockville Pike (in Congressional Plaza), Rockville. www.thefreshmarket.com
