Much well-deserved hype accompanied the opening of a certain long-awaited grocery store in downtown Kansas City, Missouri. With all due respect, though, the Charles Ball Sun Fresh — which opened on the 18th Street Expressway just north of Interstate 70 — gets our nod for the year's Best New Grocery Store. We just think this corner of Kansas City, Kansas, which had been home to an increasingly creepy truck stop, needed it more. Because folks here hadn't had a new grocery store in 30 years, they might have settled for anything, but the 43,500-square-foot Ball's Sun Fresh feels like a palatial oasis: It's sparkly clean; up-to-date in its earth-tone décor; bright with vivid produce; mindful of neighborhood tastes, with a rich selection of chiles, beans, sugar-dusted pastries and a tortillería; healthy, with a juice bar; and conveniently stocked with hot prepared dinners. Employees are friendly, and the fountain out front doesn't hurt, either. Yes, this was a TIF project, one that truly replaced blight with something that people desperately needed and one we can wholeheartedly support. Mostly, though, we support all of those strategically placed freezers full of ice-cream bars.
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