Bestway is a real local success story. It began in the 1970s in Washington DC to supply the
growing Hispanic community with fresh produce and dried goods to keep cooks in the kind of ingredients they needed to create the dishes of back home, to eat with hand-made tortillas.

These days, the company has become a large independent ethnic grocery chain with several stores in the capital, in Maryland and Virginia. And it doesn't just sell traditionally Hispanic groceries. Its range of standard general foods is broad. But I like it for the quality of some of its fresh fruits and vegetables. If I'm passing one of their stores, I'll probably stop in for really juicy limes and fresh herbs, for dried and fresh chilies, a wide range of Adobo mixes, often very good fish. I've not bought their meat, but it's cheap and the pork looks fine. Their prices all round are really competitive and it's fun to shop to marimba music.

I'm most often in these branches:

Bestway: 3178 Mount Pleasant Street NW, 202 265 3768, 8540 Piney Branch Rd, Silver Spring, 301 587 5262 and 3109 Graham Rd, Falls Church, 703 560 2101.